WordPress SEO Masterclass: SEO tips that really work

What is WordPress SEO?

SEO, or search engine optimisation, refers to the process of search engine optimisation.

It involves optimising websites to improve their findability and reach in the organic search results of search engines.

WordPress SEO focuses on the optimisation processes specifically for websites created with WordPress.

This involves more than just content optimisation or link building. Technical and structural improvements also play a crucial role.

Before we look at the individual optimisation measures, let's take a brief look at WordPress itself.

WordPress: What is so special about this content management system?

WordPress is an outstanding content management system (CMS) that has enjoyed constant popularity and use worldwide and in German-speaking countries since its launch in 2003. This platform allows users to create and manage websites and has become a favourite choice for bloggers, businesses and developers due to its ease of use and flexibility.

Current statistics on WordPress usage

Worldwide: 2023 statistics show that WordPress now powers 43.1% to 43.3% of the entire internet, with over 851.4 million websites running on this platform:

CMS	Websites (% total)	Websites (number)*
WordPress	43.1%	810 million
Shopify	3.9%	70 million
Wix	2.5%	43 million
Squarespace	2.1%	38 million
Joomla	1.8%	30 million

*Estimate based on the market share of the individual CMS platforms and the estimated number of websites on the internet.

German-speaking countries: In terms of German-speaking countries, WordPress accounts for 42.7% of all websites and has a market share of 65.1% in the CMS market.(Source)

These figures illustrate the dominant position of WordPress both globally and in German-speaking countries.

Importance of search engine optimisation (SEO) for WordPress

Optimising your WordPress website for search engines is essential to improve the visibility and ranking of your website. By implementing SEO best practices, you can ensure that your website can be easily found by your target audience, ultimately leading to increased traffic and potentially more conversions.

SEO for WordPress involves a range of strategies and tactics, including choosing an SEO-friendly hosting provider, using SEO plugins, optimising content and much more.

The following sections of this article will dive deeper into the various aspects of WordPress SEO to give you a better understanding of how to optimise your website for better search engine rankings.

The importance of a clean WordPress installation for SEO

Before you dive into the world of WordPress SEO, it's crucial to start with a clean, well-structured WordPress installation. A clean installation ensures that there are no technical obstacles right from the start that could affect the performance of your website and its visibility in search engines.

The basics of a clean installation

A clean WordPress installation involves several aspects. Here are some of the most important points you should consider:

• Choice of hosting provider: choose a reliable hosting provider that offers good loading times and high availability.
• Using an SEO-friendly theme: A well-programmed, lightweight and SEO-optimised theme is crucial for SEO.
• Minimising plugins: Only install the plugins you really need to maintain the speed and security of your website.
• Permalink structure configuration: A clear, SEO-friendly permalink structure helps search engines to better understand the content of your website.

Optimisation from day one

It's advisable to ensure a clean structure and good SEO practices from the start, rather than having to try and fix problems later. Here are some steps you should take right from the start:

• Performance optimisation: use caching plugins and optimise images to reduce loading times.
• Basic SEO settings: Configure basic SEO settings such as search engine visibility, permalink structure and XML sitemap.
• Mobile optimisation: Make sure your website looks and works well on mobile devices, as mobile search is becoming increasingly important.

Avoid common mistakes

A common mistake is, for example, overloading the website with too many plugins, which affects speed and increases security risks. A clean WordPress installation with only the necessary plugins can help you avoid many common SEO problems in the first place.

WordPress hosting

Hosting is the foundation of any WordPress website. A good hosting environment not only ensures the accessibility of your website, but also influences loading times and thus the user experience as well as SEO performance. Reliable hosting is like a solid foundation for a house - without a strong foundation, the structures above cannot stand stable.

Importance of WordPress hosting for search engine optimisation

Good hosting isn't just about having a place to store your website, it's about how efficiently and quickly it loads for visitors. A good hosting provider will ensure that your website loads quickly, is secure and stays online reliably, which are all factors that can positively impact SEO and user experience.

Checklist for high-quality WordPress SEO hosting

Here is a checklist that can help you identify a quality WordPress SEO hosting provider:

• Speed: The loading time of your website is an important ranking factor for Google. Look for hosting providers that offer fast loading times.

• Availability: High availability (close to 100%) ensures that your website remains accessible even with high traffic.

• Support: Competent and quickly accessible customer support is important in order to solve any problems promptly.

• Security: A good hosting provider should offer robust security measures to protect your website from threats.

• SEO features: Some hosting providers offer SEO tools and features that can help you optimise your website for search engines.

WordPress managed hosting

Managed WordPress hosting is a hosting solution that is specifically tailored to WordPress websites. Unlike traditional hosting, where you are responsible for managing and maintaining your website, the managed hosting provider takes over many of these tasks for you.

