These are some SEO Tips you can’t ignore if you have a WordPress Website.
As a webmaster or a blogger you’ll try to draw audience at all the times, don’t you? There can be a huge list of SEO tasks you should perform for more traffic but here are some simple and effective tips to increase traffic on your WordPress website.
WordPress is the biggest blogging platform in the world. It got exciting attention ever since it was introduced. WordPress gradually developed itself as a great platform for websites and online applications.
Now with its rich and handy feature of Pages, Categories and Menu, it proved to be the robust and flexible content management system (CMS).
Many websites are migrating to WordPress because webmasters and developers realized that this is the ideal platform for any website. The newer versions of WordPress are very much advanced and the best thing is that it is completely free.
But building a website on a robust platform is not enough. What you need, in fact, is to reach out to the target audience that helps in doing more business. You (yes, you!) need to generate enough traffic towards your website.
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Some Useful SEO Tips for WordPress Website
Getting no traffic and getting ill-targeted traffic, both won’t let you achieve your goal. No one will notice you. However, relax, there are many ways you can generate traffic for your website. And in this post, we’ll see some method through SEO eyes! Let’s have a look at some tips that can help you to increase targeted traffic on our WordPress website.
#1 Quality in Content
I don’t want to explain it much and I don’t think it’s necessary. Quality content is the first thing for website. Why would you visit any to see a pile of shit?
To get a higher ranking on Google, focus more on your content. Pay attention! You need to please both – your readers and the search engine algorithms.
Regularity, fresh and unique content with real value to the readers is what I consider the quality content. This will be the reason for readers to keep coming back to your website.
Quality content is the first and most essential element for you to come out on top.
#2 Time to Publish
How it’s related to SEO?
Everyday is not equal and every time is not either. The different kind of websites too have their own nature. You should try to find the best days and time to publish your new content.
For the better response to your content try posting during business hours (commonly most efficient time) and always post on weekdays (effective days compared to weekends). There is more possibility of someone checking out your blog during these times.
However, as I already pointed out, you should research and find out which day gets most attention for you new posts. Similarly publish at different times to find out what times you get the maximum views. Once you have these data, you can follow and get good result to your WordPress blog.
Now, after you found the day and time to publish new content, do some testing and find out the time to promote you posts as well. You can use some tools such as HootSuite.com, BufferApp.com to find the best time and schedule your message on those slots.
#3 How Many Keywords & Tags?
I’ve seen new bloggers injecting a huge number of keywords in tags section. But as I experienced, rather than aiming to all the possible keywords for any post, it’s better to concentrate on a few keywords that have potential to generate good traffic to your website. Maximum 4 or 5 keywords are more than enough. Never overpower your content with a lot of keywords.
While doing keyword research, target keywords with two aspects for every post. Choose a couple of keywords for high traffic and another couple of keywords for high conversion. You can pick some long tail keywords that will be easier to rank for and get highly targeted traffic that converts well. High traffic keywords will rank in some time and offer you long term benefits.
Google’s keyword research tool, Wordtracker’s keyword questions and the most useful keywordspy can help you to determine the best keywords to use them as tags.
#4 More Ping Services
Heard Ping for the first time?
Pinging your website is the online equivalent of waving a flag and yelling, “Hey! Over here – check this out!” to search engines and directories whenever you add or make major updates to the content on your site. Using a Ping tool can speed up indexing because it essentially sends search portals and other services a message from your website telling them that there is new content and to come crawl it. ~ Source: Grace Harman in Affilorama.com.
When you have a WordPress website you are already in comfortable position. You can make use of the WordPress update service. WordPress will automatically ping other websites through Ping-o-Matic if you have only the default listings. But you can add more sites in the list or you can do it manually.
Pinging will update the other website when you make new posts on your website. This will bring in more visitors.
- List of Ping Services: Harsh Agrawal has a great post with a collection of more than 50 ping services and a good tutorial about how you can implement it in your WordPress website. Feel free go through his WordPress Ping List. You’ll find even more ping URLs in comment section on that post.
- Manual Ping: You can use any of these online ping services for manual pinging your website – (1) Just Ping, (2) Pingler, (3) Pingomatic, (4) Blog Ping Tool, (5) PingFarm
#5 Identify The Areas to Concentrate
It is very important to keep an eye on stats and keep researching. I suggest everybody to install Google Analytics code in your websites from the first day. Google Analytics lets you to stay updated about the stats of your website. This will show you how much traffic your website is generating and that way you will know which areas to concentrate on while doing SEO for your website.
