How to Set Up Auto-Publishing from Indexa to WordPress

Manual publishing is the bottleneck that kills content velocity. You generate an article, copy the content, paste it into WordPress, add categories, upload a featured image, fill in the Yoast fields, set the slug, schedule the publish date — and repeat for every article, every day.

Indexa eliminates this entirely. Once your WordPress integration is live, articles go from generation to published with correct metadata, images, and SEO settings, with zero manual intervention.

Prerequisites

Before setting up the integration, confirm you have: - A WordPress site with admin access (or editor access with REST API permissions) - WordPress version 5.0 or higher (REST API included by default) - An Indexa account on the Starter plan or above

Step 1: Enable the WordPress REST API

The WordPress REST API is enabled by default in WordPress 5.0+. Confirm it's active by visiting `https://yoursite.com/wp-json/wp/v2/posts` — if you see a JSON response (even an empty array), the API is live.

If you get a 404, check: - Your permalink settings (Settings → Permalinks — save with "Post name" selected) - Whether a security plugin is blocking REST API access (iThemes Security, Wordfence, etc. sometimes block unauthenticated REST calls)

Step 2: Create a WordPress Application Password

Application Passwords are WordPress's secure method for third-party integrations. They're scoped, revocable, and separate from your main account password.

1. Go to Users → Profile in your WordPress admin 2. Scroll to the Application Passwords section 3. Enter a name (e.g., "Indexa Publishing") 4. Click Add New Application Password 5. Copy the password immediately — it's only shown once

Security note: The application password grants the permissions of the account it belongs to. Create a dedicated WordPress editor account for Indexa rather than using your admin account. This limits the blast radius if credentials are ever compromised.

Step 3: Connect WordPress in Indexa

1. In Indexa, go to Settings → Integrations → WordPress 2. Enter your WordPress site URL (with https://, without trailing slash) 3. Enter the WordPress username (the account that generated the application password) 4. Enter the application password 5. Click Test Connection

A successful test will display your site name and confirm the API is reachable. If the test fails, verify: - The URL format (no trailing slash, correct subdomain if applicable) - The application password was copied correctly (spaces are included in the password) - REST API is accessible from external servers (some hosts block outbound REST API calls)

Step 4: Configure default publish settings

Once connected, configure how Indexa publishes to your WordPress site:

Default post status: Choose "Draft" to review articles before they go live, or "Published" for fully automated publishing.

Default category: Map Indexa article categories to WordPress categories. Indexa will automatically assign the correct category based on the article's topic.

Featured image: Indexa generates and uploads featured images automatically. Configure the image dimensions and style to match your theme.

Author: Select the WordPress author account to assign to published articles. We recommend creating a dedicated "Indexa" author account.

SEO plugin integration: If you use Yoast SEO or Rank Math, Indexa populates their meta fields automatically — focus keyword, meta title, meta description, robots settings.

Step 5: Set up category and tag mapping

Indexa uses topic categories internally (SEO, GEO, Technical, etc.). Map these to your WordPress taxonomy:

In Settings → Integrations → WordPress → Category Mapping, create the mapping: - Indexa "GEO & AEO" → WordPress "AI Search" - Indexa "Technical SEO" → WordPress "Technical" - Indexa "Content Strategy" → WordPress "Strategy"

Articles will be auto-tagged based on their detected topics using your keyword taxonomy.

Step 6: Test with a single article

Before enabling bulk publishing:

1. Generate a single test article in Indexa 2. Click Publish → WordPress 3. Verify in WordPress: the article appeared in the correct status (draft or published), category is correct, SEO fields are populated, featured image is present 4. Check the slug matches your intended URL structure

If the slug doesn't match, adjust the URL pattern in the WordPress integration settings.

Enabling automated bulk publishing

Once the single-article test passes, you can enable scheduled bulk publishing:

In Campaigns → Auto-Publish, configure: - Maximum articles per day (recommended: 2-5 for new sites, up to 20 for established domains) - Publishing window (time of day to publish) - Review queue: whether articles queue for manual approval before publishing or publish automatically

For sites under 12 months old, we recommend keeping articles in draft for the first 30 days until you verify the quality matches your brand standards.

Troubleshooting common issues

"Connection refused" error: Your host may be blocking the Indexa IP range. Whitelist `52.x.x.x` ranges or contact your host to whitelist external REST API connections.

Articles publishing without featured images: The media upload requires the WordPress account to have "Upload files" capability. Confirm the account role includes this permission (Editor role includes it by default; Contributor does not).

Wrong author assigned: Check the author mapping in integration settings. If multiple WordPress author accounts exist, verify the mapping is pointing to the correct one.

Yoast fields not populating: Confirm the Yoast REST API extension is enabled. In Yoast SEO → Integrations, confirm "REST API" is toggled on.

*Indexa supports WordPress, Webflow, Framer, Ghost, Shopify, and 25+ additional CMS platforms. All integrations are included in every plan.*