Best Local SEO Practices You Need To Know About For Wordpress! - Digital Marketers' Blog

Saturday, July 17, 2021

Best Local SEO Practices You Need To Know About For Wordpress!


WordPress is one of the most popular and one of the most flexible open source Content Management Systems (CMS) in the market right now. WordPress is filled with rich functionality, and a low barrier to entry, along with an unbeatable price tag, has made it the most popular CMS on the web. Given all it offers, it’s no wonder that WordPress has been downloaded more than 60 million times, and it holds the largest market share, with the CMS powering more than 65% of all websites on the web.

Amongst other things, SEO with WordPress is easier, too, with the user-friendly platform being so easy that you can implement simple optimization techniques even if you are technically savvy. That’s one of the biggest reasons why small local businesses love WordPress, as it lets them do more with less and compete with more prominent companies that have the budget for sweeping SEO improvements. We here at the Freelancers Hub work with small local businesses worldwide, provide them with comprehensive digital solutions, and set them up for sustainable success.

Our most popular services are providing highly optimized WordPress websites and custom SEO services for WordPress websites. So we know all there is to know about SEO with WordPress, and we thought we should let you know the best practices you can integrate to see a massive improvement in your SEO efforts. Our specialty is creating the best sites, themes, and marketing strategy for WordPress gave us access to valuable insights into seeing which SEO practices offer the best value. So let’s check them out!

Optimized Content

You may have heard already, but in the online world, content is king. It is by far the most important asset on your website. Even if you have a website with a great site structure, lightning-fast load times, and tons of security measures, it will fail if your content isn’t up to the mark. Creating optimized content starts with understanding what the audience finds valuable. To do this, you will need to research your audience and find out what the pain points are and how your products solve the problems.

Once you find all the solutions, you can use them to create a wide range of compelling content, from videos to blog posts to infographics and other types of content. These types of content usually have a high engagement rate and always keep them coming back for more. Once you have the content you need, all you need to do is some on-page optimization.

It may seem daunting, but as we’ve said earlier, SEO with WordPress is straightforward, and the platform has many versatile essential tools like the Yoast SEO plugin to make life easier. Usually, you would need to keep track of 20 different factors; however, with Yoast, you don’t have to. It keeps track of everything for you and shows you each page a color-coded score making it easy for you to track on-page optimization and point out areas for improvement.

Reviewing The Link Profile

A recent MOZ study shows that links are still the number one ranking signal when it comes to localized organic rankings. Factors like the number of domains linked to your site, the quality of the backlinks, and the link anchor text are all strongly correlated to your local ranking. Now, we know that building a quality backlink profile takes time to cultivate. But there are a few simple tricks you can use to get valuable backlinks. Let’s check them out!

Quality Over Quantity

While the number of domains, IPs, and C-blocks is vital for local SEO for WordPress sites, you will get more value from one high-quality backlink from an industry leader in your niche. It will outweigh the several dozens of irrelevant, low-quality links, and the best part is you can use link tracking software to find and eliminate all the low-quality links.
 
Finding & Fixing Broken Links

There are several SEO plugins out there like the Broken Link Checker that you can use to identify and correct broken links. It’s a fantastic SEO tool for WordPress sites as it checks posts, pages, and even comments on broken links.

Optimizing The Anchor Text

One of the most critical parts of reviewing the backlink profile is optimizing your anchor text. Make sure you edit some of the anchor text you have by including the name of your city or town in the text. However, you have to make sure you don’t over-optimize the anchor texts, like changing all of your anchor text, too many exact matches, and other things of this nature. To get a better idea of the percentage of location-based anchor text to simple anchor texts is to conduct competitor research. Remember, it varies from niche to niche, so don’t settle for a number.
 
Identifying Link Building Opportunities

A competitor analysis tool comes in handy when looking for new link-building opportunities. You can use this tool to find potential relevant sites in your industry that link to your competitor but not you.
 
Speed Optimization

We all love the turtle and the hare story, but that principle doesn’t work online and especially not when it comes to SEO. According to Google, site speed has always been one of the most important ranking factors in SEO, and it remains vital to this day. If you want to generate more business than your competitors, make sure your website is as fast as possible. There are a few different things you can do to improve your site’s speed. So let’s check them out!

Image Optimization

When it comes to slowing down websites, the number one factor is large images. You have to make sure that all the images are optimized and compressed. There are several plugins like WP Smush to do this.

A Clean WordPress Theme



If you want to make it in the online world, then you need to have fantastic themes. The best WordPress theme for SEO is the one without unnecessary elements, making the user experience simple and shortening the customer journey. Make sure your theme doesn’t have things like unnecessary database calls, functions, JavaScript, etc. Also, make sure you delete old themes because hackers might use them to infiltrate your site.
 
