Have you put a large amount of effort into a WordPress site only to rank low on search indexes? Are you struggling to bring traffic into your blog? Aman Signh writes a great article titled, “How to Make WordPress Website SEO Friendly” with details on 38 ways to improve your site.
Tech Thoughts‘ Favorites:
Yoast SEO
The author recommends using Yoast SEO, an SEO plugin, to make a blog SEO friendly. I’ve also used Yoast SEO on previous websites with great success. The plugin has a quick install from WordPress’ plugin store and creates an easy to use interface. It allows users the ability to create xml sitemaps, add focus keywords, change metadata and so much more.
Block or Delete Spam Comments
Search engines do not like spam comments at all. Signh summarizes that too much of them will cause the search engines to flag your page as spammy and can potentially be penalized as well. Block and deleted any spam comments to avoid any conflict between the search engines and your site.
Proper Heading Tags
Using HTML heading tags improperly can also cause conflict between search engines and your page. The H1 tag should be reserved for only the title of your page. The H1 tag helps search engines locate your site’s content for rankings as well as for web accessibility. Use the proper order of headings such as H2/H3 and do not use H1 more that once.
WordPress Site Visibility Settings
WordPress includes a Search Engine Visibility setting in order to discourage search engines form indexing your WordPress site. If the setting is activated, your blog may be unintentionally be prevented from being indexed on search engines such as Google. Check your settings under “Reading” to see your site’s search engine visibility status.
Tech Thoughts | Carlos Robles 