What is SEO?
SEO is an acronym that stands for Search Engine Optimization. It’s a strategy used by website owners to get more traffic by ranking higher in search engines.
Search engine optimization isn’t about tricking Google or gaming the system. It’s simply about creating a website that has optimized code and formatting which makes it easy for search engines to find your website.
When people search the web for the topics you write about, your search-engine-optimized content will appear higher in the search results, and you’ll get more people clicking through to your website.
Why SEO is important?
Search engines are often the biggest source of traffic for most websites.
Google and other search engines use advanced algorithms to understand and rank pages appropriately in search results. However, those algorithms aren’t perfect — they still need your help to understand what your content is about.
If your content isn’t optimized, then search engines won’t know how to rank it. When people search for the topics you write about, your website won’t appear in the search results, and you’ll miss out on all that traffic.
It is really important for all business owners to make their website search engine friendly so that they can maximize their search traffic.
What Is WordPress?
WordPress is the world’s most popular content management system, which runs 35% of the entire internet and powers many of the websites you likely browse every single day.
WordPress started out as a blogging platform in 2003 but quickly pivoted to become a powerful and flexible solution to run entire websites, and in 2020, it is also capable of being used as an eCommerce solution.
Why did WordPress become so popular?
It s simple and easy to use. You don’t need to be a developer to launch a WordPress website, and it is extremely user-friendly, even for beginners.
It is flexible and adaptable. With literally thousands of themes available (including many free options), you can tailor WordPress to your needs, while also extending the core functionality with one of more than 55,000 plugins available.
The platform can also host fully bespoke themes, if you are an experienced PHP developer, want to learn the language, or choose to employ the services of a professional to turn a custom design into a stand-out site.
WordPress is open-source, and the community behind the platform is simply amazing. From support forums to easy-to-follow documentation, there is always help at hand, however simple or complex the issue may be.
Of course, it isn’t the right platform for everyone, and there are times when there may be other CMS ( Content Management System) options that are better suited to your individual needs. Commonly cited disadvantages and cons of WordPress usually relate to the need for frequent updates, potential vulnerabilities (if you are not keeping your site updated), and a little bit of a learning curve to launch bespoke themes.
But for the most, it is an extremely powerful platform and one which also gives you great foundations for SEO success.
What Is WordPress SEO?
WordPress on its own isn’t a replacement for a solid SEO strategy, and while there is no denying that the CMS saves you time and helps you to adhere to best practices without experience, you need to understand that you need to put in the effort to rank your website on Google.
Your choice of CMS doesn’t dictate whether or not you can rank well unless your site suffers from extensive technical issues that stop it from being crawled and indexed.
You shouldn’t think that WordPress is a magic weapon without further effort; it requires time and effort. SEO can get technical very quickly, but the beauty of WordPress makes it easily accessible to those who aren’t experienced or even those who don’t class themselves as being technical.
Just because you are using WordPress doesn’t mean the SEO tactics you use will change. You still need to create great content, earn great links, and ensure that your site is well-optimized and free from technical issues that could hold it back.
But WordPress helps you to take care of, out of the box, many of the basics which help your site to rank, and what you will find below are tips and tricks which help you to implement growth-driving tactics specifically on the platform.
How to optimize your WordPress site to increase your organic traffic
- Install a WordPress SEO Plugin
WordPress already has some excellent built-in SEO features. But, you can take your search engine optimization to the next level by using an SEO plugin. The best SEO plugin on the market is Yoast SEO.
With this plugin, you can perfectly optimize each page and post for your chosen keyword(s). It also includes an analysis based on the latest algorithm updates.
You can even generate an XML sitemap and add schema markup to your website.
- Do Keyword Research
Choosing to conduct keyword research will make or break your WordPress SEO strategy.
Doing keyword research will allow you to:
Create content your visitors are actually searching for.
Develop a better understanding of what your market needs.
Track the success of everything you write.
Generate valuable traffic for your site.
There are a variety of tools that will help you with keyword research. Some of the top tools include KWFinder, Solvid, and even Google Keyword Planner.
There’s a built-in option within WordPress that will hide your site from the search engines.
You might find this option useful when first building your website, but it can make ranking near impossible.
If you’ve been employing some of the tips on this list, but aren’t seeing your rankings improve, this could be the issue.
- Adjust Permalink Structure
When you first install WordPress, your site’s posts and pages will have a strange default WordPress URL structure. This default structure isn’t good for your SEO.