Utilizing A Caching Plugin

If you want to optimize your website’s speed, then you need to reduce the server load time. Make sure you use a caching plugin to create state HTML versions of dynamic pages that reduce server load times significantly. There are plenty of plugins out there that can help you with reducing server load time. Some popular choices out there for WordPress are WP Super Cache and W3 Total Cache and paid options such as WP Rocket.

Don’t Be Plugin-Crazy

In an attempt to optimize your website, you can go overboard by installing many plugins, as there is one for every single thing you need to optimize. Installing too many plugins is a wrong move as it can result in slowing down your website. Make sure you only use the essential plugins that provide real value to your website. However, we suggest you invest in website auditing software to analyze your on-page speed factors for you and suggest how to speed up your site.
 
Mobile Optimization

More than 54 percent of web traffic comes from mobile, which means you need to have a perfectly optimized website for mobile devices. Recent Google core updates show that the search engine giant indexes mobile sites preferentially to their desktop counterparts. That should tell you how important mobile optimization is for local SEO. Optimizing your mobile site’s on page speed and image compression is only the first step. Here are some other things you can do to optimize your WordPress site for mobile users. So let’s check it out!

Responsive Theme

User experience is a vital aspect of local SEO for WordPress sites. That’s why the best WordPress themes for SEO are ones that are mobile responsive. So make sure you work with your team to create a responsive theme.

Mobile Specific Designs

There is a wide range of mobile devices with different devices having different architecture. So we suggest using the WP Mobile function that automatically detects other devices on the server level and creates custom experiences for mobile traffic.
 
Launch An App

One eMarketer study shows that around 88 percent of all mobile traffic time spent by mobile traffic is on apps. Apps act like a comprehensive way to engage with favorite brands. So if possible, then make sure you launch a mobile app for your business.
 
Accelerated Mobile Pages

If you want fast mobile websites, then creating accelerated mobile pages (AMP) is the perfect option. These are incredibly fast pages explicitly designed for mobile. WordPress has an AMP plugin that you can use to create that rank at the top of SERPs when users search from mobile devices.

Integrating Google My Business Into Your WordPress Site

Google My Business (GMB) is a fascinating tool that combines several key factors into one platform. It signals physical proximity, user reviews, and business descriptions, and vital categories for local rankings. When you have your GMB page set up, make sure you add your WordPress website to the profile along with other factors like hours of operation and a description of your business. You should also look for plugins and widgets that will help you transfer key ranking signals such as photos, a business map, and customer reviews from your GMB page to your site.

Another plugin you should look into is the Google Places Reviews plugin. This plugin allows you to add your GMB review to your WordPress site, and it will help you increase consumer trust in your business. Having an intractable business map on your website is perfect for your site. You can use the Google Maps Builder plugin to create the map. It’s the ideal tool that will help your customers find you, and it helps with your WordPress site’s local SEO.

Adding Structured Data

If you’ve noticed some local business listings seem so rich, filled with reviews, star ratings, and robust descriptions while others are falling short, then you should know that the difference is structured data. You can try using Schema that feeds Google with additional information about your business.

It shows your audience who finds your website on SERPs with plenty of tidbits of information like hours of operation, price range, and physical location. While descriptions and structured data don’t directly influence your rankings, it does encourage higher click-through rates, and CTR is one of the essential factors of local SEO for WordPress sites.
 
Integrating Location Keywords In URLs

While URL structures don’t play a significant part in local SEO with WordPress sites if you include location keywords in your URL will help you improve the user experience. It will help you even more if there are multiple landing pages targeting different locations and you want to assure your customers that they’re in the right place. Before, WordPress didn’t have the flexibility when it came to URLs.

However, now WordPress defaults to pretty permalinks that include the date and name of your posts. That’s not all, however. You can adjust your URL settings from the WordPress Admin panel. You can go to Custom Structure settings to add a location to your landing page URLs.

Find The Right WordPress SEO Services

So there you go, these are the best local SEO practices for WordPress sites. Make sure you take a look at all the practices and integrate them into your local SEO efforts. However, it can be a bit daunting if you are only starting up. That’s where Freelancers Hub can help you. We have a dedicated team for WordPress development and SEO that is renowned for delivering high-value solutions for businesses.

So if you need quality SEO WordPress services, then contact us, and our specialists will help you out. You can also drop your questions in the comments below, and we will answer them for you. Also, send in your thoughts and suggestions on our socials and let us know how you think we can improve our services. And with that being said, that’s about all we have for you today. We will come back with something new for you soon. Until then, see ya!

Originally posted in: https://freelancers-hub.com/best-local-seo-practices-you-need-to-know-about-for-wordpress/


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