Build a community around your blog
১০:১৫ PMBuild a community around your blog
With so many bloggers and blog posts storming in every day, it is hard to stand out. The secret to creating an outstanding blog is to cultivate a community around your it. A strong community of fans then helps to generate new traffic to your blog.In this post, I will chalk out the tips to creating a hustling community around a blog. I’ll also share tips on monitoring community growth and how to leverage it.
Why should you create a community around your blog?
Here are the benefits to having a community of bloggers or readers around your blog.
A large number of readers encourages social shares which in turn can generate more traffic to your site.
Comments left by fans helps to position the blog as an ‘authority blog’.
A community is social proof and can help attract leads.
By nurturing true relationships with your readers increases the chances of them linking back to your valuable posts. This adds to SEO value.
Interaction with a large number of readers increases the time spent on a single page, which is also valuable for SEO.
A strong fan base will recommend you to their own communities.
Strategies to building a community around your blog
1. Build it on a single powerful idea
If you speak in a crowd, nobody will listen to you, but if you are talking to a group of like-minded people, they will applaud you. It is the same with blogging. Blogs focused on a specific topic are generally more successful.
Writing blog posts on one topic (say, sports) for a week and another (like astronomy) for the next week will drive your readers away. They will find it difficult to connect with you.
Make sure your blog is about something you are passionate about. Passion spreads like a wildfire, and is a powerful emotion to connect your idea to the right audience. This helps to cultivate an audience who knows what you feel and understands what you write.
This very sense of being connected will build the foundation of your community.
Problogger’s Darren Rowse has successfully evolved his blog problogger.net because he is focused on one single idea – blogging.
Rowse never tries to merge it with his other passion, photography and has a separate blog for this. The second blog too has a hustling community around it but with a very different audience set.
2. Make them feel comfortable
Lectures are boring and so are one-sided blogs. Nobody likes to read a blog that rants about its success and strategies and does not include the readers in it. Such blogs eventually die out.
If you want people to be active in your community you have to make them comfortable and feel at home. Here’s how.
a) Be personal
Nothing connects more with your readers than being personal. Being personal doesn’t mean sharing private details, it means writing as though you are communicating.
Make your tone humanized. Tell stories related to the post. Use words like we, you and me so that it comes across as if you are talking directly to your reader.
b) Be approachable
Give your readers the privilege to reach out to you as and when they want. This will invoke a sense of being heard. You can also encourage your subscribers to speak to you via email.
For example, Noah Kagan, the man behind Appsumo, encourages his subscribers to speak about their experiences with him.
This creates an emotional bond with his subscribers and helps to grow his community.
3. Include your audience in your blogs
After your audience is comfortable interacting with you and your blog, make them feel more included by creating a strategy to weave your readers into every thread of your blog. Here’s how:
a) Ask readers to comment
After writing a blog post, encourage your readers to take part in it. Ask them for solutions about the problem you address in your post.
People like to be seen as a source of knowledge. Give them this chance by asking them how they would solve the issue being discussed in your blog.
b) Quiz people
Quizzes are smart and fun ways to keep your readers hooked to your community. According to OkDork, eight out of the top 10 most shared content in 2015 were quizzes. The increased share count is also a factor that people love your content, which pushes the blogs popularity even higher.
This is because people love to share things that boost their own credentials and identity.
For example, this marketing buzzwords quiz on the ClickZ website has been a top trending post for the past two weeks. (Have you taken it yet?)
3. Brew an ongoing challenge
An ongoing challenge, like this 30 days to powerful blogging, is a good example of how to use a challenge to build a community around your blog.
Challenges are great because all the members of it have the same pain point. They have similar issues and similar goals. Through this, they develop an emotional bond.
In the end, you are solving a common problem for your readers with your own challenge.
4. Offer value
One of the biggest problems in community building is expecting too much from the community. You need to add value to the community by offering solutions to your followers.
Your community members are more likely to recommend you if you offer something that is valuable.
You can do this by:
1. Writing in-depth posts on your blog. You do not want your readers to go to a second blog for solutions to the same problem.
2. Giving exclusive industry insights. Social Media Examiner uses a weekly post to display all the noteworthy social media news and reviews of new social media tools launched that week.
This helps the reader to save time.
3. Giving a blog backlink can be the best way to tell your fellow bloggers and influencers that you care for them. This way you can use influencer marketing in your blog community building. But beware, only link to articles that are high quality and useful to your blog readers. Linking unrelated posts and low-quality ones will do more harm than good.
