20 Great WordPress SEO Tips, Tricks, and Resources
Getting Noticed, the Right Way!
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is an essential part of any diversified Internet marketing strategy. Without an effective search strategy in place, your brand is less likely to show up in search results. Our 20 simple WordPress SEO tips, tricks, and resources will help you implement a successful SEO strategy on your business website.
The majority of all small businesses build their websites using the popular WordPress Content Management System (CMS). WordPress makes it much easier for small business owners to gain a better understanding and control of their SEO. Even novices can use our WordPress SEO Tips right away.
Getting Started with WordPress SEO
Our WordPress SEO tips, tricks, and resources follow a step-by-step approach that is easy to understand. And while we based these tips on actual WordPress sites we designed and built for our clients, they also work for other platforms. Some of our suggestions are simply good practices. For others, you may have to search for the appropriate functionality.
If you are completely new to SEO or lack at least a basic understanding of SEO terminology, this may seem a bit overwhelming for you. Maybe you should start by getting a better understanding of search engine optimization. Here is a great resource for everything you need to learn on the subject of SEO.
20 WordPress SEO Tips, Tricks, and Resources
1 – Do Your Keyword Research
Before you do anything else, you should start with keyword research. Find out how people would search Google for what your business has to offer. You can use the Google AdWords Keyword Planner to find out how many people search for specific terms.
2 – Select A Keyword Rich Domain
Once you determine what people are looking for, try to get a similar or related web address. Your web address is also known as your domain. A dotCom domain is still the preferred domain extension. Ideally, you want your web address to look like this: www.mygreatbusinessidea.com.
3 – Use WordPress
Yes, you can build your small business website on other platforms. But if you are looking for something that both users and Google love, there are 39 reasons you should be using WordPress. The range of plugins, general ease of use, and search engine optimization options are a definite advantage.
4 – Choose An Adequate WordPress Theme
While that may be tempting, I don’t recommend that you use a free theme for your business website. You will find that you will quickly run into limitations. This shortcoming is especially relevant for SEO. Instead, you should focus on a premium theme that will give you more options. We recommend ThemeForest as a theme and plugin repository.
5 – Stay Up-to-Date
Be sure that you have the latest WordPress install (as of this writing 5.4) and that all of your plugins are the latest available version. The same goes for your theme; make sure that you have correctly downloaded and installed the latest available version.
6 – Install and Configure Caching Plugins
Page Speed is essential when it comes to Google rankings. If you use a service provider such as Cloudways or WPEngine, you are all set. Optimizing your site for speed is one of their services. Otherwise, we recommend you install a caching plugin like W3 Total Cache, WP Rocket, or Autoptimize. But be careful when you configure them to avoid any conflicts. Try one setting at a time!
7 – Install and Configure SEO Plugins
Once you confirm that your WordPress theme and plugins are up-to-date, you can install and configure your preferred SEO plugins. We recommend Rank Math, which we use on our site. You can also use one of the following: Yoast SEO (formerly WordPress SEO by Yoast) or All-in-One SEO Pack. Install and activate the plugin. You will need to connect it to your Google account if applicable.
8 – Set Permalinks
Make sure to change your Permalinks in your WordPress settings. You always want to use the real post title in your permalinks.
You can access your permalinks setting from your WordPress Admin Dashboard by scrolling down to Settings and clicking on the Permalinks tab.
9 – Create Quality Content
While there are always short-term ways to trick Google, the only way to consistently rank on search engines is quality original content. Remember, you are creating content for your audience, not necessarily yourself. Make sure your content is something your readers will want to pass around.
10 – Configure Post Excerpts
Long-form blog content is excellent. Long-form blog content on your blog landing page is not. Be sure to enable post excerpts in your blog. Want more control? Simply write your custom excerpt and insert it yourself.
11 – Configure Robots.txt
You should always disallow search bots and spiders from crawling category and tags pages on your site. You can easily do this by adding two lines of code to your robots.txt file:
Disallow: /comments/
Disallow: /category/
12 – Install Re-Direct Plugin
Sooner or later, it will become necessary to delete a page or post from your business website. But instead of your readers ending on the dreaded “Page Not Found” dump, they should be redirected to a better option. If you are using Yoast, you can simply create redirects on the fly. Another option is to use one of the many WordPress redirect plugins.
13 – Use Images Correctly
For each page or post, you need to use an appropriate image. The image should clearly illustrate the page or post content. Images can include a product, service, location, client, or even a purchased stock image. Make sure the image is high quality, and don’t forget to write proper Alt Tags and image descriptions. Here are some more tips for creating SEO-friendly images.
