Technical SEO for WordPress: A 14-Step Framework for Success

Technical SEO for WordPress can be a daunting task, but with a clear framework, you can tackle it with confidence. A well-structured approach will help you identify and fix technical issues that hinder your website's search engine ranking.

First, you need to understand that technical SEO is not just about optimizing your content, but also about ensuring your website is crawlable, indexable, and user-friendly. This means having a solid foundation in website architecture, hosting, and performance.

A key step in technical SEO is to audit your website's performance, which involves checking for issues such as slow loading times, broken links, and duplicate content. According to our research, a slow website can lose up to 25% of its traffic, making speed optimization a crucial aspect of technical SEO.

Setting up for success with technical SEO on WordPress requires attention to a few key areas. It's never been more competitive to be a WordPress blogger, and small technical changes can make a big difference in your ROI.

A technical SEO path to success exists for all WordPress users, but it's often underrated. This means you can make significant improvements with minimal effort.

Investing in a quality caching plugin can eliminate 99% of CSS and JavaScript-related PageSpeed Insights warnings. WP Rocket is a great option to consider.

Finding an optimized theme can be tricky, but it's worth the effort. Every page on your site should have only one H1 tag, and it should be the main subject of the document.

A quality theme is essential for a well-performing website. If it's a "free theme", it's probably not a great option.

Investing in a quality theme can make a big difference. A good theme can improve your website's design aesthetics, but it's also important to consider technical SEO and pageload speed.

Finding an optimized theme can be tricky. One way to evaluate a theme is to find a demo version from the developer's website and run it through a page speed testing tool like WebPageTest or GTMetrix.

A well-optimized theme can lead to significant improvements. One of our clients saw a 375% increase in organic traffic after switching to an optimized theme and performing further optimizations.

It's also important to keep in mind that every page on your site should have only one H1 tag. This should be the main subject of the document that all subsequent tags follow.

Choosing a web host is a crucial step in setting up your website. You'll want to consider the type of hosting you need, such as shared, VPS, or dedicated hosting.

Shared hosting is a great option for beginners, as it's affordable and easy to set up, with prices starting at around $5 per month. The most popular shared hosting providers include Bluehost, HostGator, and SiteGround.

Make sure to check the storage and bandwidth limits of your web host, as these can impact your website's performance. For example, Bluehost offers 50GB of storage and unlimited bandwidth, while HostGator offers 100GB of storage and 1TB of bandwidth.

Consider the level of customer support you need, such as 24/7 phone support or live chat. Many web hosts offer a free trial or demo account, allowing you to test their services before committing to a plan.

Google Search Console is a free tool that offers a wealth of data and features to help you optimize your website.

It used to have few positive features, but over the past several years, it has become a highly valuable resource.

From Google Search Console, you can see what Google thinks about your content.

You can also find technical errors to fix, submit your URLs for evaluation, and see what keywords users use to find your content.

Google Search Console provides traffic, impression, and average ranking data directly from Google's search engine.

This information can help you identify areas for improvement and optimize your website for better search engine rankings.

By using Google Search Console, you can gain valuable insights into how Google views your website and make data-driven decisions to improve its performance.

A well-structured website is essential for both search engines and users to navigate and find relevant content. This is achieved through a clear and consistent site structure.

Your website's URL structure must be logical and consistent, making it easy for users to understand. It should be a mirror of the website structure, with descriptive and keyword-rich URLs.

Internal links connect your website's pages, making it easier for users and search engines to navigate and discover relevant content. Use descriptive anchor text when linking to other pages, and focus on linking to the most relevant pages.

Avoid using special characters, excessive parameters, or overly long URLs. Instead, use hyphens to separate words, keep all words in lowercase, and include a keyword in the permalinks.

Here are some common URL issues to focus on eliminating:

When auditing internal links, look for factors such as broken links, orphaned pages, and irrelevant links. Fixing these issues can significantly impact SEO rankings and user experience.

A well-structured internal linking strategy can help distribute link equity throughout your site, improve crawlability, and boost your overall SEO.

Optimizing Content is a crucial aspect of Technical SEO for WordPress. Creating high-quality and relevant content is essential for both users and search engines.

To ensure your content is optimized for search engines, consider the aspects mentioned earlier, such as ensuring your content is crawlable and indexable. This will help search engines understand the context and relevance of your site.

Optimizing your images can also significantly impact your site's loading speed and overall performance. Compressing images, using descriptive file names and alt tags, and serving them in the right format and size can make a big difference.

Meta tags provide information about your web pages to search engines and users, helping them understand the content and context of your site.

Having unique and descriptive meta titles and descriptions for each page is crucial, and incorporating relevant keywords is a must.

You can use WordPress plugins like All in One SEO Pack to help you manage and optimize your meta tags.

Optimizing your website's images is a crucial part of image optimization. This includes compressing images, using descriptive file names and alt tags, and serving them in the appropriate format and size.

You can use plugins like Image Optimization & Lazy Load or Smush to automate the image optimization process. This can help reduce page size and improve user experience.

Compressing images down to 200KB max or less is a good focus. Tools like Imagify or Shortpixel can help with this.