5. Monitor ROI and lever your connections
You should always measure your efforts in a campaign and see if you are working in an effective way. A good place to start is measuring conversions and the number of people you were able to connect with.
You can also track your strategies to see what worked and what did not. If social media isn’t your thing, try an organic traffic method. You can also try email lists to communicate with your community members.
7 Legitimate Ways that Social Media Impacts SEO
১০:১১ PM7 Legitimate Ways that Social Media Impacts SEO
This middle ground is more likely the true situation at this point. It’s unclear what the engines will do in the future, but Matt Cutts says that Google will never factor in direct social actions (i.e., Facebook Likes, retweets, and even +1s). He stated that Google has made attempts to incorporate this information into the algorithm, but it became too difficult to organize and quantify, and therefore, Google does not and will not include it.
However, social media and SEO do overlap, and social can contribute to the overall organic success of websites in several ways. Let’s take a look at seven specific examples.
1. Link Potential
Social media activity can help to increase awareness of a brand or website content. This increased familiarity can lead to links. Let’s say a brand posts a video of a new product feature. That video gets shared 20 times on Twitter. One of those tweets is seen by a Twitter user that runs a blog (or better yet, a reporter for a major publication). The blogger or reporter decides to write about the new feature and links back to the brand’s website and video in the article. That link would not have occurred if the writer had not seen a tweet about the video.
So, while the links in those 20 tweets did not contribute directly to the overall link profile of the website, they did lead to links being placed on a site via the article. These links do contribute to the overall link profile, thus contributing to SEO impact.
2. Personalization
Google uses Google+ activity and reviews to personalize search results when the user is signed in. If you are connected to an individual via Google+ and that individual has reviewed a business, +1ed a page, or posted on Google+ about the topic you are searching for, that result is likely to rank higher for you because of the connection.
Take the example below, I searched for “craft beer bars in Denver” and the fourth result is from a person in my Google+ circles. When I toggle from personalized search, this result is not showing.
personalized-google-search
Not all searchers are signed in all the time, of course, and not all searches occur on Google. But Bing is doing the same with friends’ Facebook activity. While difficult to quantify or even view yourself, this personalization of search results does impact ranking.
3. Search Query Volume
Social media can help you get your name out to a wider audience. When that happens, you increase the overall awareness of your brand, which can lead to more people searching for your brand as a result. When Google sees that more people are searching for a brand, they view that brand as more popular and well known, and thus award it higher ranking. This is dependent on the query being searched for, naturally, and often is more of a branded search opportunity by nature.
4. Brand Signals
Some think that simply getting mentioned on a blog or site, without a hyperlink, can also contribute to ranking factors. Google calls this co-citation and considers it a brand signal. Social media’s ability to increase awareness of a brand and spur conversation can result in these co-citation mentions.
5. Traffic Volume and Site Engagement
Social media can increase the volume of traffic visiting your website, which is a key factor in search engine ranking. Oftentimes, the items being shared on social media that drive the most traffic are blog posts, videos, event listings, or other interesting content (as opposed to links to your homepage or main category pages). If that content is interesting enough to get users to stick around for a while, reading the entire page or watching a full video before visiting other pages, rather than bouncing right away, you may be rewarded in the organic results. The search engines can measure these metrics – bounce rate, pages per visit, and time on site – and may use it to inform search results and ranking.
6. Authorship
Google has indicated that they intend to incorporate identities into search ranking in the future, and are currently working hard to figure out just how they will do it. This means that certain people – based on their authority, relevancy to the topic, and likely audience size – will receive higher ranking for certain queries.
While Cutts states that Google is working on it, Eric Schmidt said last year that it’s already happening to some extent for verified profiles:
“Within search results, information tied to verified online profiles will be ranked higher than content without such verification, which will result in most users naturally clicking on the top (verified) results.”
7. Profile Ranking
A brand’s social media profiles rank high for brand terms, oftentimes on the first page and sometimes above the fold for brand queries. Take a look at the results for “Frontier Airlines” below. The fourth and fifth organic results are for two of Frontier’s social media profiles, and their Google+ page shows up in the knowledge graph box in the upper right corner of the page. This does not directly send traffic to their website, but it does allow them to better control the SERP real estate and ensure they have full branded coverage.
frontier-airlines-google
Using SEO wizard to get your site found online
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Using SEO wizard to get your site found online
Want to get found on Google® or Bing®? The SEO Wizard in Website Builder's Business Plus plan lets you apply Search Engine Optimization to up to five website pages to improve your ranking in search results. You're free to not follow all the suggestions — but overall they can make a big difference in getting found by your potential web customers.
