WordPress and SEO: Optimize the website for Google & Co.

WordPress already offers a pretty good foundation for a website that is well received by search engines like Google. But there are still some wishes that can be fulfilled with a plugin like wpSEO. 

 introduction

For many of my colleagues from the developer corner, the words “SEO” and “search engine optimization” do not evoke good associations. There are two main reasons for this.

First, it comes from some people in the search engine optimization and PR industry who have actively acted as comment spammers in the past and have also trafficked website operators with emails to sneak a link. This not only annoyed web workers outside of the SEO scene but also a lot of SEOs who do their work cleanly and conscientiously.

The second aspect is that search engine optimization has a problem similar to that of nutritional science: a lot of conclusions are based on pure observations and here one runs the risk of confusing correlation and causality. In practice, this means: While I can easily run a test series with HTML, CSS, JavaScript and PHP that immediately delivers verifiable results for everyone, the effects of my SEO measures can only manifest in days or weeks and it can only be done difficult to identify the actual causes. So you can often not say clearly: Has my search engine ranking changed due to the measure taken or despite my measure or has a completely different factor been taken into account by the search engine? It should also be mentioned

But no matter how you feel about SEO: Search engine optimization of a website is an important tool when it comes to increasing the reach of the website. Even if you look very actively at alternative sources of visitors, it will in most cases result in a large part of the visitors coming through the search engines. It should not be forgotten that these portals have a budget for advertising measures, as well as a strong presence in social networks and large e-mail distributors. In the case of web projects by ordinary people, the proportion of Google visitors far exceeds 60%.

It is also important that priorities are set correctly. The search engine optimization of a website is roughly divided into two areas: on-page and off-page SEO. “On the page” means the optimization of the website itself and “off-page” means the measures that take place outside, such as the search for new link sources.

On-page optimization is the foundation and only when it is well implemented is it worthwhile for you to take care of off-page optimization. However, many website operators do not pay enough attention to the foundation, which is not least due to the fact that this area is quite technology-intensive and requires an experienced web developer.

WordPress on-board resources

WordPress already has good options with its on-board resources to optimize a website for search engines. The individual articles are appropriately labeled with rel = ”canonical”, you can have “speaking” permalinks created and you have the option of inserting headings and subheadings. The page titles, i.e. the content of the respective title element, are automatically generated from the main headings, i.e. the headings of the pages and the articles.

So far so good. However, other important options are missing. Examples:

• So you can not choose the page title regardless of the main heading.
• You cannot enter meta descriptions. This is important because it appears in the search results. It is much more meaningful if there is an individually written description than if the search engine automatically selects any text section from the article for it.
• You can also not influence the indexing and tracking of links to subpages. However, this function is often required, for example to exclude archives from indexing and in this way to pay more attention to the individual articles and subpages.
• In addition, you cannot create an  xml sitemap that helps search engines read the website. Depending on which SEO plugin you use, this function is integrated or you have to use a separate plugin.

What SEO plugins for WordPress are there?

The plugins Yoast SEO  and All in One SEO Pack are very often recommended in various blog posts, which is not surprising since they are the two most popular SEO plugins.

But are they the best? I dare to doubt that a bit, firstly because both of them have been noticed by security gaps in the past – just search for plugin name vulnerability – and that I had to repair some installations that malfunctioned after an update from Yoast SEO the WordPress installation.

Have the xml sitemap created

If you choose wpSEO, you have to use an additional plugin for an xml sitemap. I myself have been using the Google XML Sitemaps plugin for many years. Such an xml sitemap makes it easier for search engines to index your website. Thanks to the detailed description of the plugin, the setup is self-explanatory and in most cases, it is sufficient if you activate the plugin and leave the default settings. After setting up the plugin, you can then call the sitemap at your-domain.xyz/sitemap.xml, which should look something like this:

Conclusion

With the measures presented here and the on-board resources of WordPress, you can lay a good and stable basis for the search engine optimization of your website. As with all measures on a website and as with websites in general: you are never done. It is similar to a house with a large garden. There is always something to do, something to expand, to renew or to repair … But if the house has a solid foundation and stable walls, it is worth a lot.