Step By Step SEO Guide For Beginner 2021
Step By Step SEO Guide For Beginner 2021
Table of Contents
Introduction
What is SEO?
Why is SEO important?
The Basics of WordPress SEO
Check your site’s visibility settings.
Using SEO friendly URL structure in WordPress.
WWW vs non-WWW in URLs.
The Best WordPress Search Engine Optimization Plugin
Choosing the Best WordPress SEO plugin.
Add XML sitemaps in WordPress.
Add your site to Google Search Console.
Optimizing your blog posts.
Doing keyword research for your website.
WordPress Best Practices
Properly using categories and tags in WordPress.
Make internal linking a habit.
Optimize WordPress comments.
No-Follow external links in WordPress.
Full posts vs summaries (excerpts).
Speed and Security for WordPress
Optimize your site’s speed and performance.
Optimizing images in WordPress.
Security and safety of your WordPress site.
Start using SSL/HTTPS.
What is Search Engine Optimization?
Search Engine Optimization Is the science of adjusting a website’s code, content, and also structure. To sum up, make it visible on a search engine result page for particular keywords or combinations of keywords. The end-goal in any marketing venture is to generate a return on your investment. Also, SEO is capable of generating very attractive returns by bringing people to your website through search engines.
Why is SEO important?
Search engines are often the biggest source of traffic for most websites. Google and other search engines use advanced algorithms to understand and rank pages appropriately in search results.
However, those algorithms aren’t perfect — they still need your help to understand what your content is about.
If your content isn’t optimized, then search engines won’t know how to rank it. When people search for the topics you write about, your website won’t appear in the search results, and you’ll miss out on all that traffic. It is really important for all business owners to make their website search engine friendly so that they can maximize their search traffic.
Basics of WordPress SEO
It can get technical, but it doesn’t have to be.
Just learning a few basic SEO tips to optimize your site can give you a noticeable boost in your website traffic. You don’t have to be a tech genius to use the techniques below. If you’re already using WordPress, then you’ve got what it takes! Let’s get started optimizing your website.
Check Your Site’s Visibility Settings
WordPress comes with a built-in option to hide your website from search engines. The purpose of this option is to give you time to work on your website before it’s ready to go public. However, sometimes this option can get checked accidentally and it makes your website unavailable to search engines. If your website is not appearing in search results, then the first thing you need to
do is to make sure that this option is unchecked. Simply log in to the admin area of your WordPress site and visit Settings »
Reading page.
You need to scroll down to the ‘Search Engine Visibility’ section and make sure that the box next to ‘Discourage search engines from indexing this site’ is unchecked. Don’t forget to click on the ‘Save Changes’ button to store your changes
Using SEO Friendly URL Structures in WordPress
SEO friendly URLs contain words that clearly explain the content of the page, and they’re easy to read by both humans and search engines.
Some examples of SEO friendly URLs are:
https://www.globaldesartsmedia.co.ke/how-to-install-wordpress/
https://www.example.com/common-wordpress-errors-and-how-to-fix-them/
Notice that these URLs are readable and a user can guess what they will see on the page just by looking at the URL text.
So what does a non-SEO friendly URL look like?
https://www.example.com/?p=10467
http://example.com/archives/123
Notice that these URLs use numbers unrelated to the content, and a user cannot guess what they will find on the page by looking at the URL. Using SEO friendly permalink structure improves your chances of getting better positions in search results.
Here is how you can check and update your WordPress site’s permalink structure.
You need to visit the Settings » Permalinks page.
Select the ‘Post name’ option, and then click on the ‘Save Changes’ button to store your settings.
Note:
If your website has been running for more than 6 months, then please don’t change your permalink structure unless you’re using the ‘Numeric’ option. If you’re using ‘Day and name’ or ‘Month and name’, continue using that.
By changing your permalink structure on an established site, you will lose all of your social media share counts and run the risk of losing your existing SEO ranking. If you must change your permalink structure, then hire a professional, so they can
setup proper redirects.
You’ll still lose your social share counts on the pages.