Log in to your account.
In the products list, click Website Builder.
Next to the account you want to use, click Manage.
Click Edit Site.
In the top right corner of your screen, click the three-bar icon and select SEO Wizard.
Click three-bar icon and choose SEO Wizard
If you added basic information about your business when setting up your site, skip to Step 8. If not, use the Business Info tab's What's your business? page to fill in the fields:
Fill in your basic business information
Business name: Enter the name of your business.
Business category: If you did not already select the category that your business fits into when you were setting up your site, select a business category from the suggested list or enter a category.
What are 1-2 products or services you offer: Enter keywords that describe your products or services. For example, if you have an auto repair business, you might consider terms such as mechanic, oil change, tire rotation, etc.
Click Next.
Use the Where are your customers located? page to fill in the fields:
Local: Click this option if your customers are located in one or more specific metro areas, select the number of miles to create a radius from that location and then click Add. Use the Targeting map to add a specific area or location. (You can add as many target areas as you need.) When you are finished, click Next. If you entered more than one area, you will be asked to select your primary location.
Worldwide: Click this option if your customers could be located anywhere in the country or even anywhere in the world. It does not offer the targeting options of Local, so click Next.
In the Home tab's page, choose 2-5 phrases that customers might use to find a business like yours. (People outside your line of business may describe it more broadly than you might.) Click Next.
Select one of those phrases and click Next.
Select one of those same phrases to include in the page title that Google will display in its search results. Click Next.
Write a description of your business or services in the field below the title you selected, then click Next. Make sure you include the recommended phrase you selected earlier, which is listed below the description field. (You are limited to 165 characters.) The phrase will change from red to green when you enter it in your description.
Update your main (H1) headline to include the recommended phrase, and then click Next.
If your page doesn't have an H1 headline, the SEO Wizard adds one containing only the recommended phrase. So you'll want to write a more descriptive headline to give the included phrase some context.
If the recommended phrases are not already included in your page, we recommend you update your text. You must include at least one of the suggested phrases, though we recommend you include all three. When you finish updating your text, click Next. The suggested phrases change from red to green once they're included in the page text.
When you see the Nice job! message, you may select another of your site's main pages and repeat the previous steps or skip to Step 15.
Fill in your basic business information
Click Publish to notify Google that the page has been optimized. Click Close when the SEO Wizard displays a confirmation message.
Click Exit to leave the SEO Wizard and return to your site's home page.
Want to get found on Google® or Bing®? The SEO Wizard in Website Builder's Business Plus plan lets you apply Search Engine Optimization to up to five website pages to improve your ranking in search results. You're free to not follow all the suggestions — but overall they can make a big difference in getting found by your potential web customers.
Log in to your account.
In the products list, click Website Builder.
Next to the account you want to use, click Manage.
Click Edit Site.
In the top right corner of your screen, click the three-bar icon and select SEO Wizard.
Click three-bar icon and choose SEO Wizard
If you added basic information about your business when setting up your site, skip to Step 8. If not, use the Business Info tab's What's your business? page to fill in the fields:
Fill in your basic business information
Business name: Enter the name of your business.
Business category: If you did not already select the category that your business fits into when you were setting up your site, select a business category from the suggested list or enter a category.
What are 1-2 products or services you offer: Enter keywords that describe your products or services. For example, if you have an auto repair business, you might consider terms such as mechanic, oil change, tire rotation, etc.
Click Next.
Use the Where are your customers located? page to fill in the fields:
Local: Click this option if your customers are located in one or more specific metro areas, select the number of miles to create a radius from that location and then click Add. Use the Targeting map to add a specific area or location. (You can add as many target areas as you need.) When you are finished, click Next. If you entered more than one area, you will be asked to select your primary location.
Worldwide: Click this option if your customers could be located anywhere in the country or even anywhere in the world. It does not offer the targeting options of Local, so click Next.
In the Home tab's page, choose 2-5 phrases that customers might use to find a business like yours. (People outside your line of business may describe it more broadly than you might.) Click Next.
Select one of those phrases and click Next.
