5 Best SEO Plugins for WordPress
Search engines are a primary source of site traffic, and many users like you wonder how to improve a WordPress site’s SEO. Here, we’ll share some of the best WordPress plugins and other tools that can improve the SEO of a website.
WordPress SEO from Yoast
It’s one of the most-downloaded WP plugins of all time, and for good reason: WordPress SEO from Yoast is a one-stop solution for all of your on-page SEO requirements. Its features include:The ability to add SEO titles, meta keywords, and meta descriptions to every page and post on your site.
You can write custom titles for your archives, main site, tag pages, and category pages.
Yoast’s plugin has a long list of features for WP SEO, and we prefer it for its versatility and ease of use. Installation and setup are easy as well, making this plugin a must-have if you’re running a WP site.
SEMrush
With SEMrush, you’ll get the same tool that the pros use to gather insights and analytics from their competitors. Here, you can learn which organic keywords to try to rank for, where you can get backlinks, and you’ll also get valuable insights into competitors’ advertising strategies.
While SEMrush has a paid subscription model, it’s worth the cost because of the range of data it provides.
Google’s Keyword Planner
Google is at the top of the search engine heap, and no one has more insights into the habits of online searchers. With the Keyword Planner tool, you can get keyword ideas straight from the search engine itself.
It’s free to use, and its primary purpose is to show advertisers which keywords they can bid on. The toll also helps you choose the right keywords according to estimated search volume, difficulty level, and number of search results. Bloggers and content marketers can use such data to find keywords where they can easily beat their competitors.
Open Site Explorer
Developed by SEO giant MOZ, this free-to-use tool allows you to check any domain name’s data. With it, you can see who links to the domain and which anchor text they’re using. Aside from that, Open Site Explorer gives you info such as linking domains, top pages, and more.
While the tool is free, there’s a daily per-person search limit. A MOZ Pro subscription unlocks the tool’s full potential, and it gives you access to other valuable tools as well.
Broken Link Checker
A broken link can not only create a poor experience for your site’s visitors, but it can adversely affect the site’s SEO. If you’ve been running a site for a while, you should occasionally check it for broken links.
With this free WP plugin, you can find broken links and fix them without editing posts. Broken Link Checker is a very useful plugin, and the best thing is that it’s completely free. However, it’s fairly resource-intensive, which means it might bog down your server. In fact, some hosts (such as WPEngine) have blocked it on their servers.
Bonus Tips for WP Site Owners
Site speed is a crucial search ranking factor, and fast-loading sites usually outrank the slower ones. While you’re spending a great deal of time on your content strategy, you should also take time to speed up your site.
Check its speed with tools like Pingdom or Google Page Speed, and hasten things even more by using only optimized images. Pictures can have a significant effect on a site’s speed, and by optimizing them, you can greatly improve the performance of your site.