The majority of professional bloggers and business owners choose WordPress to create a solid online presence. The tool enjoys such wide popularity because it lets users build eye-catching sites that appeal to the audience and inspire them for further interaction.
However, you should keep in mind that a visual side isn’t the only thing to bring visitors to your web resource. Another issue to take care of is to optimize your site for search engines so that it could reach top positions on the SERP.
How to Improve SERP Ranking
There are many factors that influence the ranking of your platform, from its content to links and speed, which means you’ll have to embrace a wide range of aspects of building an SEO-friendly site. Although WordPress has some built-in features for that, they are not enough to withstand severe competition on the web. To help you drive more search engine traffic to your site, there are many useful tools available for free. Install one of the WordPress SEO plugins from our set to make sure your content reaches the target audience smoothly.
All in One SEO Pack
One of the top WordPress plugins meant for automatic search engine optimization of sites is the All in One SEO Pack. The tool is a great choice for beginners, as it operates right out of the box. At the same time, advanced users will also appreciate the plugin for a convenient fine-tuning option. It provides automatic generation of Meta descriptions and keywords, optimization of post titles, and addition of alternate tags to images. In such a way, search engines will get a clear grasp of your content and deliver it to individuals interested in its subject area.
Using the All in One SEO Pack, you will have an opportunity to avoid the common problem of content duplication and, therefore, the Panda penalty. To let you make the most of your SEO strategy, the tool supports XML Sitemap, Google Analytics, and SEO on Custom Post Types. Moreover, it’s described as the only plugin ensuring SEO integration for eCommerce platforms built with WordPress, that’s why it’s definitely a must-have for your business.
WP Social SEO Booster
Ranking sites on the SERP, Google takes into account their social media rates, that’s why it’s significant to run a social-friendly platform. And WP Social SEO Booster is definitely the best WordPress SEO plugin for this purpose. With its help, you can integrate Google Rich Snippets into your content, optimize it for Facebook Open Graph SEO as well as add Twitter Meta Tags and Google+ Itemprop Tags to it. Everything can be performed with only a few clicks so you could save your time and energy for other tasks. WP Social is compatible with any WordPress SEO plugins and comprises all the microdata types that Google supports, which will allow you to improve the rankings of your web resource.
WordPress SEO by Yoast
Besides the technical aspect of optimization, bloggers should also concentrate on the creation of decent content, which is when WordPress SEO by Yoast will come in handy. The tool assists in choosing a focus keyword and provides that it is used all over the place. Thanks to its Snippet Preview feature, you will see the way your article’s title and Meta description are reflected on the SERP. It will let you check whether they are of a proper length and are meaningfully compared to other search results, which will largely increase your click-through rate.
By means of the Page Analysis option, you will be able to make sure that your content doesn’t miss anything crucial, e.g. focus keywords in alt tags or subheadings. If you have several sites, you won’t have to go through a tedious process of setting up the plugin on each one of them. Just install it on one platform, export its settings, and import them to the rest of your blogs. It’s extremely simple to use WordPress SEO by Yoast.
SEO Plugin by SQUIRRLY
To take up the highest possible position in search engines, your content should be both SEO- and reader-friendly. And Squirrly is an appropriate tool to create properly optimized and readable posts. With its aid, you will be able to find awesome keywords that will let your site outrank other resources on the web. Every week the tool generates an SEO Audit report for you to keep track of your blog’s progress. Using Squirrly, you don’t have to be an expert in SEO issues, as it will inform you of all the areas requiring some kind of improvement. If you are on the right track while editing an article, the interface of the plugin will be green. In such a way, you can be confident your SEO strategy will bring desirable results.
WordPress SEO Comments Plugin
As a rule, many readers share their feedback on interesting posts, and those remarks often contain keywords. But, unfortunately, WordPress doesn’t come with anything to optimize them. To fix things up, don’t hesitate to install WordPress SEO Comments Plugin on your platform. With the help of this easy-to-implement tool, Google will get access to the comments of your audience and index them, which will let you drive extra traffic to your web resource. Just make sure people use phrases in a natural language so that search engines wouldn’t have any problems with their indexation.
SEO Plugin LiveOptim
Here’s another tool that will let you optimize the content of your site in compliance with Google requirements. In fact, SEO Plugin LiveOptim provides more than just an optimization solution to its users. After setting it up, you will automatically join the largest community of SEO gurus. They can give useful advice on any questions you may come up with, from explaining the principles of the plugin’s work to recommending some other great tools to boost your traffic. As experts counseling is available for free and round the clock, you will get a Google-friendly site in no time.
SEO WordPress
SEO WordPress Plugin by Mervin Praison is a tool powerful in its functionality and easy to implement. Once it is installed, you will see columns for a title, Meta description, and keywords under each post in the admin panel. To optimize pages of your web resource, you will need to fill those columns up. The plugin has a feature of breadcrumbs that allow search engines to understand the structure of platforms much easier. Due to Google Analytics integration, you will be able to track the number of your readers and how much time they spend on your site. Another handy option of the tool is Google Authorship, which lets web surfers see the content author’s name and photo right on the SERP.
Auto Clean URL for SEO
URLs are known to play a key role in ranking websites on the SERP, that’s why it’s crucial to approach this aspect with due diligence, and Auto Clean URL for SEO will assist you in such a case. The plugin eliminates all the symbols apart from a letter, digit, apostrophe or space. It also recognizes stop words in English, Spanish and German languages and automatically removes them from post slugs. Make use of this tool to create SEO-friendly URLs and bring your site to a higher position in the listing of search engine results. Keep in mind that it is not compatible with qTranslate and WPML plugins for multilingual blogs.
SEO Audit Tool by ContentLook
SEO Audit by ContentLook is a must-have tool for everyone who runs a WordPress-based site, as it provides a detailed report on the major aspects of content marketing such as SEO, blogging, social media, authority, links, and traffic. With the help of this plugin, you will be able to see the areas that require meticulous attention and fix them instantly. You can also share the report with your teammates, by downloading it in PDF format and sending it to them via email. The package with SEO Audit includes step-by-step guidelines that can dramatically facilitate the process of set-up and implementation.
Visual Composer for WordPress
SEO definitely matters in promoting your web resource, but you won’t achieve a desirable result without a visually appealing platform. Here’s an effective plugin to create a stunning design for your site. Visual Composer allows for building complex layouts and requires no knowledge of coding for that. Thanks to the tool, your content and UI elements will look flawless to visitors of your site regardless of the devices they use to enter it, both desktops and handhelds. Thus, it is unexaggerated one of the best WordPress plugins for developers (to find more, click here).
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Running a properly optimized platform gives an opportunity to become more visible among customers. And to build an SEO-friendly site, don’t hesitate to equip it with some of the WordPress SEO plugins listed here. Do you know some other good tools that can help web resources take high positions on the SERP? Then, we will be grateful if you share your knowledge with us in the comments below.