While the goal of website content is to inform and engage potential customers, writers must cater to dual masters. Neglecting to optimize posts for search engines may mean that those promising clients are never aware of your site’s existence. Fortunately, WordPress offers various SEO plugins that are effective and reasonably intuitive. By utilizing these tools consistently when publishing new content, you will raise your content’s visibility in search results.
With over five million active installations and 94% five-star reviews, Yoast is a highly functional and robust SEO tool. The free version offers optimization assessments to analyze keyphrases, post/page word counts and outbound and inbound links. Additional functionality is available in the premium version.
All-In-One SEO is the SEO plugin ease-of-use winner, with interactive numeric scoring tools and easy-to-understand red-yellow-green visual cues to help authors refine content for SEO. Unlike Yoast, however, All-In-One SEO does not assess or analyze page content.
Read on to learn about the valuable functionality embedded in these plugins — as well as some side-benefits.
1. Focus Keyphrase Assessment
What is a keyphrase?
The keyphrase is the essence — or key element — of a page or post. It is the term or phrase that you wish the page to rank for in search results. While you may have multiple pages of content that focus on a general topic, each page’s keyphrase should be unique and reflect the specific content of that page.
After Super Bowl Sunday, we are still thinking in food terms … the keyphrase provides the meaty or umami taste, a fundamental element of a dish.
SEO plugins offer guidance for developing strong keyphrases and optimizing each page or post for its specific keyphrase. To maximize the findability of your post or page by target prospects, the keyword or keyphrase should be included in the …
- SEO title tag
- Page or post URL
- Meta description tag
- Page or post sub-headings
Optimally, the keyphrase is also found in appropriate density within the content of the page or post, in the first paragraph of copy, and in the alt tags of images on the page or post.
2. Headline Analyzer Tool
Let’s face it, if the headline is a loser, it’s not going to compel searchers to click. Headlines, titles or email subject lines must be refined to capture a user’s interest or respond to their need. Strong headlines use uncommon, powerful and emotionally-rich words. Length, sentiment and inclusion of the focus keyphrase are all important.
The sequence of the words in your headline can also impact its success in attracting clicks; the beginning and ending words are particularly important. Our free downloadable infographic offers tips to create enticing subject lines.
The All-In-One SEO plugin (AIO/SEO) headline analyzer tool scores your headline for various factors and ranks each with a red/orange/green indicator. As you refine the headline, the tool works interactively, updating the scores for each of the desired items.
While not as central as the keyphrase, the headline is vitally important to the success of a post. On the table, the impact of a strong headline is like a burst of crunch and sweetness.
3. Sentence Structure Analysis
Crafting quality content is an art form. To keep readers engaged, website content must be honed deliberately and edited ruthlessly.
Interactive content analysis tools help authors write content that is SEO- and user-friendly. Both the AIO/SEO and Yoast plugins analyze sentence structure and provide specific feedback relating to a wide variety of readability parameters. Items reviewed and assessed by the AIO/SEO plugin include:
- Paragraph and sentence length
- Use of passive voice
- Transition words
- Varied sentence and paragraph length and structure
The Yoast plugin highlights incidences of consecutive sentences that begin with the same word and the percentage of sentences containing transition words.
The discipline required to elevate each sentence to its potential provides the bite of heat that elevates a dish.
4. Readability and Voice (Can a reader understand you?)
The readability of your content can have a strong impact on your success. In addition to honing your writing for balance and word choice, it’s important to avoid highly technical or complex phrasing that is difficult for your target reader to comprehend.
Both AIO/SEO and Yoast include assessments relating to content complexity and reading ease. Factors considered include sentence and paragraph length and structure, transition words and inclusion of images, charts and videos to complement the text.
The intuitive interfaces increase an author’s awareness of content-related factors that impact a page or post’s effectiveness. This guidance helps authors address industry jargon and rework “tech-speak” into understandable customer-facing verbiage.
The food analogy: Successfully massaging content for readability tempers the heat with a cool avocado creme.
5. Sub-Headings Review
Sub-headings break up sections of copy and organize content into consumable sections for readers. Like chapter titles in a book, they provide context for the upcoming content. Since website visitors scan content, use of descriptive sub-headings at appropriate intervals helps visitors find the information they seek more easily.
An assessment of your sub-headings is included with both the AIO/SEO and Yoast plugins. Feedback helps authors refine the sub-heading phrasing, as well as the appropriate distribution and level of sub-headings (H1, H2, H3, etc).
Deliberate effort provides a subtle, yet intriguing spiced saltiness to the meal.
6. Metatags and Search Listings
Both the Yoast and AIO/SEO plugins provide an interactive template for crafting the post title and description tag (metatags) which appear in search results. The templates count characters and display an interactive color indicator (Yoast) or character count (AIO/SEO), based on the number of characters entered.
While the metatags are not explicitly visible in the post content, search engines seek well-crafted metatags much like a pickled or sour element completes the taste profile of a dish.
The AIO/SEO metatags assessment seeks and positively acknowledges inclusion of the focus keyphrase in the meta description. A Google snippet shows a preview of how the page will display online in search results.
7. Overall Page (or Post) Assessment
As inferred by the name used by Yoast, the overall assessment aggregates the results of the individual reviews with additional feedback. However, the AIO/SEO plugin also provides similar information within each review section.
In addition to the detailed feedback provided relating to readability, the content length for the overall page or post is assessed.
Also acknowledged are the presence or absence of internal links from the page or post. These links within your website guide visitors to related content and are valued by both search engines and users. The inclusion of outbound, or external links (to credible sources) is desired and documented.
Yoast offers premium features including a tool to optimize your content for synonyms and a redirect manager to identify and remedy broken links (404 errors).
Focused attention to fully optimize your posts will elevate their success … much like including all of the flavor profiles makes for a delectable and satisfying meal.
Need a guiding hand for optimizing your content for SEO?