Apart from Google Analytics, we have some other analysis tools. Because you have a WordPress website, you can install JetPack plugin and take benefits of WordPress.com. It really presents some awesome stats to identify where you need to focus on.
Based on the reports you can also build effective strategies to generate more targeted traffic.
#6 Optimize Your Posts & Images
Your content should always be optimized and SEO friendly. Pay attention to following tips while writing and optimizing your posts:
- Include main keyword in post title and page title.
- Make use of Format box to apply different heading tags. Heading tags should not be used for appearance but to structure your document
- Pay attention to your chosen keywords and try to come up with around 2% keyword density.
- Use Bold, Italics and Underline for your keywords wherever suitable.
- Include some internal links as well as outgoing links.
- It is better to mix-up the nofollow and dofollow links.
- Always use meaningful and relevant anchor text for hyperlinks.
- Use relevant and useful images and videos in posts.
You should also optimize the images to get best result. Remember, images alone can be a good source of targeted traffic if you are using them correctly in your website. Please consider following suggestions while using images:
- Include at least one image in every page of your website.
- Use descriptive and meaningful text for Title, ALT and Caption for your images.
- Resize images to correct dimension before you upload. Unnecessarily larger images can increase the workload of server and slow down your website. Web Page Speed is an important factor in high ranking search results. Count it as important SEO task.
- Use width and height attribute with IMG tag while inserting images in posts.
- Limit the use of images and videos. Too many may be counter productive.
#7 Optimized And Quick Loading Theme
WordPress offers thousands of cool themes. You might find every theme much better and attractive than other. However, while choosing don’t just look on the design and functionality.
Choose a theme that is SEO friendly and loads quickly without any hassles. If you have good theme like Thesis, Genesis or the like, the theme creator has paid much attention to SEO aspect while developing it.
However, if your theme is not SEO optimized, you can always use some best SEO plugins such as WordPress SEO by Yoast, SEO Ultimate or the good-old All in One SEO. This will definitely help you to improve your rankings on the search engine.
#8 Topic to Write About
Writing about hot and trending topics can be interesting to anybody but without an effective and consistent SEO effect, you’ll notice that the post is ranked only when the event is already over!
I rather prefer to choose topics that will attract visitors at all times. Look for such topics and write about them so that more visitors will take interest in reading it and it will live for longer time duration. Have a few topics that will instantly attract attention, so that these posts will attract attention for a very long time.
Those were my few SEO tips to your WordPress Blog. Hope it is helpful to you. You are most welcome to share you views and suggestions. Please do comment.
Image Credits: FreeDigitalPhotos.net
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Twitter: BloggersTech
January 23, 2013 9:22 pm
Excellent tutorial for newbie bloggers , keep it up Suresh
Twitter: CyberGanesh
January 24, 2013 12:12 pm
Since I heard about blogging I heard the word “SEO” and related to this word like “Content & Quality in Content”, “Keywords” etc. I usually get confuse on time to publish post on blog after reading this post I got some idea about the time to publish hope this will help me to increase visitor on my blog.
About Pinging Service, till now I’m not using any pinging service for my blog. Am I loosing any opportunities? And I think it’s difficult to find “Optimized And Quick Loading Theme” in free is there any free theme which have these options? if any plz suggest me.
Anyway, it’s really helpful post on topic SEO, hope to read more useful posts in future.
Thank You
Ganesh Maharjan recently posted…MCQ of Database Management System (DBMS) – Set 1
Twitter: bivori
January 24, 2013 6:10 pm
Ganesh, you should try different publish time and day to find out which one returns best result.
Because you are using WordPress, it pings with default ping service. However, it is better to add more ping services on your list for better result. You can expect quicker indexing and better ranking. But beware! too frequent pinging will be considered as spamming!
You can use SEO plugins if your theme does not have SEO features. Make sure that your current theme has use < h 1 > tag for your post title, link in Logo image and site tag is set as alt text. Make sure the theme loads faster. < / h 1 >
Suresh Khanal recently posted…WordPress Malware Removal Tool Sucuri!
Thanks Suresh ji for this useful roundup of wordpress seo tips.
Pinging is surely a good way to force the search engines to index our blog posts quicker but since we err in our grammar, spellings and other things, we usually hit the Publish or Update button too often within a short period of time.