Optimizing image file size is also essential. A high definition image can be uploaded to the web and only used to display a 300×300 block, which can slow down your website. Consider finding a way to optimize your images before uploading them, or using a solution that optimizes them after upload.

Image SEO should be a strategic part of your SEO strategy. Optimizing website images can help you get more traffic from Google Images, improve user experience, and have a faster website load speed.

Here are some image issues to look out for and fix:

Remember to add alt attributes to every image in your media library. This helps improve accessibility and search engine understanding of your content. Use a brief and accurate description of the image, like a keyword that highlights what the image is about.

Improving your WordPress site's performance is crucial for user experience and search engine rankings. A slow-loading site can lead to higher bounce rates, lower conversions, and decreased search visibility.

To improve your site's performance, consider using a tool like GTmetrix and Pagespeed Insights to check website performance and speed. These tools will help you identify areas for improvement and provide recommendations.

Here are some key areas to focus on:

By implementing these strategies, you can improve your site's loading speed, reduce bounce rates, and increase conversions.

Limiting plugins is crucial for improving performance. Too many plugins can introduce large images, fonts, JavaScript, CSS, and third-party resources that slow down your pages.

Adding too many plugins can cause unused resources to be called in the head of a page, which slows down the page for no reason. This can be painful for both website owners and users.

Plugins like Asset CleanUp or Asset CleanUp Pro can help remove unused CSS, JavaScript, and other resources from your pages, which can significantly speed up your site.

You can spot page speed issues or potential problems with a plugin by running a GTMetrix and Google PageSpeed Insights scan on your homepage before and after installing a new plugin.

Only add a plugin if you believe it is absolutely necessary, as there are some things you may have to live with.

Here are some key points to remember:

Schema markup is a code snippet that helps Google learn about your website easily.

There are different types of schema markup for different types of content, including about page schema, website schema, web page schema markup, recipe schema markup, how-to schema markup, and person schema markup.

To ensure your pages use the right schema markups, you need to check for any issues during a technical audit.

Schema markup code snippets should not be broken or incorrect, so it's essential to use a tool like Google Rich Snippets testing tool to find and fix schema markup issues.

You can enter your webpage's link or paste your page's code to check for any structured data issues.

Server Side Rendering vs Client Side Rendering is a crucial aspect of improving your website's performance.

Server-side rendering is the way to go, as it ensures that your JavaScript files render on the website server, not on the user's browser.

This approach provides a better user experience, faster page load speed, and reduces the risk of content being missed from indexing by search engine bots.

With client-side rendering, all the burden of loading your site quickly falls on the visitor, which can lead to a poor user experience.

Search engine bots use JavaScript resources for crawling and indexing your content, which can result in JavaScript content being missed by crawlers and not included in the search engine index.

Running a site speed test can help you identify if JavaScript is rendering on your site's server, and crawled pages in Google Search Console can indicate if Google missed any content while crawling.

Mobile optimization is crucial for a good user experience, especially with more people accessing the web on their mobile devices. Ensure your site is responsive, easy to navigate on smaller screens, and has quick loading times.

Implementing AMP (Accelerated Mobile Pages) can help improve your mobile site's loading speed. The official AMP plugin can help you enable AMP on your WordPress site.

Mobile usability issues can result in a poor user experience and lower search engine rankings for your site. Use Google's Mobile-Friendly Test tool to identify and fix any mobile usability issues on your site.

Here are some key things to check for mobile-friendliness:

Google will stop indexing pages and websites that are not fully mobile-friendly from July 2024, so it's essential to act now and ensure your site is fully optimized for mobile devices.

Choosing a quality theme is crucial for a smooth mobile experience. Ensure your site is mobile friendly by using the free Google Mobile-Friendly Test tool.

A free theme is likely not a great option, so consider investing in a quality theme. You can check your site's mobile responsiveness by entering your website URL and clicking the 'Test URL' button.

A responsive WordPress theme is a good starting point, but you can also follow a guide on how to change your WordPress theme without losing any data or traffic. This will ensure a seamless transition to a mobile-friendly design.

Every page on your site should have only one H1 tag, which should be the main subject of the document. This will help with search engine crawling and improve your site's overall usability.

Ensuring your website is mobile-friendly is crucial for a good user experience and search engine rankings. Google's Mobile-Friendly Test tool can help identify and fix any mobile usability issues on your site.

Google is taking mobile compatibility seriously and will stop indexing pages and websites that are not fully mobile-friendly from July 2024. This means you should act immediately to ensure your site is fully optimized for mobile devices.

A responsive WordPress theme can help make your site mobile-friendly. You can check your site's mobile responsiveness using the free Google Mobile-Friendly Test tool.

To improve mobile-friendliness, consider the following:

You can check the Mobile Usability Report in Google Search Console or use a tool like Bing Mobile-friendly tester to check whether your website is mobile-friendly.

Fixing site errors is crucial for maintaining a well-functioning and SEO-friendly site. Site errors can negatively impact your site's user experience and search engine rankings.

