Keywords are an essential part of SEO. Adding an SEO plugin like SEOPress to WordPress can help you research keywords, optimize pages for keywords and even track ranking for keywords in Google.
To help you understand the different keyword-related jobs that need to be done in WordPress, we have compiled this list of 30 great keyword tips. These also refer to some tutorials that we have already written on this important subject.
Keyword Research
- Remember that a keyword is often, more accurately, a key phrase made up of more than one word. A keyword should reflect what a user would type into Google. This is also called a search query by Google.
- Imagine what your clients or readers would type into Google. Even better, ask them.
- Use the Performance report in Google Search Console to find the queries for which your site is already visible. Sort by clicks to see the queries that generated the most clicks to your site. Sort by impressions to see the queries that generated the most visibility and that could therefore generate the most traffic.
- Don’t forget to research and target your own names. Target your personal name if that is relevant, or company name, brand name, product name.
- Use Google’s autosuggest feature to explore popular search queries. Type one word into Google, then a space and see what Google suggests as the next word. Type the letter “a” and see what words starting with the letter “a” Google suggests. Continue with the letter “b” and so on.
- Use the Google Suggest feature in SEOPress PRO to get keyword suggestions from within WordPress.
- In query data, see if you can spot a trend of users searching by city or another type of locality (district, county, country, etc.). If this type of search is popular, it may be relevant for you to add your locality even if that specific locality is not listed in query data.
- You do not need to target or optimize your site for keywords containing “near me.” The text “near me” is normally ignored by Google and used instead to change the intention of the search to a local search. Rather than optimizing for “near me” you need to choose keywords containing your city name.
- Use the Google Keyword Planner in Google Ads or specialist tools such as Ubersuggest, AnswerThePublic, Keywords Everywhere, to obtain keyword ideas and search volumes.
- Use software and data providers such as SEMRush, SE Ranking, SpyFu or Ahrefs to find your competitors’ best keywords. See our case study on this method: Competitive Keyword Research When You Are Rich, an SEO Consultant.
- From keyword research try and make a shortlist of 10 to 30 keywords that you will follow over time to analyze your overall SEO performance.
Keyword Optimization
- The Meta Keywords tag is not used by search engines. Ignore it.
- Identify the best page on your site for each keyword, create new pages if necessary. Make a list of keywords and next to each keyword, indicate the target URL.
- For each page or post in WordPress, add the relevant keyword to the Target keywords field of the Content analysis metabox, then click Refresh analysis to see if your page is optimized or needs improving.
- For blog posts, make sure that your keyword is in the title. The first title given to a blog post in WordPress will often be used automatically to create the H1 tag, TITLE tag and permalink. These are important for search engines.
- Write a unique Meta description for each page and make sure to include the target keyword.
- For WooCommerce sites, use a relevant keyword in product names. The keyword will therefore be used automatically in links and titles to optimize the product page.
- Use the targeted keyword in permalinks. Replace spaces by dashes. Write all letters in lower case and avoid accents or other special characters.
- Use a post’s targeted keyword in its title and again in several headings (H2, H3, etc.) throughout the article.
- Use the targeted keyword at least once in the text of the post and make sure that the post has enough content to make it interesting to search engines. Often this means providing at least 300 words of text. For long articles, you can repeat the keyword several times, but you must be careful not to repeat the same keyword too often.
- When you use the same keyword on several pages of your site, link to the target page at least once from every page. Create the link by selecting the keyword when it appears in a text paragraph.
- Add Alt text to every image used in the post and use the keyword in at least one Alt text. The best images for Alt text optimization are original images that are not already used elsewhere on the web.
- Read Optimize WordPress posts for a keyword for a tutorial on keyword optimization.
Keyword Tracking
- If you don’t have access to rank tracking software, manually track your website’s position by searching for keywords in Google in a private navigation window. Search keyword, by keyword and note positions each week in an Excel file.
- Use SEOPress Insights to track keyword positions in Google for up to 50 keywords per site and see results directly in the WordPress Admin.
- Don’t use the Average position metric in Google Search Console as a KPI for your overall SEO results. The score is not based on a fixed set of keywords.
- It is difficult to see what Google search results look like in another country. We recommend using Bright Local’s Local Search Results Checker or specialized rank tracking software like SEOPress Insights.
- Add keywords to track as you write posts by using SEOPress Insights. When you have SEOPress Insights installed, you can add a Target keyword to your list of keywords to track via a simple button.
- Use keyword tracking results to help prioritize the keywords you need to optimize first. Order by rank and choose the keywords that are ranking between the third and 20th position in Google and have a high search volume.
- Read our tutorial How to Track Keyword Rankings