Here are some of the benefits and features of managed WordPress hosting:

Care and support

Managed WordPress hosting providers usually offer expert support for WordPress-specific questions and problems. This means that you have access to people who are familiar with WordPress and can help you solve problems efficiently.

Performance optimisation

The servers and services of a managed WordPress hosting provider are specially optimised for WordPress. This means that they usually offer faster loading times and better performance than conventional hosting solutions.

Automatic updates

A key feature of managed WordPress hosting is the automation of WordPress and plugin updates. This ensures that your website is always up to date and helps to minimise security risks.

Security features

Managed WordPress hosting providers often offer advanced security features such as automatic backups, malware scans and DDoS protection to protect your website from various threats.

Developer tools

Many managed WordPress hosting providers offer developer-friendly tools such as staging environments, Git integration and SSH access to make developing and managing your website easier.

Price point

Managed WordPress hosting is usually more expensive than shared hosting or VPS hosting as it offers a higher level of support and specialised services.

Managed WordPress hosting providers

Provider	Description of provider
SiteGround	Special features: Favourable packages, 10 GB storage, daily backups
Kinsta	Kinsta is known for its high-performance WordPress hosting solutions and offers excellent speed and security.
WP Engine	WP Engine is a premium WordPress hosting provider that offers strong performance and security.
Flywheel	Special features: User-friendly, custom caching configurations, free website migrations
Cloudways	Special features: Managed VPS hosting, automated backups, easy scaling options
DreamHost	DreamHost offers a fully automated managed WordPress experience at an unbeatable price, making it ideal for growing businesses

WordPress themes

The theme you choose for your WordPress website not only determines its visual appearance, but also influences SEO performance and user experience. A well-chosen, SEO-friendly theme is like a well-planned foundation for a house - it ensures that everything built on top of it is stable and efficient.

Requirements for a WordPress theme in terms of SEO

Aspect	Theme description
Code quality	Clean, efficient code that complies with WordPress best practices
Responsive design	Adapts to different devices and screen sizes.
Loading times	Fast loading times for a better user experience and SEO performance.
SEO features	Built-in SEO options and good integration with popular SEO plugins.

Checklist: What you should look for when choosing a theme from an SEO perspective

• Code quality: A well-coded theme follows WordPress best practices and offers a clean and efficient code structure that is easy for search engines to crawl.
• Responsive design: An SEO-friendly theme should have a responsive design so that it looks and works well on different devices and screen sizes.
• Loading times: A fast theme is crucial for good loading times, which in turn improves user experience and SEO performance. You can check the loading time of a theme by testing the theme's demo site with tools like Google PageSpeed Insights.
• SEO features: Check what SEO features the theme offers and how it integrates with popular SEO plugins. Some themes offer built-in SEO options, but it is also important that they work well with plugins such as Yoast SEO or All in One SEO Pack.

Recommended WordPress theme providers

Choosing the right theme provider can help you find a high-quality, SEO-friendly theme. Here are some recommended providers:

• Elegant Themes: Offers a wide range of SEO-friendly themes and is known for their popular Divi theme, which offers intuitive drag-and-drop design functionality.
• StudioPress: Known for their Genesis Framework, StudioPress offers a range of SEO-optimised and well-coded themes.
• Astra: Astra is a lightweight and SEO-optimised theme that offers a fast loading time and a variety of customisation options.

Instructions: Installing and activating a WordPress theme

WordPress is installed with a standard theme (default theme). If you would like to replace the default theme with a different theme, first navigate to the WordPress administration panel:

Step 1: Click on "Design" on the left-hand menu bar and then on "Themes". This will take you to an overview page with the themes already installed.

Step 2: Now click on the "Add new theme" button.

Step 3: A selection of themes from the official WordPress theme directory will open. Here you have the option of uploading your own theme or using the search function to find a theme.

If you have purchased a paid theme from a provider and would like to install it, you can upload the file here and install the theme.

At the top of the theme page you will also find several directory tabs: Featured, Popular, Latest, Favourites and Filter by functions. The "Featured" tab is active by default.

If you now move the cursor over a theme, two options appear: Install and Preview.

Click on "Preview" to see a preview of the theme.

If you like the theme, you can add it to the page by clicking on "Install" in the top left-hand corner. Otherwise, you can continue searching for a suitable theme (see next step).

Step 4: Under "Filter by functions", you can select your favourite functions in the Layout, Features and Theme sections.

Step 5: Then click on "Apply filter" to display the corresponding theme selection.

Step 6: Once you have found an appealing theme, click on it and install it. You can activate it immediately with another click.