And we ping the search engines every time we update something. Hence, we could be penalized for excessive pinging.
There’s a good plugin called Wordpress Ping Optimizer by masdiblogs which helps to check our pings.
I hope the plugin helps.
Twitter: bivori
January 25, 2013 8:21 pm
Thank you Neelam for your input and timely reminder. I agree with you are concerns are genuine.
Suresh Khanal recently posted…Don’t Ignore These SEO Tips for WordPress Websites
Twitter: CyberGanesh
January 31, 2013 4:22 pm
Thanks Neelam for suggesting the plugins for Ping called “WordPress Ping Optimizer”, I’ll try it on my blog…!
Ganesh Maharjan recently posted…MCQ of Database Management System (DBMS) – Set 1
Twitter: bloggingandwb
January 25, 2013 7:35 am
I agree with your all points except your 4th point. And I have a problem with 2nd point. I have only few visitors from my own country. I have more visitors from India and USA. but their time zone is totally different.
Raplus recently posted…Top 10 Benefits of Blogging
Twitter: bivori
January 25, 2013 9:18 am
Thank you Raplus for your comment.
Regarding the #4, I suggest to include a few more ping services to your ping list rather than the single pingomatic. Hope it helps you to get indexed sooner.
About #2, you can test by publishing new posts at different times and check which time brings in traffic quicker to your website. For example if you got 50 visitors when you published post at 7AM but only 30 visits when publishing next post at 3PM, obviously 7AM is better for you. You should run the test for quite some posts and determine the best time for your publish schedule.
Though you have traffic from around the globe and I do agree the timezone for each is different, still, you can find the best time for your website to publish new posts.
Suresh Khanal recently posted…Don’t Ignore These SEO Tips for WordPress Websites
Twitter: bloggingandwb
January 25, 2013 10:27 am
Thanks for the reply. Few months back, I saw a thread about ping in worriorforum. Many wrorriorforum members( I think, more than 20 members) had said there is no pint in pinging. That’s why I said that type of thing.
Raplus recently posted…How to SEO – 10 SEO Tips for 2013
Twitter: bivori
January 25, 2013 11:45 am
Once you have good sitemap and submitted the sitemap to the search engines every time you publish new post, ping won’t be really required. However, pinging is to raise the flag for search engines and welcoming them to crawl your page, there is no harm in calling them. Sometimes if crawlers do not pay much attention to your sitemap, pinging will help you.
So, better to have ping services and a good number of ping services listed.
Twitter: WinAppleWorld
January 25, 2013 1:39 pm
Well written sir.
A perfect guide for a newbie blogger or some one who is going through tough phase.
I have come across many such articles but everytime i read such article, i learn something new.
Anchit Shethia recently posted…Apple Nears Historic $1 Trillion Value
Twitter: bivori
January 25, 2013 5:13 pm
Thank you Anchit for the comment and I’m glad that you find the post useful. Blogging, after all, involves the ‘all-time-learning process’
Suresh Khanal recently posted…Don’t Ignore These SEO Tips for WordPress Websites
Twitter: WinAppleWorld
January 25, 2013 9:08 pm
Not only blogging but every field has something new to learn.
And a new thing i leanrt is how many keywords should be used as i used to stuff them in the beginning.
Anchit Shethia recently posted…Apple Nears Historic $1 Trillion Value
Hey, thanks for posting this. I have recently opened a website and was looking for some tips for generating a good traffic. I guess it will help me a lot.
Twitter: bivori
January 26, 2013 5:23 am
Ofcourse Vaibhav! With the best SEO practices, a proper plan and consistent effort you can certainly bring in more traffic and make a successful blog! My best wishes to you.
Suresh Khanal recently posted…Don’t Ignore These SEO Tips for WordPress Websites
HI Suresh
A very informative post.
I at times overlook the #3 and try to stuff the post with too many key words.
Also I feel I need to start using the Ping services.
Thanks for sharing this.
P.S Your message regarding comment on one of my post, it’s my very old post and I have disabled the comments for those. My Apologies for the inconvenience.
Sapna
Twitter: bivori
January 26, 2013 10:38 am
Having more ping services in your list will certainly help you indexed quicker. The whole lot of SEO process just after indexing only
I also used almost all the relevant keywords as tags but later realized that focusing on a fewer ones could produce better impact. Why not to chew bit by bit? After all we have to blog till the foreseeable future
Reg. comment in your psot: No problem. IMHO, it would be better to modify and update than to disable comments.