14 – Install and Configure Google Analytics
You absolutely must install Google Analytics and Webmaster Tools on your business website if you have not already done so. Be sure to add the actual Google Analytics Code and verify the code with Google Webmaster Tools.
15 – Create an XML Sitemap
Be sure to create an XML Sitemap of your business website and upload it to Webmaster Tools. Rank Math and Yoast do this for you, but you may also want to install the Google XML Sitemap Plugin and run it as well. Make sure you check your sitemap for any errors or inconsistencies.
16 – Claim and Optimize Applicable Social Channels
You need to connect your business website to social media pages relevant to your industry or business. At the very least, your brand or product company should have a presence on Facebook and Twitter. For business and B2B marketers, LinkedIn is essential.
If you have much visual content, you should focus on Pinterest and Instagram. And YouTube or Vimeo is a must for video content. And don’t forget about some exciting newcomers like TikTok.
17 – Promote on Social Media
For every page or post you create on your business website or blog, be sure to promote it on your social media channels. Social activity is a key ranking signal. It will not only improve your SEO; it can directly boost site traffic as well. AddThis and Monarch are great tools for social sharing, and helpful social media tools like Agorapulse will save you time and effort.
18 – Submit Your Site to Directories
Submit your business website to open directories in your industry or business, as well as any other directory site with a high Google Page Rank. Not sure where to check page rank? Why not use the Google Page Rank Checker?
Share your business website on quality social bookmarking sites to share your content with a like-minded audience. We are very fond of Reddit, Digg, Mix, Slashdot, and HackerNews. But there may be others specific to your industry, so be sure to check them out!
20 – Build Quality Backlinks
All of the above should lead to some solid on-page and on-site results. Keep in mind that this is an ongoing effort, and you will have to keep up. Constantly changing algorithms and directives can be challenging for small business owners. The one thing that provides lasting value is high-quality backlinks. Whenever you have spare time, you should build backlinks to your quality content.
Implementing Our WordPress SEO Tips
To implement our WordPress SEO tips, you should have admin-level access to your WordPress business website. For this post, we are only evaluating free SEO and other plugins and extensions. In many cases, there are premium or upgrade versions available for a fee. I recommend you start with the free versions first. If you want to get really serious here are 66 tools you can add to your SEO toolbox.
If you don’t already have a WordPress business website, you really should get one. The majority of small business websites run on WordPress, and for a good reason. Especially for SEO, you have advantages right out of the box. And additional SEO enhancements can easily be added.
Working on Your SEO Strategy
Once you have your WordPress business website up and running, you can use our WordPress SEO tips, tricks, and resources as a guide. Simply check off each item on our list that is already part of your overall SEO strategy. Start working on implementing the rest. Much of it is merely getting into the habit of doing things a certain way.
Most of our WordPress SEO tips are pretty straightforward. If you already do some or all of your small business digital marketing, you should have no problem implementing them. Many of the tools, extensions, and plugins we mention have tutorials that provide additional details.
If you need some more help with your WordPress SEO, check out these posts on our blog:
- 100 Google SEO Factors Ranked by Importance
- 10 Common Small Business SEO Mistakes You Must Avoid at All Costs
- 13 Tips for Creating SEO-Friendly Images and Improve Your UX
- 42 Essential SEO Tools to Put in Your SEO Toolbox in 2020
- 9 Essential SEO Upgrades to Help You Rank Higher in 2020
- 25 Easy to Use WordPress SEO Tips, Tricks, and Resources
Implementing our WordPress SEO tips is only the beginning. To keep your business website ranking high, you need to keep working on and improving your SEO. For many of you, this will become second nature. But if you are already uncomfortable with SEO, you may be better off engaging professional help. We are here to help.
Do You Need Implementing Our WordPress SEO Tips?
Are you unsure how to implement these simple WordPress SEO tips on your website or e-commerce store yourself?
Here at PixoLabo, we offer a full range of website consulting and design services for businesses and product brands, including custom web design and development, e-commerce solutions, search engine optimization, and WordPress optimization.
We help businesses and product brands improve their search rankings and visibility and increase website traffic. Contact us to learn more about our WordPress web design and SEO services, and how our team can help you implement these WordPress SEO tips.
Did You Use Our WordPress SEO Tips, Tricks, and Resources?
Have you implemented any or all of these WordPress SEO tips on your business website or your e-commerce store? Did our suggestions help you improve your search rankings? Please feel free to comment below so our audience can benefit as well, and grab our feed, so you don’t miss our next post! And feel free to share our post with your audience!
Thank you! We appreciate your help to end bad business websites, one pixel at a time!
By Gregor Saita
Co-Founder / CXO
@gregorsaita