Select one of those same phrases to include in the page title that Google will display in its search results. Click Next.
Write a description of your business or services in the field below the title you selected, then click Next. Make sure you include the recommended phrase you selected earlier, which is listed below the description field. (You are limited to 165 characters.) The phrase will change from red to green when you enter it in your description.
Update your main (H1) headline to include the recommended phrase, and then click Next.
If your page doesn't have an H1 headline, the SEO Wizard adds one containing only the recommended phrase. So you'll want to write a more descriptive headline to give the included phrase some context.
If the recommended phrases are not already included in your page, we recommend you update your text. You must include at least one of the suggested phrases, though we recommend you include all three. When you finish updating your text, click Next. The suggested phrases change from red to green once they're included in the page text.
When you see the Nice job! message, you may select another of your site's main pages and repeat the previous steps or skip to Step 15.
Fill in your basic business information
Click Publish to notify Google that the page has been optimized. Click Close when the SEO Wizard displays a confirmation message.
Click Exit to leave the SEO Wizard and return to your site's home page.
Increasing your Search Engine Ranking (SEO)
১০:০১ PM
Increasing your Search Engine Ranking (SEO)
Search engines rank sites to help their users such as yourself find the best, most relevant sites. They take time to examine and index your site, and thus it takes time for SEO to increase or links listed to change. They know what the "tricks" are. Keep in mind it depends on a variety of factors including content, descriptions, link-backs, host, URL, and more!
Note: when you switching to and from websites (content or url), your SEO may be refreshed as well, so you may have to work on these elements again.
1. Connect your domain! (Pro & Limited)
Your domain is the best keyword to search for your site. Connecting yourname.com or yourcompany.com will take you a long way. Here's how to do that.
If you won't be upgrading, don't worry, your http://page.strikingly.com url has good SEO and loads quickly as well! Read more.
2. Actively share your site on other websites.
A huge part of search engine ranking comes from back-links and traffic. That means the more sites that link to your site, and the higher the quality of those sites, the better your search engine ranking will be.
Start posting your site on blogs, forums and social media! Create a Google Plus profile, if relevant. Include your URL in your LinkedIn profile, email signature and other networks. Find the places where people are interested in what you do and share!
3. Complete page descriptions and meta tags.
Go to Settings -> Descriptions and fill in as much information as possible. Your description should be a few sentences long, and you should have several tags that categorize your site or business. However, be careful not to include tags just for the sake of increasing your ranking, as many search engines demote this behavior and rank you lower.
Good description: "Johnny's Bakery is a gourmet bakery and confectionary based in the Mission in San Francisco. We started in 1965 and we've been offering delightful breads, cakes, pies, and cookies to happy customers ever since!"
Good tags: "johnny's bakery, san francisco mission bakery, delicious pies, fresh bread, wedding cakes"
4. Write a descriptive title.
The title is the text that shows up in the title bar in the viewer's browser. This is like the front door of your page. Make it attractive! "Johnny's Bakery - Freshly Baked Everyday in San Francisco" is much better than "Johnny's Shop."
5. Add keywords to your headings.
Headings are the big text boxes that are located throughout your site. Titles are important for SEO because search engines give additional weight to heading text. So, it's better to add descriptive text in the headings. For instance, "About Johnny's Bakery" is better than "About" as a heading for your "About" section.
6. Add descriptions to all the images.
Since search engines don't understand images, they look for image descriptions. An image description will help search engines index your image, which helps index your site. These are the same as adding "alt" tags in HTML.
Search engines rank sites to help their users such as yourself find the best, most relevant sites. They take time to examine and index your site, and thus it takes time for SEO to increase or links listed to change. They know what the "tricks" are. Keep in mind it depends on a variety of factors including content, descriptions, link-backs, host, URL, and more!
Note: when you switching to and from websites (content or url), your SEO may be refreshed as well, so you may have to work on these elements again.
1. Connect your domain! (Pro & Limited)
Your domain is the best keyword to search for your site. Connecting yourname.com or yourcompany.com will take you a long way. Here's how to do that.
If you won't be upgrading, don't worry, your http://page.strikingly.com url has good SEO and loads quickly as well! Read more.
2. Actively share your site on other websites.
A huge part of search engine ranking comes from back-links and traffic. That means the more sites that link to your site, and the higher the quality of those sites, the better your search engine ranking will be.