Suresh Khanal recently posted…Don’t Ignore These SEO Tips for WordPress Websites
Twitter: celebslams
January 26, 2013 9:41 pm
Hey..Nice Blog..Seriously, SEO is the major concern for bloggers and the task is becoming harder day by day.
Sanju recently posted…Top 10 Romantic Songs of All times
Twitter: bivori
January 27, 2013 3:07 pm
Thank you Sanju for commenting.
Suresh Khanal recently posted…Solved Auto-Spammed Comments Problem
Twitter: soulmate787
January 29, 2013 11:29 am
Nice & useful tips you shared, I will Apply these tips to my new project which I am starting on wordpress and I hope these will help me a lot.
Thanks for sharing.
Adnan Shahid recently posted…4 Handy Tips to Get Great Links By Using Infographics
Twitter: bivori
January 31, 2013 7:31 am
SEO is an ongoing learning and updating process and I hope these will help you to begin with. WordPress is really awesome platform indeed for optimization.
Suresh Khanal recently posted…Solved Auto-Spammed Comments Problem
Modern day SEO focuses on high quality, original content that provides value to the readers and incorporates an involved audience.
Sandipan recently posted…Quora Blogs – Are They Worth It?
Twitter: bivori
January 31, 2013 7:36 am
That’s absolutely correct!
BTW, you’ve written a nice post on Quora platform. Thank you for spreading awareness!
Suresh Khanal recently posted…Solved Auto-Spammed Comments Problem
Twitter: startup_today
January 31, 2013 3:40 am
Great post 1 As a blogger, SEO is crucial for getting a lot of traffic to my blog and i find that high quality content that is keyword rich works well for me
Twitter: bivori
January 31, 2013 7:24 am
Thanks Phil for your input. Welcome to bivori and I appreciate your comment.
Suresh Khanal recently posted…Solved Auto-Spammed Comments Problem
Twitter: Servando_Silva
February 1, 2013 9:17 am
I’ve heard adding big lists of pinging services isn’t good because Google can tag you as a SPAMer.
Since most ping services repeat each other, I think the best would be to have an small (elite) list of 3-5 services and no more. Have you heard about this?
Servando Silva recently posted…5 Great TED Talks for Bloggers
Twitter: bivori
February 1, 2013 10:52 am
That’s very understandable, Silva. Frequent pings are considered as ping spamming and you need to have some plugin that will limit the ping frequency within small interval. On the contrary, it is equally important that you ping your website once a week and every time you publish new posts. Pinging one time to each of the services won’t do any harm.
Suresh Khanal recently posted…Twitter Cards and how they can improve traffic
Twitter: Servando_Silva
February 1, 2013 11:03 am
But some people publish several posts per week or even per day. And every time you update a post or change something, the ping services do the pinging again. Not only when publishing.
But I agree, if you only publish 1-2 times per week and it’s only to publish a post, then it’s a must.
Servando Silva recently posted…5 Great TED Talks for Bloggers
Twitter: bivori
February 1, 2013 3:51 pm
That’s why I said you should have Ping Optimizer plugins. They’ll take care of frequent and subsequent pings.
If you have blog that gets new post every now and then, I hope the search engine crawlers are in the blog most of the times. You won’t need to focus heavily on pinging.
Suresh Khanal recently posted…Twitter Cards and how they can improve traffic
Twitter: enstinemuki
February 6, 2013 7:38 pm
What a great tutorial for starters. I’m going to send this link to my students to study during this weekend.
Thanks for publishing
Enstine Muki recently posted…2 Key factors to make money blogging ~ A must read!
I changed from a different platform to WordPress a few months ago and my experience with WordPress has been great. WordPress is certainly great for managing a blog. Thanks for mentioning the ping services. You have mentioned that you there should be limited number of images on the website. Is there a specific number?
Thanks for the nice tips,I have never used Ping services will be giving an try now.
Janmejai recently posted…Top 10 Sports of the World
Thanks for these seo tips share with us.I always forget to optimize my post images and thanks for these advices.Pinging is the proper way to index our pages speed or not?.
Nice post Suresh,I hope this post helps to every one,most experienced people are also doing mistakes but it always better to remind again and again. Thanks for share informative points with us.