One of the keys to a successful blog is to be able to drive traffic to your older posts. So you’re going to want to optimize those articles in a way that allows them to be search engine friendly.
Each blog article is like its own web page in that adheres to the same principles with regards to search engine rankings. Proper SEO optimization of your blog posts is crucial in order the get them to rank well, the higher they rank, the more likely your site will be found.
So with that in mind, here’s how to write perfect SEO articles in WordPress.
Meta Title/Post Title:
For starters, let’s look at how the meta title is different from the post title.
- Meta Title: the title that search engines see and then show as a search result
- Post Title: What the reader sees
If you don’t include the meta title in your site’s SEO settings, the title of the post will be shown as the meta title. Keywords are a big deal in a meta title.
Note: You want your post titles to be under 66 characters
Post meta breakdown:
Meta descriptions are highly significant for search engine ranking and each SEO plugin lets you include one. Look at your meta description like a piece of sales copy for your blog article. You get 156 characters to add in keywords while creating a description that compels users to click on the link. If you haven’t utilized meta descriptions before, now is the time to start doing so.
Since you now know what the meta description is and does, you want to go back to any previously published articles that don’t have one and add meta descriptions.
Remember, each post is significant when it comes to web traffic and ranking. Google views each post as its own web page, and you want to optimize everyone with keywords to achieve the best ranking.
Google doesn’t understand images. The text is what counts – which is why it’s a smart move to check out writing service reviews – and to make sure the search engines grasp what your image is, you need to insert image names that properly convey what the image is. So avoid uploading names such as image003.jpg, since it will do nothing to describe the image to Google.
Create names that are relevant to the actual image. For instance, if you are doing a post about vacationing in Aruba and you upload an image of a beach in Aruba and name the image “Beach” it won’t tell Google what you want it to, rather create the name “Beach-Aruba” to accurately convey it.
You can use the SEO Friendly Image plugin to use the name you give your image as ALT (alternate text). This will help people find your site when they’re searching for a specific image in Google image search.
If you decide to skip the plugin, you can simply add ALT manually when uploading the image.
A tip for optimization: When creating a name for an image, include keywords to yield better search ranking results.
Interlink and Anchor text:
Every time you create a new article, it’s a good move to link it back to an old post. This makes it easy for readers to find your earlier work and alerts the search engine spider to re-crawl your older work.
Use anchor text to interlink to your older posts. When you’re linking to an older blog post, be sure to insert the main keywords and post title into the available boxes.
Using an SEO plugin like Smart Links for Auto Linking will help optimize the links you create and lower bounce rates.
Another way to optimize links is to eliminate stop words in the permalink title. For example, a post title called: 6 Ways to Get a Six Pack, would have a default permalink of domain.com/6-ways-to-get-a-six-pack.html
“To”/”an” are the stop words in the above example. By clicking on edit permalink, you can alter the link to get a six-pack, thus getting rid of the stop words and the other non-essentials.
Note: Do not alter a post permalink once it’s been published.
H1,H2,H3 Headings:
A key aspect of SEO is the correct use of H1/H2/H3 heading(s). The default setting of SEO optimization includes H1 tags being used for the post title. So for your first sub-heading, you can go with an H2 heading, 2nd sub-heading H3, and continue on from there.
Correct heading tags are an important element of effective SEO, particularly for your longer posts. And to maximize your heading’s SEO potential, you’ll want to incorporate your keywords into your H1/H2/H3 tags.
Bonus Tip: You can seek the service of any reputed SEO agency to boost your rankings naturally. https://t-ranks.com is one of the leading digital agencies to purchase high-quality PBN links at a cheap price.
To Sum Things Up
SEO is both an art and a science. As mentioned above, you need to treat each blog post as its own web page and make every effort to properly optimize in order to impress Google and get the boost up the search rankings you’re looking for. While optimization can be a bit intimidating for those new to the game, if you just relax and follow these tips you’ll have the search engines sending people to your blog in no time.
This article from CarVeto is a good example of an optimized piece of content that ranks highly in Google for a medium to low competition keyword with some decent search volume. There is a good use of headline tags, URL structure, and images.
About the Author: Janet Anthony is a blogger from Kansas City and content writer at Top Writing Reviews who has been writing professionally for five years now. She mostly writes about blogging, social media, and SEO. Her motto is “What you do today can improve all your tomorrows”. Find Janet here: twitter