The most search-engine-friendly URL permalink structure is the Post name setting. By switching to this setting, you’ll be able to include your blog post or page title and even a keyword in your URL.
If you’re making this change late in the game, you may need to redirect any old URLs. You can do this with a plugin like Permalink Helper. Simply input your old URLs, and they’ll forward to your updated URLs.
- Add Your Site to Google Search Console
Using Google Search Console will show you how your website is currently performing in the search engines, and alert you to any sitewide errors that may be affecting your search results ranking.
- Integrate Google Analytics
Another Google tool you’ll want to have in your arsenal is Google Analytics. This tool will show you how well your WordPress SEO strategy is working by giving you an in-depth breakdown of your site’s traffic.
- Submit a Sitemap to Google
Sitemaps are used by search engines to crawl your website better. Though search engines will still crawl your site without a sitemap, creating one allows you to report the data that you want the search engines to crawl.
The best way to ensure certain pages that don’t contribute to your rankings aren’t crawled, as well as give precedence to your more valuable pages. If you’re using the Yoast SEO plugin, then you can easily create and submit a sitemap.
- Optimize Your Site for Mobile
Google is testing its mobile-first index. This means that they’ll use the performance and functionality of your mobile pages to determine your rankings. So, if you aren’t utilizing a responsive theme, this is the best time to fix it.
But, beyond choosing a responsive theme, you can check to see how your website currently performs across the mobile spectrum. To do this, open up Google’s mobile-friendliness test, and enter your site’s URL.
This will give you a breakdown of how the mobile version of your site performs, show you a screenshot, and offer some tips on how to improve it.
- Speed Up Your Website
Website speed has always been important. Having a slow-loading website will negatively impact your rankings and user experience. Page speed is also a ranking factor, so make sure it is up to speed.
- Fix Any Broken Links
Having a lot of broken links isn’t good for your readers or your rankings. Also, they make it harder for Google bots to crawl your WordPress site.
The easiest way to check your website for broken links is to open up Google Search Console and click on Links.
which will show you where the broken link is, so you can take a look and fix it.
- Have an SEO Focus Keyword For Every Post
Even though the way we optimize for keywords has changed, they still play an important role in SEO. Whenever you’re writing a post on your site, you should have a focus keyword for that specific post.
Here are some of the best practices when optimizing for a chosen keyword:
Don’t overstuff the keyword into your post, only include it when it’s natural.
Include your keyword in the first paragraph of your copy, if possible.
Use your target keyword in your title and your subheadings.
Add your target keyword to your URL, and meta description.
Yoast SEO plugin makes implementing the above tips easy.
Whenever you’re writing a post, input your target keyword into the tool. You’ll get an analysis of how well-optimized that post is for your chosen keyword.
- Create High-Quality Content
Google loves high-quality content. Take a look at the top 10 results for any given keyword, and you’ll find the content satisfies two requirements:
The content is generally longer and has high content standards.
The content satisfies the search intent.
Long, well-written content is great for your WordPress SEO. But, you might not know what search intent is. At the core, search intent is the intention behind the keyword phrase.
- Create Longer Content
Longer content tends to rank better in search engines. Studies found that longer content gets more social shares and backlinks overall, which means higher rankings.
Another study has found that most of the content that’s ranking on the first page of Google is over 2000 words. This doesn’t mean every post on your site has to reach this content length, but it should be something you shoot for.
remember not to stuff your content with unnecessary words to hit your word count goals.
Instead, you should focus on the intent of the keyword. Meaning, what’s the reason the user is searching for that keyword in the first place. Then, answer the goal of that keyword in the most thorough and useful manner possible, which in some cases might mean writing fewer words.
- Create Evergreen Content
Evergreen content can be a powerful driver of organic traffic. This style of content will always be relevant as it doesn’t rely on timely information.
Evergreen content is valuable in that it doesn’t lose its relevancy. This means you can continually share, promote, and pick up backlinks to this content. This style of content will typically hold top-ranking positions for years.
Even though evergreen content will take more time and effort to create, the results will pay off for years to come.
- Link Out to Quality Sources
Linking out to high-quality sources won’t hurt your search engine optimization; in fact, it might help it. When you link to high-quality reliable sources, you’re letting Google know that the linked content is similar to yours. Plus, it enhances the user experience by providing readers with more information on the topic.
Don’t let your website become a dead end on the internet, sharing the link love is a good thing. Make it a regular practice to link out to helpful sources, as it’ll help to improve your own credibility and trustworthiness. By linking out to others, also gives you a reason to reach out and start a dialogue.