Now let's move on to the next important topic: WordPress SEO extensions.

SEO plugins for WordPress: These extensions help you with search engine optimisation

SEO plugins are indispensable tools when it comes to improving the visibility and performance of your WordPress website in search engines. And WordPress has a lot to offer in this regard.

The SEO tools offer a wide range of functions, from optimising meta tags and generating sitemaps to content analysis.

As a rule, a few plugins are sufficient. Using too many extensions has an unfavourable effect on the loading time of your website. And we don't want that. Because a low loading time is one of the most important ranking factors for Google.

In this section, we will analyse four popular SEO plugins: Yoast SEO, The SEO Framework, Rank Math and All-in-One SEO.

Yoast SEO

Yoast SEO is one of the most popular SEO plugins for WordPress. It offers a comprehensive range of features to help you optimise your website for search engines.

Functionality	Feature Description
SEO analysis	Analyses the SEO value of your content and makes suggestions for improvement.
Readability analysis	Analyses the readability of your text and provides tips for improvement.
Focus keyword optimisation	Helps you to define and optimise a focus keyword for your content.
Meta tags optimisation	Allows you to easily edit meta titles and descriptions.
XML sitemaps	Automatically generates a sitemap for your website.
Breadcrumbs	Allows you to easily set up breadcrumbs for improved user guidance.
Canonical URLs	Avoids duplicate content by setting canonical URLs.
Schema markup	Enables the simple integration of schema markup.
RSS feed optimisation	Optimises the RSS feed of your website to improve search engine crawling.
Social Media Integration	Enables how your content is shared on social media.

USP: Yoast SEO offers a unique real-time page analysis that gives you instant feedback on the SEO and readability optimisation of your content.

After installing Yoast, you should first activate the following functions. You can then use these to carry out various SEO measures.

Activate/deactivate functions:

1. Once you have installed and activated the plugin, click on the new "SEO tab" and then on "Functions" in the top bar.

2. Now activate/deactivate the desired functions in the function list. You have a choice:

With Yoast SEO you can:

• define a focus keyword and analyse the article or website you have written
• edit the title and meta description (meta descriptions) and view them in a snippet preview
• check the readability of your SEO texts
• Check pages and posts for duplicate content
• generate an XML sitemap
• Format page content so that it is displayed properly in social networks
• Activate breadcrumbs (theme must support it, otherwise this feature will not work)
• redirect the attachment URLS automatically generated by WordPress to the actual attachment page, saving you valuable crawl budget
• mark relevant pages as cornerstone content

Rank Math: an alternative SEO plugin for optimising your website

Rank Math is an up-and-coming SEO plugin that is characterised by its user-friendliness and comprehensive functions, and is basically similar to the Yoast SEO plugin - but it is more comprehensive, faster and much clearer.

The Rank Math manufacturer offers you the opportunity to test the plugin using the Rank Math demo: you can take a look at the plugin setup wizard and all available setting options at your leisure and without any risk.

Function	Function Description
SEO analysis	Provides a detailed SEO analysis of your website.
Keyword ranking tracking	Tracks how your keywords rank in the search engines.
Rich snippet support	Enables the easy integration of rich snippets.
404 monitor	Monitors your website for 404 errors and helps you fix them.
Redirection Manager	Manages redirects and prevents duplicate content.
SEO breadcrumbs	Allows you to easily set up SEO-friendly breadcrumbs.
Automatic image SEO	Automatically optimises the alt tags of your images.
Sitemap generation	Automatically creates sitemaps to improve indexing.
WooCommerce SEO	Provides special SEO optimisations for WooCommerce websites.
Content SEO overview	Provides an overview of the SEO-friendliness of your content.

USP: Compared to competitor extensions, Rank Math comes with few lines of code.

	RANK MATH	YOAST SEO	SEO PRESS
Lines of code	51.300	87.200	61.500

The less code a plugin contains, the more powerful your website will be.

Additional functions: The tool offers you many more features: Rank Math presents a total of more than 80 different functions on its website.

All-in-One SEO Pack

All-in-One SEO Pack is another popular and powerful SEO plugin for WordPress. It offers a wide range of features to optimise your website for search engines.

Functionality	Description: SEO Customiser
SEO Customiser	Enables easy customisation of SEO settings.
Title and meta optimisation	Helps with the optimisation of titles and meta tags.
XML sitemap generation	Automatically creates sitemaps to improve indexing.
Robots.txt editor	Enables easy editing of the robots.txt file.
Social media integration	Improves the presentation of your content in social media.
Schema Markup	Supports the integration of structured data for better visibility.
Breadcrumbs	Enables easy setup of breadcrumbs for improved user guidance.
Local SEO	Offers special optimisations for local SEO.
RSS feed optimisation	Optimises the RSS feed of your website to improve search engine crawling.
Google AMP support	Supports Google AMP integration for improved mobile performance.

uSP: All-in-One SEO offers special local SEO features to help you rank better in local search results.

