SEO Training for WordPress Sites
SEO, or Search engine optimization, is something I am asked about quite often. WordPress does a very good job of this “out of the box”, but that doesn’t mean it’s something you should ignore. The entire point of having a website is to attract visitors, after all. If you are not showing up in search results it will hurt your chances to be seen and, by extension, sell your products.
One way to help increase your search engine visibility is to utilize an SEO plugin such as Yoast. Yoast offers a free version which works quite well for the vast majority of WordPress users. They also have a premium version that offers extra features, and provide full blown SEO courses on top of that.
The video above is produced by the team at Yoast which demonstrates some basic functionality of the Yoast SEO plugin. Please keep in mind that you’re not always going to get the ‘green light’, nor should you always want to. While a fantastic plugin, Yoast SEO cannot be all things, to all people, in all situations. The recommendations this plugin provides are more of a ‘best guess’ based upon what the script sees within your content. It’s a script, not a human, so don’t expect that it will always offer the best suggestions for any given post or page.
A Word of Caution about Many SEO “Services”
There are “companies” who will contact you out of the blue to tell you your website can be better optimized. They tend to make incredible claims of getting you to the top of Google, and increasing your traffic by huge amounts. The vast majority of these are snake oil salesmen. Especially if they are sending you unsolicited information. Not only is doing so illegal, it’s not a legitimate business practice.
Google keeps its search algorithms a closely guarded secret so as to ensure nobody can game the system. That said, sometimes people figure out ways to do just that. When they do, Google will figure it out, ban them from their search results, and update their algorithms. This is why using trickery and shady techniques is a bad idea. Follow the rules and do it right the first time. Then you won’t have to worry as much about changes in algorithms.
Helpful SEO Links
SEO Information & Learning
SEO Tools
Yoast SEO Plugin for WordPress (Free)
Nibbler by Silktide (Free)
List of 24 Free SEO Tools (Free)