Optimize WordPress for Search Engines: My Advice w/ Lou Holtz & Hitch

My Advice for a Systematic Approach to Optimization

Regardless of the medium, the most successful business owners are typically the ones who are the most passionate and persuasive in demonstrating value from their product and service offering. Those business owners, especially small business owners are finding that in order to develop a meaningful presence online, they must find efficient ways to educate prospects and customers about their organization’s value through meaningful and relevant content marketing. Furthermore, the businesses who are winning take their education of value from adequate explanations to outstanding buying experiences.

The most profitable businesses in this space tend to take a systematic approach in providing the most elegant solution possible. This is achieved by utilizing content management systems configured to streamline creation, editing, publishing, distribution, and promotion of that education-based buying experience across a seemingly endless number of touch points to engage their market and scale their business. This means you can’t just build a site on WordPress, install a responsive theme, develop a nifty plug-in, create a few short codes or simply tweak title and Meta tags and expect a silver bullet to be the force behind hockey stick type results. You need to develop a comprehensive set of repeatable, streamlined processes that lead to incremental long-term gains.

That is why when GoDaddy asked me to write an informative tutorial for their clients on how to Optimize WordPress for Search Engines, I needed a series of posts on various topics to provide a comprehensive yet elegant solution allowing any business the opportunity to develop a meaningful, relevant presence online. So without further ado, my advice for optimizing WordPress from Out-of-the-Box setup to refreshing older posts…

• Out of the Box Setup – This section will introduce you to much of the jargon around on page optimization with terms like canonical links, permalinks, pinging, caching, and robots.txt. While using these terms in the wrong company might make you an outcast at a party, not knowing about them pales in comparison to the isolation and anonymity you will feel if you get this section wrong and become non-existent to Google and BING.
• Sitemaps, Plug-ins and Accessibility – In this post I do provide a few of the closest things to a silver bullet for improving the optimization of your site. It will also provide a glimpse into how easy the folks at Yoast and Automattic have made your life.
• Local Search Matters – For small businesses with a brick-and-mortar presence, if you only have time to optimize in one area, make it local search. At a local level, you can compete with national brands. When it comes to competition at a local level, I think Lou Holtz said it best, “You don’t have to be the best team in the world, just the best team in the stadium.”
• Single vs Multiple Business Locations – This post provides detailed tutorials for how to ensure your business is found in all appropriate places and provides quick ways to alert search engines to each of your business addresses.
• Blogger’s Checklist for High Performance – Finally after you have navigated all the setup and jargon you need to down to the production, distribution and promotion of content. This checklist provides insights all key aspects to produce a meaningful blog.

Like in the movie Hitch, these posts will get you 90% of the way there, but that last 10% that seals the deal with the prospects you love, comes from your ability to educate and influence better than anyone else on the topics most important to your business. If you still haven’t read enough, and are in search of that last 10%, check out some additional thoughts from others on optimization for search engines.

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