The SEO Framework

The SEO Framework is known for its lightweight and bloat-free approach to SEO. It provides the essential SEO features without unnecessary distractions.

Functionality	Feature Description
Automatic meta tags	Automatically generates meta tags for your content.
Title optimisation	Optimises the titles of your pages and posts for search engines.
Description optimisation	Helps to optimise meta descriptions for better click-through rates.
Canonical URLs	Prevents duplicate content by setting canonical URLs.
Sitemap generation	Automatically creates sitemaps to improve indexing.
Browser caching	Improves loading times through browser caching.
Robots.txt editor	Enables easy editing of the robots.txt file.
Social media metadata	Improves the presentation of your content in social media.
Structured data	Supports the integration of structured data for better visibility.
301 redirects	Allows you to easily set up 301 redirects.

USP: The SEO Framework is known for its bloat-free and fast performance, making it a great choice for websites of all sizes.

Now let's move on to the extensions that will help you reduce loading time.

5 WordPress SEO plugins for load time optimisation

The use of lightweight website templates (themes) and a few plugins have a positive effect on loading time. At the beginning of this guide, you have already learned that the servers of a website host play a major role in optimising the loading time of a website.

The following extensions for page speed optimisation have proven their worth:

W3 Total Cache

To make a website load faster, a caching tool can be used to save an image of a website. W3 total cache offers you complex cache functions such as browser cache, page cache and other features such as Content Delivery Network (CDN) and Minify.

WP Rocket

With this paid plugin, you can easily optimise the performance of your WordPress website.

In addition to the great caching function, you can use the lazy load feature to load images outside of the actual viewing area. The reduction of HTML and JavaScript code as well as CSS files is made possible by an additional plugin function.

Autoptimise

Autoptimize optimises website load time by aggregating, minimising and caching scripts and styles.

Among other things, the plugin offers functions to:

• Optimise HTML, JavaScript and CSS code,
• Merge JavaScript, inline JavaScript, CSS and inline CSS files,
• Insert and move inline CSS code,
• Remove Google Fonts, emojis or query strings from statistical resources and
• Optimise images or load them with a delay.

WP Super Cache

The open source plugin WP Super Cache helps you to generate static HTML files from dynamic WordPress websites. These are displayed instead of the heavier WP PHP scripts.

A popular function is the automated garbage collection process, which cleans up old files from the cache directory.

Optimus

With the Optimus plugin, PNG files can be compressed without loss and JPEG files with slight losses. The focus here is on preserving the image quality.

Advantages:

• Original and preview images (thumbnails) are automatically optimised
• progressive compression ensures fast image loading
• interoperable with WordPress WooCommerce and Multisite
• special mass optimisation function

You can find more information and tips on this important topic in our blog article "All about page speed and loading time optimisation with Pagespeed Insights".

Other useful WordPress SEO extensions

Broken Link Checker

Website operators can use this WordPress plugin to check the functionality of internal and external links.

You can enter intervals in the Broken Link Checker at which all hyperlinks on your website are tested.

Further plugin functions:

• Link changes can be made via the extension menu.
• Missing redirects and images are also found by the tool.

Cookie Notice

The GDPR-compliant Cookie Notice plugin allows you to comply with the provisions of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). The tracking codes from Google Analytics and the like only become active once visitors have agreed to your website's cookie policy. In this way, you protect yourself from any warnings or fines.

Schema Pro

Use plugins such as Schema Pro to add structured data and improve visibility in the SERPs.

Link Whisper

Use plugins like Link Whisper for better internal linking.

Choosing the right SEO plugin for your WordPress website can make a big difference in the visibility and performance of your website in search engines.

Each of these plugins offers a unique set of features and benefits tailored to the specific needs and goals of your SEO strategy.

Experiment with different plugins and find out which one best suits your needs to take your WordPress SEO to the next level.

Now that we know the most important SEO extensions, let's look at WordPress SEO basics.

WordPress basic settings

The basic settings of your WordPress site are crucial to the success of your website in the search engines. Without this solid foundation, your website is unlikely to get the visibility and traffic you want.

In this section, we'll go through some basic settings and practices you should consider to build a solid SEO foundation for your website.

Visibility for search engines

It's important that your website is visible to search engines. In WordPress, there is a setting that allows you to enable or disable search engine visibility.

• Go to Settings > Reading in your WordPress dashboard.
• Make sure that the Allow search engine indexing option is activated.