Start posting your site on blogs, forums and social media! Create a Google Plus profile, if relevant. Include your URL in your LinkedIn profile, email signature and other networks. Find the places where people are interested in what you do and share!
3. Complete page descriptions and meta tags.
Go to Settings -> Descriptions and fill in as much information as possible. Your description should be a few sentences long, and you should have several tags that categorize your site or business. However, be careful not to include tags just for the sake of increasing your ranking, as many search engines demote this behavior and rank you lower.
Good description: "Johnny's Bakery is a gourmet bakery and confectionary based in the Mission in San Francisco. We started in 1965 and we've been offering delightful breads, cakes, pies, and cookies to happy customers ever since!"
Good tags: "johnny's bakery, san francisco mission bakery, delicious pies, fresh bread, wedding cakes"
4. Write a descriptive title.
The title is the text that shows up in the title bar in the viewer's browser. This is like the front door of your page. Make it attractive! "Johnny's Bakery - Freshly Baked Everyday in San Francisco" is much better than "Johnny's Shop."
5. Add keywords to your headings.
Headings are the big text boxes that are located throughout your site. Titles are important for SEO because search engines give additional weight to heading text. So, it's better to add descriptive text in the headings. For instance, "About Johnny's Bakery" is better than "About" as a heading for your "About" section.
6. Add descriptions to all the images.
Since search engines don't understand images, they look for image descriptions. An image description will help search engines index your image, which helps index your site. These are the same as adding "alt" tags in HTML.
Important 5 Ways to Improve your Site’s Ranking (SEO)
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Important 5 Ways to Improve your Site’s Ranking (SEO)
Follow these suggestions, and watch your website rise the ranks to the top of search-engine results.
1. Publish Relevant Content
Quality content is the number one driver of your search engine rankings and there is no substitute for great content. Quality content created specifically for your intended user increases site traffic, which improves your site’s authority and relevance.
Identify a keyword phrase for each page. Think about how your reader might search for that specific page (with phrases like “mechanical engineering in Michigan,” “best applied physics program,” or “Michigan Tech degrees”). Then, repeat this phrase several times throughout the page—once or twice in the opening and closing paragraphs, and two to four more times throughout the remaining content.
Don’t forget to use bold, italics, heading tags, and other emphasis tags to highlight keyword phrases, but don’t overdo it.
Never sacrifice good writing for SEO. The best pages are written for the user, not for the search engine.
2. Update Your Content Regularly
You’ve probably noticed that we feel pretty strongly about content. Search engines do, too. Regularly updated content is viewed as one of the best indicators of a site’s relevancy, so be sure to keep it fresh.
3. Metadata
When designing your website, each page contains a space between the <head> tags to insert metadata, or information about the contents of your page. If you have a CMS site, the UMC web team will have pre-populated this data for you:
Title Metadata
Title metadata is responsible for the page titles displayed at the top of a browser window. It is the most important metadata on your page. For those with a CMS website, the web team has developed an automated system for creating the meta title for each webpage.
Description Metadata
Description metadata is the textual description that a browser will use in your page search return. Think of it as your site’s window display—a concise and appealing description of what is contained within, with the goal of encouraging people to enter.
Keyword Metadata
Keyword metadata are the search phrases that people type when they want to find your page. You’ll want to include a variety of phrases. However, don’t get greedy: if your list becomes excessive, the browser may completely ignore the data. As a general rule, try to keep it to about 6-8 phrases with each phrase consisting of 1-4 words. A great example would be "computer science degree."
4. Have a link-worthy site
Focus on creating relevant links within the text. Instead of having “click here” links, try writing out the name of the destination. “Click here” has no search engine value beyond the attached URL, whereas “Michigan Tech Enterprise Program” is rich with keywords and will improve your search engine rankings as well as the ranking of the page you are linking to.
5. Use alt tags
Always describe your visual and video media using alt tags, or alternative text descriptions. They allow search engines to locate your page, which is crucial—especially for those who use text-only browsers.
These are only a few of the many methods for improving your search engine ranking. If you want to learn more, we recommend the following resources:
Follow these suggestions, and watch your website rise the ranks to the top of search-engine results.
1. Publish Relevant Content
Quality content is the number one driver of your search engine rankings and there is no substitute for great content. Quality content created specifically for your intended user increases site traffic, which improves your site’s authority and relevance.
