A Google search does not turn up much on the issue, although there are many interesting articles about adding a firewall to your WP app (such as this article).

The most promising aspect of code relates to define proxy settings:

define('WP_PROXY_HOST', '192.168.84.101');
define('WP_PROXY_PORT', '8080');
define('WP_PROXY_USERNAME', 'my_user_name');
define('WP_PROXY_PASSWORD', 'my_password');
define('WP_PROXY_BYPASS_HOSTS', 'localhost, www.example.com');

So, you’ve realized that your website’s traffic isn’t what it could (or should) be, and you ask yourself, why? Why doesn’t my company’s website show up in the list of Google results?  What can I do to improve its ranking in search results?

At this point you probably think you have to go out and hire an internet marketing firm to promote your site.  What will that set me back? Five hundred dollars? Three thousand dollars?  Before you even start along that route, you can implement the following five FREE strategies to increase the ranking of your site:

1. Have concise yet descriptive title tags for each of your pages.  This is the most important step!  Perhaps all of your pages’ titles simply consist of the same “Hamptons Scrapbooking.”  Well, that is not enough.  Retitle each page to be explicit as to its content, and even try to include brand names of the items you carry. For example, a page listing your shop’s papers could be titled “Hamptons Scrapbooking – Shop Cardstock Papers by SEI, Bazzill and Coredinations”
2. Add quality and unique META tags to each page. After the title tag, search engines will sift through your site’s keywords and description META tags.  These are not actually displayed to the customer on their browser, but Google, Bing and other search engines will often show the description META tag text in the preview of your site.  Creating different keywords and description META tags for each page lets the search engines know that each page is unique.  One word of caution:  do not put in too many keywords. This is known as “keyword stuffing” and will negatively affect your site’s rank.
3. Register your site with the top search engines. Usually you register your site by downloading a unique identifier file from the search engine and uploading it to the root directory of your webserver.  You will find directions on how to register your site by searching for “webmaster tools” on the top search engines’ own sites.
4. Submit a sitemap to the top search engines. Once you’ve registered your site, you can submit a sitemap telling the search engine how your site is structured and how often its content is updated.  This is especially useful if your site’s pages are dynamically generated.  Simply list in the sitemap the top-level organization of your dynamic pages, such as “products.aspx?category=Cardstock”
5. Add description tags to each of your images. This often gets overlooked. If you add a quality description tag to each of your shop’s images, search engines will see those words as more prevalent and thus more relevant as to the content of your site.  This is also a way to supplement your page’s keywords META tag.

Even if you haven’t yet deployed your website, you should keep these strategies in mind while developing your site.  Creating well-crafted information about what your company offers will drive traffic to your site.

If you are launching your business in the new frontier known as the social network–Twitter, Facebook and the like–you are most likely rather confused about how to go about it. There are a few books out there that can help you along on the journey.

• Content Rules: How to Create Killer Blogs, Podcasts, Videos, Ebooks, Webinars (and More) That Engage Customers and Ignite Your Business (New Rules Social Media Series) by Ann Handley and C.C. Chapman (ISBN-13: 978-0470648285)
• Guerrilla Social Media Marketing: 100+ Weapons to Grow Your Online Influence, Attract Customers, and Drive Profits by John Conrad Levinson and Shane Gibson (ISBN-13: 978-1599183831)

1. Instead of text on a page full of forms, use label tags, and set the “AssociatedControlID” for each one.
2. If you use Visual Studio, do not ignore the warnings. Your site will compile, but address these warning items before they become too numerous to contemplate.
3. Make sure your pages have titles. This is a good practice for SEO purposes as well.