WordCamp OrlandoSEO Workshop

Presented by Nile Flores and Chris Edwards

Objective❏ Cover SEO Basics❏ Cover SEO Best Practice tips❏ Cover basics of SEO and Social Search❏ Explain Yoast SEO❏ Make sure your site is hooked up with social integration feature of

Yoast SEO❏ Make sure your site is hooked up with Google Analytics❏ Make sure your site is hooked up with Google Search Console and

Bing Webmaster Tools

SEO Basics(Segment 1)

Objective of Segment 1❏ Explain basics of SEO❏ Share strategies to optimize your site’s design❏ Share strategies to optimize your content❏ Share resources to help you with SEO

What is SEO?SEO is an acronym for Search Engine Optimization. What is on your website from content, code, and design are basic factors in telling the search engines the organization of your site.

Wikipedia- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Search_engine_optimization Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of affecting the visibility of a website or a web page in a search engine's "natural" or un-paid ("organic") search results.

Google’s MissionGoogle’s mission is to build the perfect search engine that helps people find what they are looking for. Making your website and your marketing strategy fit this goal is always the way to go.

- from “Content SEO” by Marieke van de Rakt and Joost de Valk

How does Google find you?Answer: By following links from one web page to another one.

How does Google crawl your website?Answer: By following the links on your website.

Your navigation, breadcrumbs, internal links from one page or post to another help Google crawl your website.

How does Google determine what to list, and where?Search results are determined by what fits your search terms best.

Listings to well written content, links from other websites (also knowns as off-page factors), and content that is shared well, may rank better than other websites.

The Major Players in SEOon Your Site

❏ Content❏ Social search (in Segment 2)❏ Design - Graphics❏ Design Coding

Content

Types of Content❏ Text❏ Images❏ Audio❏ Video

Content Tips❏ Your site should contain an About page and

a Contact page❏ Video, audio/ podcast, image/ infographics

should be accompanied by some text❏ Blogging is not required, but it certainly is

recommended in order to build authority❏ Referring to other resources to enhance your

own content also builds authority

Content Tips❏ Write natural, and let your blog voice shine

through❏ Use keyword research to cover topics that your

niche needs in order to target and bring in readers/ subscribers/ buyers

❏ Title is 50-60 characters❏ Put your keywords toward beginning of post❏ Write an engaging title

Social Search

What is Social Search?

Social search or a social search engine is a type of web search that takes into account the Social Graph of the person initiating the search query.

- Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_search

Design - Code & Graphics

Design Tips❏ While HTML5 throws valid coding for a loop, it is important

to try to keep to coding your site with clean and well organized markup.

❏ If you are not sure about how to code a site, most new themes in the WordPress Theme Repository have gone through extreme review before being approved. ( http://wordpress.org/themes/)

❏ Keep your navigation clean and to the point.

More Design Tips

❏ If you want social network interaction, you might want to try installing a social share type plugin or adding the social buttons manually to your theme’s templates.

❏ Your front page does not always have to look like the traditional blog page. For some site’s this does not work.

❏ Got a business? Your whole site can be on WordPress! Let WordPress do the work and all you have to do is add your content.

Tips

❏ Keep the design clean and easy on the eyes for your readers.❏ Watch load time❏ If your theme has Schema markup, or requires specific plugins

to integrate rich snippets, make sure it doesn’t conflict with Yoast SEO or any other SEO Plugin

Resources❏ WordPress SEO Tutorial - https://yoast.com/wordpress-seo/

❏ Introduction to Optimizing WordPress for Website Speed - http://bit.ly/1MGaIVz

❏ Blogging and Content Creation for WordPress - http://bit.ly/1EkxCd5

❏ Podcasting for WordPress - http://bit.ly/1wEHa4P

❏ Beautiful or Usable: What’s important while designing your website? - http://bit.ly/1lBHifC

❏ Optimizing Your Website and Identifying Quality Content for SEO - https://chrisedwards.me/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/ChrisEdwards-SEO-Slides.pdf

SEO, Site Structure, and Social Search

(Segment 2)

Objective of Segment 2

❏ Cover the Importance of a solid site structure❏ Explain Social Search and what it means for your site❏ Make sure your site is set up with Yoast SEO’s Social

integration

Site Structure

Site StructureThe way you organize your web site is called site structure.

It’s important as it allows your visitors, and Google to easily understand your website.

On-page factors

This is where you’ve linked content from one page of your website, to another page on your website.