Identify a keyword phrase for each page. Think about how your reader might search for that specific page (with phrases like “mechanical engineering in Michigan,” “best applied physics program,” or “Michigan Tech degrees”). Then, repeat this phrase several times throughout the page—once or twice in the opening and closing paragraphs, and two to four more times throughout the remaining content.
Don’t forget to use bold, italics, heading tags, and other emphasis tags to highlight keyword phrases, but don’t overdo it.
Never sacrifice good writing for SEO. The best pages are written for the user, not for the search engine.
2. Update Your Content Regularly
You’ve probably noticed that we feel pretty strongly about content. Search engines do, too. Regularly updated content is viewed as one of the best indicators of a site’s relevancy, so be sure to keep it fresh.
3. Metadata
When designing your website, each page contains a space between the <head> tags to insert metadata, or information about the contents of your page. If you have a CMS site, the UMC web team will have pre-populated this data for you:
Title Metadata
Title metadata is responsible for the page titles displayed at the top of a browser window. It is the most important metadata on your page. For those with a CMS website, the web team has developed an automated system for creating the meta title for each webpage.
Description Metadata
Description metadata is the textual description that a browser will use in your page search return. Think of it as your site’s window display—a concise and appealing description of what is contained within, with the goal of encouraging people to enter.
Keyword Metadata
Keyword metadata are the search phrases that people type when they want to find your page. You’ll want to include a variety of phrases. However, don’t get greedy: if your list becomes excessive, the browser may completely ignore the data. As a general rule, try to keep it to about 6-8 phrases with each phrase consisting of 1-4 words. A great example would be "computer science degree."
4. Have a link-worthy site
Focus on creating relevant links within the text. Instead of having “click here” links, try writing out the name of the destination. “Click here” has no search engine value beyond the attached URL, whereas “Michigan Tech Enterprise Program” is rich with keywords and will improve your search engine rankings as well as the ranking of the page you are linking to.
5. Use alt tags
Always describe your visual and video media using alt tags, or alternative text descriptions. They allow search engines to locate your page, which is crucial—especially for those who use text-only browsers.
These are only a few of the many methods for improving your search engine ranking. If you want to learn more, we recommend the following resources:
WordPress sites definitive guide to higher ranking
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WordPress sites definitive guide to higher ranking
WordPress is one of the best, if not the best content management systems when it comes to SEO. That being said, spending time on your WordPress SEO might seem like a waste of time, it most definitely is not. Optimizing your site to the best practices outlined in this article will help you improve your rankings, gain more subscribers and have a better website in general.
As we take quite a holistic view on (WordPress) SEO, meaning that we think good SEO should be engrained in all aspects of your online marketing and PR, this guide covers quite a lot of ground and is therefore a long read. Check out the table of contents below for some quick jumping around.
Updates to this WordPress SEO article
This article has been kept up to date with the best practices for WordPress SEO since early 2008 and the release of WordPress 2.5, the most recent update was on Nov 2015, with WordPress version 4.0 being the most current release. The goal of this article is to let all the info of all the different articles we wrote about the topic, here and on other sites, fall into one big piece: the final WordPress SEO tutorial.
The first versions of this article were heavily based on using a plugin called HeadSpace and a series of other plugins. We’ve since released our own Yoast SEO plugin which replaces quite a few of those. That plugin has proven so powerful that sites like SearchEngineLand, and The Next Web now all use it. This Yoast SEO plugin is very stable and ready to use and this article now assumes you’re using it.
Get the most out of Yoast SEO, learn every feature and best practice in our Yoast SEO for WordPress training!
More info »
Yoast SEO for WordPress training
If you’re using another SEO plugin, like All in One SEO pack or Ultimate SEO, but would like to switch and make use of our free and extremely powerful SEO plugin, we’ve written a migration guide for you. It’s a really easy process. If you’re not using an SEO plugin yet, grab our Yoast SEO plugin and get going.
As search, SEO, and the WordPress platform evolve we will continue to keep this article up to date with best practices. Be sure to subscribe to our WordPress & SEO newsletter to receive notification when we update this article.
Need your website reviewed?
If you need an outside look at your WordPress install, you might consider our website review. The results of this review contain a full report of improvements for your site, encompassing our findings for improvements in different key areas such as SEO to Usability to Site Speed & more. From only $699, you’ll receive a report that represents a much larger value in turn-over and profit. Get it now!
