Use targeted keywords in titles, headings, and URLs while keeping content natural to improve relevance for search engines.
SEO Basics: What Is SEO, and Why Is It Important?
Search engine optimization, or SEO, is the practice of improving your website’s visibility in search engine results. Optimizing key elements such as keywords, metadata, images, and site structure increases the odds of potential visitors finding you.
With so much competition out there, implementing SEO WordPress strategies is a must to stand out.
Do it right, and you’ll attract more traffic, improve user experience (UX), and take your online presence to the next level.
1. Verify Your Website Is Visible to Search Engines
You’ll never improve your website’s traffic from search engines if your website isn’t visible to search engines. Fortunately, this is an easy setting to check in your WordPress dashboard. In WordPress, go to Settings > Reading and ensure the box labeled “Discourage search engines from indexing this site” is unchecked. This will make your site visible to search engines.
2. Add an SSL Certificate
An often overlooked aspect of WordPress SEO is security. So, how can you signal to search engines and visitors that your site is secure? By installing an SSL certificate.This boosts your site’s security and trustworthiness in Google’s eyes and gives visitors the confidence to stick around and explore.
While installing an SSL certificate may sound complicated, WordPress plugins make it easy. These plugins offer a mix of free and paid options for securing your WordPress site in minutes.
3. Maintain a Consistent Address Format
Whether you use a “www” website address or not, the most important thing to SEO for WordPress is sticking with it.
A clear, consistent URL structure makes sure humans and search engines alike know exactly what to expect from your website. It also cuts down on 404 errors and ensures humans and web crawlers can get where they need to go.
Here are some best practices for standardizing your address format:
- Keep it simple and consistent: Use static, human-readable URLs over dynamic ones.
- Establish a hierarchy: Implement a clear hierarchy with directories and subfolders instead of subdomains.
4. Optimize Permalinks
A permalink is the full URL that users and search engines see. They’re a key piece of SEO for WordPress. Keeping the structure consistent and concise means you’re delivering the best experience to both visitors and search engine crawlers.
5. Install a WordPress SEO Plugin
You can get expert SEO recommendations—at a fraction of the cost of a human expert—with a wordpress SEO plugin.
Plugins like YOAST SEO can guide your SEO optimization efforts and provide tools for managing metadata and more. They are also easy to set up. Even beginners can get started right away.
6. Submit Your Sitemap to Google Search Console (GSC)
Search engine crawlers won’t always have the bandwidth to crawl every page on your website. Optimize your WordPress SEO so that bots regularly crawl your most important pages. This is where XML sitemaps come in.
Submitting your XML sitemap to Google Search Console gives Google crawlers a roadmap for traveling your site most efficiently. This means more of your site’s pages will be indexed—and that means a greater chance of ranking on search engine results pages (SERP).
Categories and tags are your allies when organizing your WordPress content.
- Categories are meant for broad topics and follow a hierarchical structure via subcategories. This hierarchy helps organize content into main topics and subtopics, which helps with site navigation.
- Tags apply to more specific topics and are not hierarchical. Using them is a way to label content with extra detail. They’re sort of signposts for finding related posts across different categories.
The way you use category and tag pages will likely change over time, but if you start with a logical structure, you’ll be better off in the long run. This means considering the breadth of topics your site will have and creating categories and tags that enable you to index it properly.This makes it easier for visitors to find the content they’re looking for and creates more entry points for SEO.
8. Create a Logical Site Structure
If you want users and crawlers to navigate your website efficiently, create a logical site structure from the start. This includes a clearly laid-out hierarchy that offers seamless and predictable navigation.
Here’s what that might look like:
- Home page: Acts as the hub, linking to primary categories.
- Categories and subcategories: Organize content into broad topics (categories) and then break them down further (subcategories).
- Individual pages: Each piece of content belongs to a category, keeping navigation predictable.
You might map out your structure visually with a flow chart or sitemap to get going.
What your site structure ultimately looks like will depend on many factors. For inspiration, check out sites you consider easy to navigate. You may find it easier to emulate your favorite site’s structure than creating one from scratch.