Subdomains or directories

The structure of your website is crucial for SEO. A common question is whether subdomains or directories should be used. Here are the differences:

Property	Subdomain	Directory
URL structure	sub.domain.com	domain.com/sub
SEO rating	Rated separately	Evaluated together

Example:

• Subdomain: blog.example.com
• Directory: example.com/blog

From an SEO perspective, directories are preferable to subdomains. This is because Google views each subdomain as an independent entity. This means that you would have to carry out search engine optimisation for each subdomain.

With or without www?

The choice between a domain with or without "www" depends on your personal preferences. Choose one version and make sure that the other is redirected to the chosen version to avoid duplicates.

Example:

• If you choose www.beispiel.com, example.com should redirect to www.beispiel.com.

SSL / HTTPS

SSL (Secure Socket Layer) is important for the security of your website and is rated favourably by search engines.

Purchase and install an SSL certificate through your hosting provider or use a free certificate from Let's Encrypt.

If you want to learn how to successfully redirect from HTTP to HTTPS, then our article "Why and how you should switch WordPress to HTTPS" is just right for you.

Permalinks and the URL structure

A clean and SEO-friendly URL structure is crucial for the visibility of your website.

Switching from a standard URL to a custom URL is very easy to do:

1. First, go to Settings > Permalinks in the WordPress backend to find out the current setting.
2. Only make a permalink change if you already know how you want to organise your URL structure.
3. After making your selection/entry, save your changes.

You should keep these general WordPress SEO tips in mind when creating URLs and permalinks:

• Use the main keyword of the respective page in the URL or permalink.
• Clearly display hierarchies in a URL or permalink.
• Use URLs that are as short as possible.
• Pay attention to speaking URLs: The visitor should recognise what the page offers based on the URL.
• Increase the readability of your URLs by separating words with a hyphen.
• Always use lower case for a URL or a permalink.

Multilingualism

If your website is available in several languages, use a plugin such as WPML or Polylang to configure the different language versions correctly.

Sitemap

A sitemap helps search engines to understand the structure of your website.

Use an SEO plugin such as Yoast SEO to create a sitemap and submit it to Google Search Console.

In our blog post "Create and submit a sitemap easily", we show you how to create a sitemap in WordPress and submit it to Google Search Console.

.htaccess

The .htaccess file is a powerful configuration file that controls the server settings. It is therefore a configuration file.

You need it if your site is running on an Apache web server. You can use it to define rules for individual directories and subdirectories or for the entire website. This is because it regulates the directory in which it is stored.

Use the .htaccess file to set up redirects, optimise the URL structure and improve website security.

robots.txt

The robots.txt file gives instructions to search engines about which areas of your website they can and cannot index.

WordPress automatically creates a virtual robots.txt file, which is stored in the root directory of your domain. It instructs the search engine crawlers how they should crawl the pages of your website.

The text file is part of the robots exclusion standard protocol, a defined web standard group.

An optimised robots.txt file helps you to direct the valuable crawling time (crawling budget) specifically to the important page content.

Google Search Console and Google Analytics

Google Analytics helps you to find out how your SEO is affecting your WordPress site.

The tool shows you

• whether your traffic comes from Google search, social networks, backlinks (referral), a direct page view or email,
• how many pages were viewed,
• how long the average dwell time was or
• how high the bounce rate of your users was.

We therefore recommend that you create a Google Search Console account and a Google Analytics account and link the two together. Here you can find out how to set up your Google Search Console (formerly Webmaster Tools).

Next, we'll discuss a topic that is often neglected: website architecture (page structure) and on-page optimisation.

Structural on-page SEO measures for optimising a WordPress website

The structure of your WordPress website influences how search engines interpret and index your content. A well-structured website makes it easier for search engines to understand the content of your pages and improves the user experience. In this section, we will discuss the most important aspects of website structuring in WordPress and their impact on SEO.

Pages vs. posts

There are two main types of content in WordPress: Pages and Posts. While pages are for static content like your about us or contact page, posts are for time-sensitive content like blog posts.

	Pages	Posts
Content	Static	Time dependent
Comments	Deactivated	Enabled
Taxonomies	None	Categories, Tags
Sorting	Hierarchical	Chronological

Categories and tags

Categories and tags help you to organise your content and provide structure for users and search engines.

They have the following effects on WordPress SEO:

• Structure and internal linking: With tags and categories, you create internal links as you link related page content together.
• Additional information with added value: Additional information, keywords or synonyms can be used to supplement the tags.
• Duplicate content: The normal website pages and overview pages of the categories and tags can be very similar due to the titles, images and text excerpts. To prevent Google from recognising this as duplicate content, you can exclude these overview pages from search engine indexing. You can use an extension such as Yoast or Rank Math or the robots.txt file to do this.