WordPress is one of the best, if not the best content management systems when it comes to SEO. That being said, spending time on your WordPress SEO might seem like a waste of time, it most definitely is not. Optimizing your site to the best practices outlined in this article will help you improve your rankings, gain more subscribers and have a better website in general.
As we take quite a holistic view on (WordPress) SEO, meaning that we think good SEO should be engrained in all aspects of your online marketing and PR, this guide covers quite a lot of ground and is therefore a long read. Check out the table of contents below for some quick jumping around.
Updates to this WordPress SEO article
This article has been kept up to date with the best practices for WordPress SEO since early 2008 and the release of WordPress 2.5, the most recent update was on Nov 2015, with WordPress version 4.0 being the most current release. The goal of this article is to let all the info of all the different articles we wrote about the topic, here and on other sites, fall into one big piece: the final WordPress SEO tutorial.
The first versions of this article were heavily based on using a plugin called HeadSpace and a series of other plugins. We’ve since released our own Yoast SEO plugin which replaces quite a few of those. That plugin has proven so powerful that sites like SearchEngineLand, and The Next Web now all use it. This Yoast SEO plugin is very stable and ready to use and this article now assumes you’re using it.
Get the most out of Yoast SEO, learn every feature and best practice in our Yoast SEO for WordPress training!
More info »
Yoast SEO for WordPress training
If you’re using another SEO plugin, like All in One SEO pack or Ultimate SEO, but would like to switch and make use of our free and extremely powerful SEO plugin, we’ve written a migration guide for you. It’s a really easy process. If you’re not using an SEO plugin yet, grab our Yoast SEO plugin and get going.
As search, SEO, and the WordPress platform evolve we will continue to keep this article up to date with best practices. Be sure to subscribe to our WordPress & SEO newsletter to receive notification when we update this article.
Need your website reviewed?
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SEO Guide for Beginner's
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SEO Guide for Beginner's
New to SEO? Need to polish up your knowledge? The Beginner's Guide to SEO has been read over 3 million times and provides comprehensive information you need to get on the road to professional quality Search Engine Optimization, or SEO.
How Search Engines Operate
How People Interact With Search Engines
Why Search Engine Marketing is Necessary
The Basics of Search Engine Friendly Design & Development
Keyword Research
How Usability, Experience, & Content Affect Rankings
Growing Popularity and Links
Search Engine's Tools for Webmasters Intro
Myths & Misconceptions About Search Engines
Measuring and Tracking Success
What is Search Engine Optimization (SEO)?
SEO is a marketing discipline focused on growing visibility in organic (non-paid) search engine results. SEO encompasses both the technical and creative elements required to improve rankings, drive traffic, and increase awareness in search engines. There are many aspects to SEO, from the words on your page to the way other sites link to you on the web. Sometimes SEO is simply a matter of making sure your site is structured in a way that search engines understand.
SEO isn't just about building search engine-friendly websites. It's about making your site better for people too. At Moz we believe these principles go hand-in-hand.
This guide is designed to describe all areas of SEO—from finding the terms and phrases (keywords) that generate traffic to your website, to making your site friendly to search engines, to building links and marketing the unique value of your site. If you are confused about this stuff, you are not alone, and we're here to help.
Search Engine Market Share
Why does my website need SEO?
The majority of web traffic is driven by the major commercial search engines, Google, Bing, and Yahoo!. Although social media and other types of traffic can generate visits to your website, search engines are the primary method of navigation for most Internet users. This is true whether your site provides content, services, products, information, or just about anything else.
Search engines are unique in that they provide targeted traffic—people looking for what you offer. Search engines are the roadways that make this happen. If search engines cannot find your site, or add your content to their databases, you miss out on incredible opportunities to drive traffic to your site.
Search queries—the words that users type into the search box—carry extraordinary value. Experience has shown that search engine traffic can make (or break) an organization's success. Targeted traffic to a website can provide publicity, revenue, and exposure like no other channel of marketing. Investing in SEO can have an exceptional rate of return compared to other types of marketing and promotion.
Why can't the search engines figure out my site without SEO?
Search engines are smart, but they still need help. The major engines are always working to improve their technology to crawl the web more deeply and return better results to users. However, there is a limit to how search engines can operate. Whereas the right SEO can net you thousands of visitors and increased attention, the wrong moves can hide or bury your site deep in the search results where visibility is minimal.
In addition to making content available to search engines, SEO also helps boost rankings so that content will be placed where searchers will more readily find it. The Internet is becoming increasingly competitive, and those companies who perform SEO will have a decided advantage in visitors and customers.