Most obvious:Site menu, Category menu, breadcrumbs, landing pages

Focus Keyword and Site StructureYour content should be designed around your core content and keywords. According to Yoast, your site should resemble a pyramid.

Site Structure Example

Site Structure tips

❏ Make URLs easy to guess❏ Make Use of your taxonomies (Categories and tags)❏ If you remove content, 301 redirect it to content that is

equivalent. Don’t just redirect it all the time to the home page.

Keyword Research Tips❏ Make a list of keywords for

your website❏ Use both general and very

specific keywords

Keyword Research Tools

❏ https://adwords.google.com/KeywordPlanner❏ https://yoast.com/suggest/❏ https://www.google.com/trends/

Social Search

Social Search: Wait… what?Google has been active about making their search engines more human-like and have recognized that...

Content Is King,Visitors are Queen!

You MUST engage your readers in conversation and to social share your articles in order to build authority and rank.

What is Social Search?

Social search or a social search engine is a type of web search that takes into account the Social Graph of the person initiating the search query.

- Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_search

Social Search (more technical explanation)

The search experience takes into account varying sources of metadata, such as collaborative discovery of web pages, tags, social ranking, commenting on bookmarks, news, images, videos, knowledge sharing, podcasts and other web pages.

Example forms of user input include social bookmarking or direct interaction with the search results such as promoting or demoting results the user feels are more or less relevant to their query.

Simply...

Every picture, every link, every video, and “status” you share on a Social network are searchable.

They also shape your timelines, and can influence the timelines of friends and family.

Prepping Your Website for Social Search❏ Social share buttons❏ Open Graph metadata

Social Share Buttons are a MUST!Make it easy to share your content to social networks.

Lots of plugins out there to choose from.

What is Open Graph?In layman’s terms, this add rich snippets or special code to your web pages on you website so various sites can pull in information and display it on a search engine, or social search engine.

The information pulled in could be the link, title, meta description, or more.

Examples of Open Graph information

Yoast SEO and Social Search

The Yoast SEO plugin allows you to integrate social profiles for the Google Knowledge Card as well as integrates Open Graph metadata to your website.

Resources❏ Intelligent Site Structure for Better SEO - http://bit.ly/1NPCyje❏ Keyword Research Tools: Which ones to use? - http://bit.ly/1sT3Ith❏ Why focus on Long Tail keywords? - http://bit.ly/1yQ7wkV❏ Resources to connecting Facebook Insights, Twitter, and Pinterest - http://kb.

yoast.com❏

Yoast SEO, and Google Analytics

(Segment 3)

Objective of Segment 3❏ Explain Yoast SEO❏ Hooking up Google Analytics for WordPress❏ Hooking up Google Search Console❏ Hooking up Bing Webmaster Tools

Yoast SEO

Yoast SEO is a plugin that is a guide to allow your content to be seen more favorably by search engines and even integrates social metadata.

Page Analysis ToolThis is tool that analyzes your content and guides you to create content that is optimized.

It is not the solve all tool. Having all green lights is not necessary.

Yoast SEO Metabox

Google Analytics

Free and trusted method of tracking your website’s traffic.

http://www.google.com/analytics/

Google Analytics for WordPress plugin

Adds the Google Analytics tracking code to your website.

http://bit.ly/1lFpBax

What information does Google Analytics track?❏ Pageviews❏ Bounce rate❏ Time on website❏ Live traffic❏ Demographics❏ Goals❏ Sales

Google Search ConsoleFree method of seeing how Google “sees” your website.

http://bit.ly/1jz7QwH

Features of Google Search Console❏ Lists links to your site❏ Lists internal links❏ Shows if your site is

being indexed❏ Shows crawl errors❏ Content keywords❏ Page Speed Insights

❏ Ability to remove URLs❏ View crawl stats❏ Refetch site as Google❏ Find out if your site has

any security issues❏ Author stats❏ Structures data testing

tool

Other Resources❏ The temptation of the green bullet in Yoast SEO - https://yoast.com/want-

green-bullet-wp-seo/❏ Configuration Guides of Google Analytics for WordPress, and Google Search

Console and Bing in Yoast SEO are located at http://kb.yoast.com

Bing Webmaster ToolsFree method of seeing how Bing “sees” your website.

http://www.bing.com/toolbox/webmasterNote: Features aren’t too different from Google.

To get resources and these slides, go to:

http://bit.ly/1MNoKjO