How it works#
WordPress publishes an RSS feed of your latest posts at your site's address followed by /feed/, and it's on by default. Heropost reads that feed. There's no WordPress plugin to install and nothing to log in to, and it works the same for WordPress.com blogs and self-hosted sites.
Each new article becomes an item you can post, or that Heropost posts for you.
Selling with WooCommerce? Products have their own feed: use the WooCommerce automation.
Set it up#
- Click Automations in the left menu, then Create Automation.
- On the WordPress card, press Add Automation.
- In WordPress Site URL, paste your site's home page address, such as
https://your-blog.wordpress.comorhttps://yourbusiness.com. - Press Save. Heropost shows "WordPress automation created! Your items are being imported and will appear shortly."
- Press Settings on the new automation, select your accounts, choose Read from Source or Publish Immediately, and press Save.
Post only one category#
WordPress has a feed for each category. Paste the category's feed address, such as https://yourbusiness.com/category/news/feed/. When the address already contains /feed, Heropost uses it as it is.
What each item contains#
| Part | From your site |
|---|---|
| Title | The article's title. |
| Description | The article's excerpt as plain text, or its text when there's no excerpt. |
| Link | The article's address. |
| Picture | The first picture in the feed entry or the article. If there's none, the article's preview picture, usually the featured image. |
Settings that work well#
- Preferred Post Type: Link, Backup Post Type: Image. Carousel/Image isn't offered for WordPress.
- Caption: Custom with
{{title}} {{link}}keeps posts short enough for every network. - Check for New Posts: Every Hour if you publish several articles a day, so they go out one by one.
All settings: Automations: how they work.
If it doesn't work#
First, open your site's address followed by /feed/ in a private browser window, for example https://yourbusiness.com/feed/. You should see a feed (code or a list of articles), not an error or a login page.
| What you see | What it means | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| "Invalid URL" | The address isn't complete. | Paste the full address, starting with https://. |
| "An unexpected error occurred while processing your request." when you save | Heropost couldn't read your feed. It's switched off, it's behind a login or a maintenance page, or a security plugin or firewall blocks it. | Make the feed load in a private window, then add the automation again. Use your site's home page address, not the admin area. |
| "The supplied URL host could not be resolved: {host}." | The domain doesn't exist. | Check the spelling. |
| Errors keeps growing | The feed stopped loading. | Check /feed/ again. A new security setting or a site move is the usual cause. |
| Articles have no picture | The articles have no featured image, and the feed has no picture. | Set a featured image on each article. |
Questions#
Do I need a plugin or my WordPress password?
No. Heropost reads your site's public feed. Nothing is installed on your site.
Will my older articles be posted?
Not automatically. They're imported into the feed, and you can post any of them with Create Post. Auto-posting only covers articles Heropost finds after you switch it on.
I updated an article. Is it posted again?
No. Heropost recognizes items it already imported, so an edited article isn't imported a second time.