WordPress is one of the biggest and most popular website building platforms in the world. So, why should you not focus on SEO for WordPress?
In this post, I’ll discuss ways to create SEO-friendly landing pages for your WordPress website. Use these SEO tips and techniques to improve the search rankings of your WordPress landing pages.
Ready? Let’s get started.
1. Use a Good SEO Plugin
The first thing you need to do to create SEO-friendly landing pages for WordPress is to install a good SEO plugin.
The most popular SEO plugin for WordPress is the free Yoast SEO plugin. This plugin will help you create SEO-friendly landing pages right from the start.
You can use it to optimize your content and meta descriptions, generate sitemaps, and a lot more. So, simply by using a good SEO plugin, half your job is already done as it will take care of all SEO aspects and will guide you to create SEO-friendly landing pages.
And, if you need more help, you can always get expert SEO services from a consultant or an agency.
2. Clean Your URL Structures
The default URLs that are generated on WordPress are often long and messy. For your landing pages, at least, you should use a clean URL structure. Ideally, your URLs should have your target keyword and should be short and clean.
But, how can you change the URLs of your landing pages?
Simply click on the “Permalinks” option in the Settings menu on your dashboard. You will see many options that you can choose from or create a custom structure, as shown below.
The “Post Name” option is a good way to go as it adds only the post title, which usually includes the target keyword. You don’t really need a date or number for your URLs, so this option is the best way to create non-messy permalinks.
3. Create Highly-Targeted Pages Focused on a Keyword
Whenever you create a landing page, make sure that it is focused on one target keyword. You can use side keywords as well, but never target two keywords with one landing page.
You should also avoid creating multiple landing pages for one keyword as it will cause cannibalization. This means that more than one of your pages will be competing against each other for rankings.
So, what is the best way to create SEO-friendly landing pages?
Create one landing page for one target keyword and maintain a good keyword density of 1.5%-2%. Make sure that you add your target keyword to the title, headings, and subheadings without making it appear forced.
Also, try to add your target keyword within the first two lines of your landing page content. Leverage these SEO tips and you will see a significant improvement in your landing page rankings.
4. Optimize Your Meta Data for Keywords
One rule of thumb for creating SEO-friendly landing pages is to always add your target keywords to your title tags. This helps search engines understand your content and categorize it better.
One of the best practices to follow for landing pages is to use your target keyword in all of your meta content, including descriptions and titles. While many experts say that keywords in meta descriptions no longer affect rankings, it is still good for SEO.
If nothing else, a relevant and targeted meta description will help you increase your click-through rate. There’s no harm in that, right?
So, optimize your meta content for your target keyword to create SEO-friendly landing pages.
5. Use Image Alt Text
Image alternative text is basically the image description that websites use to help visually-impaired readers understand an image.
But, that’s not all they are good for!
Alt text can also help search engines understand your visual content better and get more context about it. So, insert keywords in your alt text as well to help search engines understand your content and increase your rankings.
Wondering how to add alt text?
Well, WordPress makes it really easy to add alt text. Whenever you insert an image on your page or post, WordPress automatically shows a box where you can add alt text.
Image via WordPress
Always follow this practice when using visuals in landing pages and you will see the difference yourself.
6. Optimize Your Videos for Video Search
Just like images, you also need to help search engines understand your video content better. You can do this by adding optimized video descriptions and the VideoObject schema.
Adding VideoObject schema helps search engines understand your videos and also increases your chances of ranking in video search results. You just need to provide a title, description, and thumbnail image for your videos.
Good video content combined with structured data can significantly improve your search rankings. So, if you want to optimize your landing pages, don’t forget to optimize your videos as well.
Conclusion
These are some of the best SEO practices that you should follow to create SEO-friendly landing pages for your WordPress site. Use these and see the results first hand.
So, what are you waiting for?
Start creating SEO-friendly landing pages right now. All the best!
Author Bio
Gaurav Sharma is the founder and CEO of Attrock, a results-driven digital marketing company. Grew an agency from 5-figure to 7-figure revenue in just two years | 10X leads | 2.8X conversions | 300K organic monthly traffic. He also contributes to top publications like HuffPost, Adweek, Business 2 Community, TechCrunch, and more.