While tags (keywords) can be used to specify the post details, categories group certain page content into superordinate subject areas.

Breadcrumbs

Breadcrumbs are a secondary navigation that helps users understand their position on your website and improves vertical internal linking. This favours the crawlability of your website.

This in turn sends a positive signal to Google, which in turn has a positive effect on your ranking.

Example:

Home > Blog > SEO > This post

Topic clusters (siloing)

Topic clusters help to organise the content on your website and improve the relevance and authority of your website. A topic cluster consists of a main topic (pillar content) and several subtopics (cluster content).

Example:

• Pillar Content: A comprehensive guide to SEO.
• Cluster content: Articles on specific SEO techniques such as keyword research, link building and on-page optimisation.

In this section, we've covered the most important aspects of structuring your WordPress website and their impact on SEO. By organising and structuring your content effectively, you can improve both the user experience and the SEO performance of your website.

Content optimisation

It's often said in the digital marketing world that content is king. This is especially true when it comes to SEO (search engine optimisation). Optimising your content is crucial to ranking well in search engines and improving the visibility of your website. In this section, we'll explore the different aspects of content optimisation and show you how to optimise your content for better SEO results.

What is content optimisation?

Content optimisation is the process of improving your content to make it more attractive to search engines and users. This includes choosing the right keywords, structuring your content, optimising images and much more.

Keyword research as the foundation of your success

Keyword research is the first step in content optimisation. It is important to find the right keywords that your target group uses and to use them in your content.

How to carry out keyword research:

1. Topic identification: Identify the main topics you want to write about.
2. Use keyword tools: Use tools such as Google Keyword Planner, Ahrefs or SEMrush to find popular keywords and their search volume.
3. Competitor analysis: Analyse which keywords your competitors are using and how they rank.
4. Long-tail keywords: Find long-tail keywords that are less competitive and more specific.

Tool	Function
Google Keyword Planner	Finds keywords and estimates the search volume
Ahrefs	Analyses keywords and the competition
SEMrush	Provides comprehensive keyword data and competitor analysis

Writing SEO texts

Once you've found your keywords, it's time to write your content. Here are some tips on how to write SEO-optimised copy:

• Keyword placement: place your main keywords in the titles, subtitles and main text.
• Naturalness: Write naturally and don't force keywords into the text.
• Unique content: Make sure your content is unique and informative.
• Timeliness: Keep your content current and update it regularly.

HTML headings

HTML headings help search engines to understand the structure of your content. They enable search engines to recognise the relevance of your content to certain keywords.

Example of an HTML heading structure:

• H1: Main title of your post
  • H2: Subtitle (main point)
    • H3: Sub-subtitle (sub-item)
      • H4: Further subdivision (if necessary)

Google snippets & other optimisation tips

Rich snippets are enhanced snippets that display additional information in the search results, such as star ratings, images and prices. SEO plugins can help you create rich snippets and further optimise your content.

Here are some SEO plugins that can be helpful:

• Yoast SEO: Helps create rich snippets and offers many other optimisation features.
• All in One SEO Pack: Offers similar features to Yoast and is a popular alternative.

Image SEO

Images can have a significant impact on your content optimisation. Here are some tips for optimising your images:

• Reduce file size: Use tools like TinyPNG to reduce the file size of your images.
• Use alt tags: Add alt tags to your images to describe them for search engines.

Content design and content optimisation

A well-designed content layout can improve the user experience and increase the time spent on your website.

• Readability: Ensure good readability with sufficient paragraphs, bullet points and subheadings.
• Image use: Use images and graphics to make your content visually appealing.

Links

Linking is an important part of content optimisation. It not only helps search engines but also users to navigate through your content.

• Internal links: Create links to other relevant content on your website.
• External links: Link to high-quality, relevant external resources.

Advanced WordPress SEO

After you've mastered the basics of WordPress SEO, it's time to dive into the world of advanced SEO techniques. Advanced SEO strategies can help you to further improve the visibility and performance of your website to achieve even better search engine rankings. In this section, we'll look at mobile SEO, reducing load times, structured data and link building.

Mobile SEO

Mobile SEO is essential as more and more users are accessing websites via their mobile devices. A mobile-optimised website not only provides a better user experience, but is also ranked preferentially by Google.

Responsive design:

• Make sure your theme is responsive so that it adapts to all screen sizes.
• Example: A user visits your website from a smartphone. With a responsive design, the website will display correctly and be easy to navigate, regardless of the screen size of the device.

Mobile-friendly test:

• Check your website with the Google Mobile-Friendly Test to make sure it is mobile-friendly.

