WordPress Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is all about optimizing your websiteʼs position in search results. You want your website on top of the listings, so it’s seen first.

Showing up higher in search results (like when you go to Google and type in a phrase or keyword) usually means more traffic and more business.  WordPress is especially well suited for boosting your siteʼs rank in search engines. Which is another reason why using WordPress as a content management system is a good idea.

How WordPress Works for SEO

Of the shelf, WordPress is SEO-friendly. It puts important information in the right places by default, so as long as you fill in the appropriate information, youʼll have a good start in the search engine rankings. There are also a number of extra steps you can take to optimize your search engine rank, which are either built in to WordPress or easily managed with plugins, such as:

  • Easy pretty permalinks which are the direct urls to your content and optimizing how those links appear is good SEO.
  • Generate an XML sitemap, which is a widely adopted standard among search engines, and helps improve your search rank.
  • Descriptive meta tags, which are information embedded in your siteʼs code that tell search engines what type of content you have.
  • Write customized titles & descriptions using your main keywords in your title bar for more SEO juice.
  • Local search is important for many businesses and organizations. Learn more +

WordPressʼs SEO- friendly features & a little elbow grease will move your site to the top of the search results. Get your quote here +

More on How SEO Works

SEO is part science and part art. The SEO experts figure out what search engines look at when they rank websites. Then they figured out what can be tweaked to improve a siteʼs rank in the results. Some SEO tactics are of questionable value and others are borderline unethical, but the mainstream of SEO thought is simple, basic improvements that will boost your rank in search engine results. Itʼs usually simple things like figuring out keywords for your site and then putting those keywords in the right places. Those right places include the title bar (the text that shows up at the top of your browser), any headers, headlines or bold text on a page, and the meta data (helpful information in a pageʼs code that is not visible in a browser).

Itʼs not really brain surgery. The search engines look at a page and try to figure out whatʼs the most important topic on that page. For a page to be the number one search result for something like brain surgery it better have the words “brain surgery” and other important keywords in certain locations on the page. Otherwise search engines will think the page is about something else.

Click for full sized image
Search Engine Land Periodic Table of SEO Download Search Engine Land’s Periodic Table of SEO