WWW vs non-WWW
If you are just starting out with your website, then you need to choose whether
you want to use www (http://www.example.com) or non-www
If you are just starting out with your website, then you need to choose whether
you want to use www (http://www.example.com) or non-www
(http://example.com) in your site’s URL.
Search engines consider these to be two different websites, so this means you need to choose one and stick to it.
You can set your preference by visiting the Settings » General page.
Add your preferred URL in both the ‘WordPress Address’ and ‘Site Address’ fields.
Despite what someone else might say, from an SEO standpoint there’s no advantage to using one or another.
For more detailed information on this topic, take a look at this guide on www vs
non-www – which is better for WordPress SEO.
The Best WordPress SEO plugin
One of the best parts about WordPress is that there’s a plugin for everything, and SEO is no exception.
There are thousands of WordPress SEO plugins which makes it harder for beginners to choose the best WordPress SEO plugin.
Instead of installing separate plugins for individual SEO tasks, we will help you choose the best WordPress SEO plugin that does it all, and it’s 100% free.
Choosing the Best WordPress SEO Plugin
When it comes to choosing the best WordPress SEO plugin, you will most likely narrow your choices down to the two most popular solutions: Yoast SEO or All in
One SEO Pack.
They are both effective solutions, and you can check the pros and cons comparison
of them both here: Yoast SEO vs All in One SEO Pack.
Although, in this tutorial, we’ll be using Yoast SEO for screenshots and examples.
Regardless, there is a step by step guide on properly setting up each of these
plugins:
How to install and setup the Yoast SEO plugin in WordPress
Best SEO company Step By Step SEO Guide
for All in One SEO Pack
Optimizing Your Blog Posts
Often beginners make the mistake of thinking that installing and activating a WordPress SEO plugin is all that’s needed.
It is an ongoing process that you must keep up with if you want to see maximum results. All top SEO plugins allow you to add a title, description, and focus keyword to every blog post and page.
It also shows you a preview of what users will see when they Google your website. We recommend that you optimize your title and description to get maximum clicks. When writing your blog post, simply scroll down to the SEO section and take full
advantage of it.
Doing Keyword Research for Your Website
Many beginners use their best guesses to figure out what topics people are looking for and what they should add to their blogs and website. It is like shooting an arrow in the dark.
You don’t need to do that when you can use real data to find out what people are looking for. Keyword research is a research technique used by content creators and experts.
It helps you discover words users enter into search engines to find content, products, and services in your industry. You can then use those words and phrases on your website to get more search traffic. There are a ton of keyword research tools (both free and paid) that you can use. You can try SEMRush, as it helps you discover keywords and even find out the keywords where your competitors are ranking.
WordPress SEO Best Practices
If you follow the basics of WordPress SEO and use the best WordPress SEO plugin, you will already be ahead of most websites. However, if you want even better results, then you need to follow the WordPress best practices below. These aren’t too technical and most won’t even require you to touch any code. But they will make a big difference if you follow them.
Properly Using Categories and Tags in WordPress. WordPress allows you to sort your blog posts into categories and tags.
This makes it easy for you to manage your content by topics, and for your users to find the content they’re looking for. Categories and tags also help search engines understand your website structure
and content.
Step By Step SEO Guide For Beginner 2021
Often, beginners get confused on how to best use categories and tags. Here’s how you can approach categories and tags.
Categories are meant for the broad grouping of your posts.
If your blog was a book, then categories will be the table of content.
For example, on a personal blog, you can have categories like music, food, travel, etc. Categories are hierarchical, so you can add child categories to them. On the other hand, tags are more specific keywords that describe the contents of an individual post.
For example, a blog post filed under the food category can have tags like salad, breakfast, pancakes, etc. By using categories and tags properly, you make it easy for your users to browse
your website. Since it’s easy for users, it also makes it easier for search engines to browse your website.
You’ll want to take your skills even further to get ahead in your marketplace. Contact Us at Global Desarts Media for the Best SEO company for your Step By Step SEO Guide For Beginner 2021
and consultants.