Page Speed Optimisation:

• Mobile users expect fast loading times. Use tools such as Google PageSpeed Insights to check loading times and receive optimisation recommendations.

Reduce WordPress loading times

Loading times are an important ranking factor for Google. A fast-loading website also offers a better user experience.

Caching:

• Use caching plugins such as W3 Total Cache or WP Super Cache to reduce loading times.

Optimise images:

• Compress images before uploading with tools like TinyPNG or use plugins like Smush for compression.

CDN (Content Delivery Network):

• A CDN delivers your website content from servers that are geographically closer to the user's location, significantly reducing load times.

Check plugins:

• Deactivate and delete all unneeded plugins, as too many plugins can slow down the website.

Structured data / schema markup

Structured data helps search engines to better understand the content of your website and can improve the presentation of your website in the SERPs (search engine results pages).

Schema markup:

• Add schema markup to your website to give search engines additional information about the content of your page.
• Example: If you have recipes on your website, structured data can provide search engines with information about the ingredients, cooking times and ratings.

Rich snippets:

• Rich snippets display additional information directly in search results, such as star ratings, images and prices.

Tools and plugins:

• Use plugins such as Schema Pro or the Google Structured Data Markup Helper tool to add structured data to your website.

Link building

Link building is an advanced SEO technique that aims to improve the authority and relevance of your website through high-quality backlinks.

Internal links:

• Create internal links between relevant content on your website to make it easier for users and search engines to navigate.

External links:

• Get backlinks from high quality, relevant websites to increase the authority of your website.

Guest posts:

• Write guest posts on other blogs and websites in your industry to get both traffic and backlinks.

Optimise your website content with this step-by-step guide

The following steps and tips will help you to improve your content.

Tip 1: Carry out keyword research

In order to improve your visibility in organic search results, it is necessary to look at the user's search intent, the search term and the keywords. This is because you need content that responds to the search intent of visitors and also contains relevant keywords.

The foundation of a search engine optimised post is researching and analysing the most important keywords. You can find out how to do both in our guide "Keyword research & keyword analysis".

Tip 2: Write SEO texts

Good SEO texts contain content that can achieve good search engine rankings.

That sounds good and simple at the same time, doesn't it?

For an SEO text to actually rank well, a number of factors have to work together. And the text should also fulfil certain criteria so that it appeals to readers and search engines:

Among other things, it should

• contain unique content
• be informative and entertaining
• be topic-optimised and contain the previously researched keywords

More about how to write SEO texts

Tip 3: Use correct HTML headings

HTML headings work like headings in Word: There can only ever be one H1(main heading) in any text - anything else is incorrect. And the H1-H6 heading hierarchy must be adhered to.

Tip 4: Prepare a perfect Google snippet

After a search query, the first thing users notice about you is the snippet from Google Ads or your organic SERP snippet. That's why you should take the time to design and optimise it.

A Google snippet can be optimised using the Sistrix SERP snippet generator or an extension such as Yoast SEO.

Tip 5: Stick to the optimisation tips of a plugin

Yoast or Rank Math contain numerous functions that you can use to optimise your website and content. If you follow their feedback, you'll be on the safe side.

Tip 6: Pay attention to image SEO

By optimising images, you can not only achieve a better ranking in image search, but also in organic search.

This is because images also have a positive effect on the user experience, as they can break up the text structure and illustrate a term or entire text passage

You can find out how to optimise images in our SEO-optimised images article.

Tip 7: Focus on content design

Writing a text is one thing, content optimisation is another, which is often put on the back burner.

You can improve the usability and readability of a finished text by adding images and videos and formatting it attractively.

Valuable tips for optimisation:

• Use a subheading every 150 to 300 words.
• Use short sentences and paragraphs.
• Embed images/videos.
• Highlight tips, key phrases, words or important text passages with coloured boxes or bold type.
• Add an alternative text with the focus keyword or a relevant term to each image.

Tip 8: Ensure good links

Internal links/links: Internal links navigate visitors to your website, increasing their dwell time.

With their help, you can tell Google which pages are important to you and which keywords should rank in the search engines.

External links/links: These are used to link the content of a website to other websites. This can be further content or text sources from websites with high domain authority.

This improves the user experience for your users and shows Google that you value high-quality content.

nofollow: If you want to avoid a hyperlink being evaluated by Google, you can add rel="nofollow" to it.

This instructs the search engine crawlers to ignore the link target.

Tip 9: Reduce WordPress loading times

As the loading time has been one of Google's ranking factors since the Core Vital Values update, it should of course also be optimised.

Our article "All about page speed and loading time optimisation with PageSpeed Insights" is a comprehensive guide that provides you with explanations and tools as well as the best optimisation measures.