Can I do SEO for myself?
The world of SEO is complex, but most people can easily understand the basics. Even a small amount of knowledge can make a big difference. Free SEO education is widely available on the web, including in guides like this. Combine this with a little practice and you are well on your way to becoming a guru.
Depending on your time commitment, your willingness to learn, and the complexity of your website(s), you may decide you need an expert to handle things for you. Firms that practice SEO can vary; some have a highly specialized focus, while others take a broader and more general approach.
In any case, it's good to have a firm grasp of the core concepts.
How much of this article do I need to read?
If you are serious about improving search traffic and are unfamiliar with SEO, we recommend reading this guide front-to-back. We've tried to make it as concise as possible and easy to understand. There's a printable PDF version for those who'd prefer, and dozens of linked-to resources on other sites and pages that are also worthy of your attention.
New to SEO? Need to polish up your knowledge? The Beginner's Guide to SEO has been read over 3 million times and provides comprehensive information you need to get on the road to professional quality Search Engine Optimization, or SEO.
How Search Engines Operate
How People Interact With Search Engines
Why Search Engine Marketing is Necessary
The Basics of Search Engine Friendly Design & Development
Keyword Research
How Usability, Experience, & Content Affect Rankings
Growing Popularity and Links
Search Engine's Tools for Webmasters Intro
Myths & Misconceptions About Search Engines
Measuring and Tracking Success
What is Search Engine Optimization (SEO)?
SEO is a marketing discipline focused on growing visibility in organic (non-paid) search engine results. SEO encompasses both the technical and creative elements required to improve rankings, drive traffic, and increase awareness in search engines. There are many aspects to SEO, from the words on your page to the way other sites link to you on the web. Sometimes SEO is simply a matter of making sure your site is structured in a way that search engines understand.
SEO isn't just about building search engine-friendly websites. It's about making your site better for people too. At Moz we believe these principles go hand-in-hand.
This guide is designed to describe all areas of SEO—from finding the terms and phrases (keywords) that generate traffic to your website, to making your site friendly to search engines, to building links and marketing the unique value of your site. If you are confused about this stuff, you are not alone, and we're here to help.
Search Engine Market Share
Why does my website need SEO?
The majority of web traffic is driven by the major commercial search engines, Google, Bing, and Yahoo!. Although social media and other types of traffic can generate visits to your website, search engines are the primary method of navigation for most Internet users. This is true whether your site provides content, services, products, information, or just about anything else.
Search engines are unique in that they provide targeted traffic—people looking for what you offer. Search engines are the roadways that make this happen. If search engines cannot find your site, or add your content to their databases, you miss out on incredible opportunities to drive traffic to your site.
Search queries—the words that users type into the search box—carry extraordinary value. Experience has shown that search engine traffic can make (or break) an organization's success. Targeted traffic to a website can provide publicity, revenue, and exposure like no other channel of marketing. Investing in SEO can have an exceptional rate of return compared to other types of marketing and promotion.
Why can't the search engines figure out my site without SEO?
Search engines are smart, but they still need help. The major engines are always working to improve their technology to crawl the web more deeply and return better results to users. However, there is a limit to how search engines can operate. Whereas the right SEO can net you thousands of visitors and increased attention, the wrong moves can hide or bury your site deep in the search results where visibility is minimal.
In addition to making content available to search engines, SEO also helps boost rankings so that content will be placed where searchers will more readily find it. The Internet is becoming increasingly competitive, and those companies who perform SEO will have a decided advantage in visitors and customers.
Can I do SEO for myself?
The world of SEO is complex, but most people can easily understand the basics. Even a small amount of knowledge can make a big difference. Free SEO education is widely available on the web, including in guides like this. Combine this with a little practice and you are well on your way to becoming a guru.
Depending on your time commitment, your willingness to learn, and the complexity of your website(s), you may decide you need an expert to handle things for you. Firms that practice SEO can vary; some have a highly specialized focus, while others take a broader and more general approach.
In any case, it's good to have a firm grasp of the core concepts.
How much of this article do I need to read?
If you are serious about improving search traffic and are unfamiliar with SEO, we recommend reading this guide front-to-back. We've tried to make it as concise as possible and easy to understand. There's a printable PDF version for those who'd prefer, and dozens of linked-to resources on other sites and pages that are also worthy of your attention.