Broken links and 404 errors are common site errors that can lead to a poor user experience and lower search engine rankings. Regularly auditing your site to identify and fix broken links is essential.

You can use plugins like Broken Link Checker to help manage and fix broken links on your WordPress site. This plugin can help you find and fix issues at scale, and it's recommended to run it at least once a month.

Fixing broken links quickly and efficiently is important, as they can impact crawl quality by interrupting the flow of link equity between pages. This can affect the rankings of internal pages.

The good news is that you don't have to manually check all your links, as the Broken Link Checker plugin can help you do this automatically.

Broken links and 404 errors can lead to a poor user experience and lower search engine rankings.

Regularly auditing your site to identify and fix broken links is crucial, and plugins like Broken Link Checker can help manage and fix broken links on your WordPress site.

Broken links are a tremendous frustration to users, and every broken link should be fixed quickly and efficiently.

The good news is that you don't have to manually check all your links, as plugins like Broken Link Checker can help you find and fix issues at scale.

Other options for WordPress users include external SEO tools like Semrush, Sitebulb, or Screaming Frog, which can also help you find internal and external 404s and 503s.

To fix 404 errors, you should determine if a page is broken because the content is gone forever or if it just changed addresses, and then implement a 301 redirect where necessary.

Here are some steps to fix 404 errors:

By following these steps and using tools like Broken Link Checker, you can fix broken links and 404 errors and improve your website's user experience and search engine rankings.

Crawled Not Indexed Errors are a common issue that can hinder your website's visibility in search engine results. Crawling and indexing are two separate processes, and errors in one can affect the other.

Google Search Console is a free tool that can help you uncover these issues. You can find crawling and indexing errors on your website and which pages are affected by them in the 'Why pages aren’t indexed' report.

To fix crawling and indexing issues, you can check the 'Crawl Stats' report in Google Search Console to get insights about your website's crawl budget. Analyze the report and make changes accordingly to solve the issues.

Some common crawling and indexing issues include excluded by no-index tag, which can be fixed by removing the no-index tag if its goal is to get traffic. Other issues may include proper internal linking, regularly updating/improving existing content, getting high-quality backlinks, and adding important pages to the header, footer, or sidebar.

Here are some tips to improve your website's crawling and indexing:

A technical SEO audit is the process of identifying and resolving technical issues that affect your website's SEO, ensuring Google can crawl, index, and rank your site.

Performing a technical SEO audit is important for all types of websites, but for larger, complex sites, it can be tougher, requiring a clear process and experience to manage successfully.

To audit your website architecture, consider the 3 core elements: making your website accessible to search engines, helping users discover your content easily, supporting the future growth of your website, and reducing bounce rates.

Here are some key elements to consider when auditing your website architecture:

Regularly auditing your website's log file can help you understand how crawlers interact with your site, identify issues that may be stopping crawlers from smoothly crawling your website, and make the required changes to your SEO strategy.

Analyzing the architecture of your website is a crucial step in a technical SEO audit. A good website architecture makes your website accessible to search engines, helps users discover your content easily, supports the future growth of your website, and reduces bounce rates.

Website architecture refers to how your website's structure is planned and organized. There are three core elements to consider: website structure, navigation, and content organization.

Here are the key aspects of a well-structured website architecture:

A website with a solid architecture will have a clear hierarchy of pages, making it easy for users and search engines to navigate. This will also help distribute link equity throughout your site, improve crawlability, and boost your overall SEO.

To ensure your website architecture is up to par, consider the following:

By following these best practices, you'll be able to create a website architecture that supports your SEO goals and provides a great user experience.

Performing an audit is a crucial step in maintaining a website's SEO strategy, and it's recommended to do it quarterly as part of ongoing website maintenance.

A website's size and type affect the frequency of technical SEO audits, with larger websites or those publishing a lot of content requiring more frequent audits.

Websites with minimal changes, like a single page with no updates for months, may not need as much frequency.

If you run a local business, you may want to focus on an on-page local checklist and do a technical SEO audit as a one-off exercise.

Your WordPress website's security is crucial for both users and search engines. Google will give preference to sites that use HTTPS over those that use HTTP.

To secure your site, you'll need an SSL certificate to encrypt the connection between your website server and the user's browser. You can check this by looking for the padlock sign in your browser's search bar at the top.

Most WordPress hosting companies now offer free SSL with all their plans. You can ask your host to see if they offer that.

Google will flag your site for malware if it's a security risk for users, showing a warning message that can impact your rankings and website traffic.

To scan for malicious files on your website, you can use a WordPress security scanner like Sucuri or Cloudflare.

In technical SEO for WordPress, a strong internal linking structure is key to search engine rankings. Internal links help search engines understand your website's hierarchy and relevance.

AIOSEO's SEO Link Assistant feature makes it easy to discover link opportunities and automate the process. This plugin crawls your WordPress website's links and provides a detailed report.

You can see the number of internal links, outbound links, and affiliate links for each post and page with this feature. This helps you identify areas for improvement.

AIOSEO's SEO Link Assistant also shows all link suggestions in one place, making it easy to add internal links to your older posts. With a single click, you can automatically go back and add internal links to your older posts.