You know that linking out is important, but you also want to link out in the right way. To avoid sending readers away from your site it’s a good idea to have all external links open in a new window.
Then, click the gear icon, which will bring up your link options.
Change Link Options
A text box will appear and simply check the box that says Open link in a new tab.
Now, whenever a user clicks on the link, it’ll open up in a new tab, instead of being redirected off your website.
- Internal Link Content Together
Whenever you have the chance, you should be linking to older content you’ve published. Regular internal links can bring you benefits like:
Making it easier for Google bots to crawl your website and access other posts and pages.
Helping Google understand the context of your page’s content by using related hyperlink text.
Keeping visitors on your site longer by visiting more pages, thus reducing bounce rate, improving time on the website.
WordPress makes it easy to interlink your content together.
Whenever you’re writing a post, simply highlight a portion of the text and click the hyperlink button. Then, select the gear icon, bringing up your link options. This is very similar to linking to an external source.
In the pop-up window, you’ll see a list of previous posts you’ve written. Select the most relevant post or page from the list, and your internal links are complete.
- Optimize Your Post and Page Titles
Your title tag is your most important heading tag. It tells Google what your page is about, and will influence whether readers will click through to your website. If you’re not sure which tag is your title tag, it’s the name of your post or page.
Follow these best practices for optimizing your title tag:
Include your target keyword as early in the title as possible.
Create a title tag between 60 to 70 characters.
Create an enticing title that gets people to click.
Changing your title tag to something well-optimized and clickable is quite easy, especially if you’re using the Yoast SEO plugin.
To change your title tag, open up one of your posts, and scroll to the bottom. You’ll see a section called Snippet editor.
Here, you’ll be able to adjust your WordPress SEO title, slug, and meta descriptions. Make sure there are no red or orange colors, only green, and optimize it to rank better.
- Optimize Your Header Tags
Your header tags will give the crawler bots an idea of what your content is about. Using these tags throughout your content will make it more readable and optimized for the search engines.
In general, you should have one H1 tag per post and use a hierarchy of H2, H3, H4, etc., underneath that.
Your H1 tag will be the title of your post, so you’ll want to include your target keyword. For the rest of your header tags, use a variation of your target keyword, if possible. However, don’t stuff your heading tags with keywords if it doesn’t make sense for your blog post.
Within the WordPress editor, you can easily add header tags via the drop-down menu.
- Use Shorter URLs
When it comes to your URLs, the shorter the better. Do your best to shorten your URLs, so they don’t show multiple categories or directories. Try to only include your target keyword, and get rid of everything else.
A long URL won’t hurt your rankings, but it can make your link look like spam, as well as lower the CTR. If you want to change your permalinks, this will help give you more control over your URL structure.
Follow these best practices when creating an SEO-friendly URL:
Use a shorter URL whenever possible, and cut out filler words.
Include your target keyword in your URL.
Sensibly match your titles and URL.
Make it readable.
Avoid multiple categories and folders whenever possible.
With the above in mind, you can easily edit your URL from within WordPress.
- Optimize Meta Descriptions
Your meta description is the bit of text that’s below the title in the search results. It gives searchers an idea of what that page is going to be about.
Your meta description isn’t a direct ranking factor, but it will help improve your search engine CTR. A well-written and enticing meta description will drive the person searching to click on your post, instead of the other search results.
The data is correlation-based, but if you have a high CTR, Google will deem your page more relevant, which could improve your rankings.
To optimize your meta description implement these SEO tips:
Include your focus keyword in your description. Google will highlight this keyword in bold, so it’ll make your listing stand out.
Think of your meta description as an ad copy. You’re persuading your reader to click on your listing over others on the page.
- Include Schema Markup
If you haven’t heard of schema markup before, basically, it’s additional code that helps search engines better deliver data to their searchers. By implementing schema markup, you can help your search engine listings look more attractive. This can lead to improved CTR and more traffic for your website.
Your WordPress theme might already have schema markup installed. To see if your site already has schema markup, run it through this tool. If you don’t have schema markup installed, then you can use the Schema plugin. It’s easy to configure and will automatically add schema markup to your website.
- Optimize for Google SERP
You’ve probably seen the boxes that appear at the top of the Google search results. If not, they look like this:
This spot is technically position zero, meaning you’ll get more organic traffic and high click-throughs. However, if you’re already ranking on the first page, then getting this spot will give you two listings in the results.