Tip 10: Use structured data/markup

With the help of structured data via microdata, JSON-LD or RDFa, you can mark up the content of your website for search engines such as Google or Bing. Thanks to the markups, they can categorise and interpret the data better, which improves its readability.

If this makes your search result stand out from others, visitors are more likely to click on your website. And this increases your click-through rate.

Tip 11: Build backlinks

Even if you have followed all the previous optimisation tips, your website may not get a top ranking.

Why is this?

Your website may lack the crucial authority (domain authority): You build this up through natural backlinks. Backlinks are links to your website that have been created by other websites. Backlinks are an essential part of off-page optimisation.

Tip 12: Take care of mobile SEO

Not so long ago, the desktop version of a website was crawled, indexed and then ranked by Google.

As more and more searches are now being carried out from mobile devices, Google has changed this. Now it's mobile first. In other words, Google uses mobile-first indexing and prioritises your mobile website version.

Conclusion: What you have learnt about WordPress SEO

In this blog article, I have given you a comprehensive introduction to WordPress SEO and explained step by step how to optimise a WordPress website for search engines.

I started by explaining the importance of WordPress SEO and then covered the most important areas of optimisation:

• WordPress hosting: you learnt what to look for when choosing a hosting provider and got recommendations for WordPress hosting providers.
• WordPress themes: You now know the requirements for an SEO-friendly theme and recommended theme providers.
• WordPress SEO plugins: I've introduced the features and benefits of popular SEO plugins such as Yoast SEO, Rank Math and All in One SEO Pack.
• WordPress basic settings: You can now make basic SEO settings in WordPress, such as search engine visibility, permalink structure and sitemap.
• WordPress website structure: You now know how logical structuring with pages, posts, categories and breadcrumbs improves SEO.
• Content optimisation: We have covered various measures for optimising text content, images and internal/external links.
• WordPress SEO for advanced users: I have explained advanced techniques such as mobile SEO, load time optimisation, structured data and link building.

The article provides a comprehensive step-by-step guide to optimising your WordPress website for search engines. It covers all essential areas from basic WordPress settings to advanced SEO techniques. Following the recommended measures can help you to significantly improve the ranking and visibility of your WordPress website in search engines.

If you have any questions about WordPress SEO or would like professional support with the implementation, simply contact us. Send an email to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. call us on +43 1 353 2 353 or send us your enquiry using our contact form.

Frequently asked questions

Is WordPress good for SEO?

WordPress is known for its SEO friendliness as it offers clean code and a structured hierarchy. There are also many SEO plugins such as Yoast SEO or All in One SEO Pack that help users to optimise their website for search engines. In addition, the large community and many resources available make it relatively easy to find support and information on SEO optimisation on WordPress.

What is SEO in WordPress?

SEO, or search engine optimisation, in WordPress refers to the practices and plugins used to improve the visibility of a website in search engine results. By optimising keywords, meta descriptions and other on-site elements, WordPress users can design their pages to be better recognised and indexed by search engines.

Why is my WordPress site not being found on Google?

There could be several reasons why your WordPress site is not being found on Google. Your website may be new and not yet indexed, or there may be technical issues such as faulty robots.txt files or poor SEO practices that are affecting visibility. A lack of content or poorly optimised content can also be a factor.

How can I improve my SEO?

To improve your SEO, you should research relevant keywords and use them in your content, meta descriptions and URLs. Use SEO plugins such as Yoast SEO to make optimisation easier and create high-quality, original content that is valuable to your target audience. It's also important to conduct regular SEO audits to identify and fix potential issues.

How much does SEO cost per month?

The cost of SEO can vary greatly depending on the scope of services required and the agency you hire. Prices can range from a few hundred to several thousand euros per month. It is advisable to get several quotes and understand exactly what services are included in the price.

Is WordPress still up to date?

WordPress remains one of the most popular and versatile platforms for creating and managing websites. Thanks to its huge community and countless plugins and themes, it can be easily customised to suit current web design trends and requirements.

For whom is SEO worthwhile?

SEO is worthwhile for anyone who has an online presence and wants to increase the visibility of their website in search engines. This includes companies, bloggers, online shops and practically anyone who wants to benefit from increased traffic and a better online presence.

For whom does SEO make sense?

Similar to the previous question, SEO makes sense for anyone who wants to benefit from increased online visibility. It is especially valuable for those who run an online business or want to build a brand.

Is SEO free of charge?

Basic SEO practices can be done for free, especially if you do the optimisation yourself. There are also many free resources and tools online. However, advanced SEO strategies and tools, as well as hiring SEO experts, can come at a cost.