30 WordPress SEO tips to improve your rankings: Part 1 of 6

1. Install a WordPress SEO plugin
WordPress already has some fairly strong built-in SEO features. But you can take the optimization to the next level using an SEO plugin. The best SEO plugin on the market is Yoast SEO, in fact, it is the one we use here at Hostinger.

With this plugin, you can perfectly optimize each page and publication for your chosen keyword. It also has an integrated analysis based on the latest algorithm updates. You can even generate an XML sitemap and add structured data to your website.

To set up Yoast, go to your WordPress desktop and select Plugins> Add new . In the search bar, type ‘ Yoast SEO ‘ and click on ‘ Install now ‘ in the plugin that appears.

Finally, click on ‘ Activate ‘ when the option appears. The plugin will start running on your site and you can access it by clicking on the SEO icon in the menu on the left. You can also check our detailed guide on how to use Yoast SEO plugin to the maximum potential.

2. Do a keyword research
Keyword research is decisive in your SEO strategy in WordPress. Doing a keyword research will allow you to:

Create content that your visitors are really looking for.
Develop a better understanding of the needs of your market.
Track the success of everything you write.
Generate valuable traffic for your site.
There are a variety of tools that will help you with keyword research. Some of the best tools include KWFinder , SEMRush and even the Google Keyword Planner .

Although several articles would be required to cover the topic of keyword research, the basic concepts are the following:

Create a list of objective keywords related to your topic.
Enter them into a keyword search tool to discover words that receive a decent volume of traffic and have little competition.
Investigate competitors by checking similar sites through keyword search tools to see which keywords generate the most traffic.
See which of these keywords have a low enough competition in which you can compete.
With your keyword list created, it’s time to start creating content and optimize it with the tips on this list!

3. Enable visibility for search engines
There is a built-in option within WordPress that will hide your site from the search engines.

This option may be useful when you build your site for the first time, but it may make it impossible to achieve any positioning. If you have been applying some of the tips on this list, but do not see that your positioning improves, this could be the problem.

To see if this setting is enabled, go to Settings> Reading from the WordPress desktop. Scroll down and you’ll see a section called Search Engine Visibility .

Make sure you leave this box unchecked. Then click on ” Save changes “.

4. Adjust the structure of permanent links
When you install WordPress for the first time, the pages and publications on your site will have a strange URL structure. This default structure is not good for your SEO.

The cleanest and friendliest URL structure for search engines is the “name of the entry” setting. By changing to this configuration, you can also include your publication title or page, and even a keyword in your URL. To change this setting, go to Settings> Permanent links .

In the ” Common settings ” section , select the option that says ” Name of the entry “.

If you make this change late, you may need to redirect the previous URLs. You can do this with a plugin like Change Permalink Helper . Just enter your old URLs and redirect them to your updated URLs.

5. Add your site to Google Search Console
Using Google Search Console will show you the performance of your site in the search engines and will alert you to any errors on the site.

To add your site to Google Search Console, first visit this page and register with your Google account. Then, click on the ” Add a property ” button and enter the URL of your website.

Click on ‘ Add ‘ and you will access a screen where you must verify the ownership of your site. There are several methods you can use to verify your site, but the easiest is to select Alternate methods and then choose HTML tag .

Copy this code, then navigate to your WordPress desktop. To add this code to our header we will use a plugin. Go to Plugins> Add new , then look for ‘ Insert Headers and Footers ‘.

Install and activate the plugin shown in the image above. Next, open the plugin by going to Settings> Insert Headers and Footers .

Now paste the code in the box marked as Header and click on ‘ Save ‘. Finally, go back to Google Search Console and click on the Verify button .