There isn’t a tried and true way to get this top spot, but the following website optimizations will increase the likelihood that you get it:
Add schema markup to your site.
Answer the question implied in the keyword early on in your post.
Format your answer in the form of an ordered or unordered list.
- Optimize Images For Search Engines
Using images throughout your content will create a better quality reading experience. This will help keep your users engaged, which will give positive website performance indicators. But, beyond adding images to your site, you can optimize these to improve your SEO too.
There are three components of proper image optimization:
The Image Title Text
The image title text isn’t crawled by the search engines, but it can be a factor in your user experience. When a user hovers over your image, a pop-up will appear that has your image title text.
To change your image title text, navigate to your post editor where you’ve placed an image. Hover over the image and click the pencil icon, which will bring up the Edit option.
The Alt Text
Your image’s alt text will give an indicator to Google what your page is about. Your images should use keywords that are variations of your target keyword as well as describe the image.
To change your image’s alt text, navigate to your visual editor and hover over an image you’ve added. Once again, click on the pencil icon which will bring up the Edit option. The pop-up box will bring
The File Name
Your image file name can help your image rank in Google image search, which can bring your website some additional traffic.
Most default image filenames are long and confusing, plus they don’t relate to the topic of the post. Before you upload an image to WordPress, you should consider the purpose of the image, and the keyword phrase you’re targetting. Then include that keyword and other descriptive phrases in your image filename.
Also, if you’re using multiple words in your filename, make sure you’re using a hyphen between them, as Google will read these hyphens as space.
- No-Follow Any Affiliate Links
A lot of websites use affiliate links to generate revenue. These links are used to track commission when you recommend a product, service, or course.
But, using too many of these links is frowned upon by Google. If you’re using a lot of affiliate links, then you can disguise them, while making sure they’re no-follow. You can do this by using a plugin called Pretty Links.
- Add HTTPS to Your Site
HTTPS is also a ranking factor, so sites that make the upgrade in security will have a ranking advantage. This allows your browser to make a secure connection with any website you’re connected to and encrypts any data sent between the two.
To switch your WordPress website to HTTPS follow the steps below:
Make sure that your current host supports HTTPS and SSL.
Purchase an SSL certificate or obtain one through Let’s Encrypt.
Install the SSL certificate on your host.
Verify if SSL is working.
Redirect all of your HTTP traffic and links to HTTPS.
- Build High-Quality Backlinks
Backlinks are still one of the top-ranking factors. The more high-quality links your site has, the better its chances of ranking.
Now, this isn’t a post on building backlinks, as it would be impossible to cover every strategy in detail here.
Here are a few methods that can help you generate quality backlinks to your site:
Create skyscraper content.
Look for broken backlinks.
Create ego-bait content.
Guest post on popular websites.
Do outreach link building.
- Do an SEO Audit
If you aren’t sure if your WordPress site is properly optimized, then you can perform an SEO audit. But, instead of going through every step yourself, you can run the website through an SEO auditing tool. These tools will run your site through a series of checks and give you a report that tells you what you’re doing right and the SEO tips you can improve upon.
SEO Site Checkup is a free tool that’ll analyze over 50 different onsite ranking factors and let you know how your site is performing. You can also use the Solvid SEO audit tool which will see how well your WordPress site is aligning with Google’s guidelines.
- Force Google to Crawl Your Site
Usually, your website is crawled by how often you publish new content. But, there is a workaround that’ll get your content immediately indexed by Google.
Open up Google Search Console, navigate to Crawl, and click on Fetch as Google. Input the URL of the post you’ve just published or updated and click on FETCH.
Next, click on Request Indexing, and your new URL will be indexed by Google. Sometimes this won’t happen instantly, but it’ll be much faster than waiting for Google to crawl your website.
- Target Long-Tail Keywords
Depending on your niche, ranking on the top page of Google for the main keywords can be difficult. Many of them are already conquered by veteran pages with content that’s been working perfectly for a long time. Not to mention a big profile of backlinks assisting them.
In such cases, you’ll need to think out of the box and work your way up, higher in search results, by targeting smaller yet highly specific keywords. These are often referred to as long-tail keywords. For example, try to brainstorm what a potential visitor might research before purchasing a product.
Finally, remember that WordPress SEO is a long-term game. The more effort you put into your WordPress SEO, the more results you’ll see, but typically these results will only come in time. Use SEO plugins and this SEO guide to help your posts and pages improve in the best way.
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