When I say SEO maintenance, I’m referring to making sure you build upon the foundation you’ve set up already. Every time you create a new page or post, there are certain things you should be doing at the moment instead of putting it off. Even though it can be annoying, it will save you time in the future.
One of my clients raised this question, so I decided to write this blog post. The methods I describe are what you have to do manually or with the help of somebody. There is another part to SEO maintenance that involves the technical assistance of an SEO plugin. I will go into that in an upcoming blog post.
Prepare, upload and fine-tune your images
We’ll be differentiating between featured and background images vs the other images.
Featured or background images
- Choose the images – you can find great free stock images here: Pexels and Unsplash.
- Make them a 16:9 ratio.
- Scale the size to ~1920 x 1080 px.
- Ensure they’re a jpg or jpeg file – if not, revert them to jpg/jpeg.
- Compress them to Lossy – or at least Glossy using ShortPixel
- Tip: Don’t install the ShortPixel plugin. Instead, please create an account with ShortPixel and compress your images from within your account.
- Name them logically!
- Please don’t keep the name that the image had when you downloaded it from Pexels or Unsplash.
- Give them a name that makes sense to you – if you can include the keyword!
- Separate the words with a ‘-‘. For example: this-is-how-you-should-name-your-images.jpg
- Upload the image to your WP Media files
- Update the images’ ‘Title’ by removing the ‘-‘. For example, ‘This is how you should name your images‘.
- Alternative Text: I leave this empty.
- Background or Featured images usually don’t help to make somebody understand the text or content better.
- But that’s up to you; if you think this image is essential for the content, add an Alternative Text that includes your keywords.
Other images
Same steps as above, with a few exceptions:
- Crop the images to the ratio and the size you want to show them as on your page or post using the tool or app of your choice.
- For example, if you want to show them as 500 x 500 px, don’t upload an image that is 800 x 800 px.
- If the image has a transparent background, it’s ok to keep it as a png-file. Otherwise, convert it to a jpeg/jpg file.
- Compress them to Glossy using ShortPixel; if they are small images (125 x 125 px), you can also use Lossy.
- After uploading them to your WP Media Files, add a title and alternative text.
- Add your keywords to some of the images’ alternative text, but not all!
What to watch out for when adding your content
- NEVER steal somebody else’s content. Yes, you can use it as inspiration, but that’s all. Not only can you get in trouble from a legal perspective, but even Google & Co will penalize you. For example, they can banish you from showing up in any search results.
- Keep a consistent styling. The moment a visitor lands on your new page or post, they should know it’s your website.
- Use the same branding colors and fonts etc.
For new pages, the SEO maintenance that you have to keep in mind:
- Don’t add 500 and more words-explanations! Keep it short and to the point.
- More bullet points and short paragraphs
- Don’t use headers to style your page. Use them logically. I’ll explain further below.
- Link to other important pages and blog posts, where it makes sense.
- Remember to make an affiliate link a no-follow link!
For new blog posts, remember to
- Add enough written content, around 600 words or more.
- Use bullet points & short paragraphs
- Break your content up with enough headers.
- Link to other blog posts that extend on the topic or go into further details on something important.
- Add external links to trustworthy sources that help your visitor learn more or get further details.
- For example, if you’re writing about a specific plugin, add the plugin’s link on the wordpress.org website.
- If you include links to your affiliate products, you must make sure it’s a no-follow link.
Headers can be a pain in the a**, but they’re important for ongoing SEO maintenance
Visitors like to scan pages and posts, and so do the search engines. So when you’re adding the headers to your page, follow these rules:
- Always start with the H1 header.
- You can only have 1 x H1 header. It is unfavorable for your rankings to have more than 1 x H1 header.
- Use a descending sequence. For example:
- H1 header
- H2 header
- H3 header
- H3 header
- H2 header
- H3 header
- H4 header
- H4 header
- H3 header
- H2 header…
- H2 header
- H1 header
- Add your keywords or keyphrase to your H1 header, preferably at the beginning.
- Google & Co. give more importance to the H1, H2, and H3 headers, so make sure to sprinkle your keywords to the H2 and H3 headers too. But not in every header!
- Install the Web Developer extension (Web Developer for Firefox) to check your header structure.
- Click on the icon
- Go to the tab: Information.
- Click on Document Outline
What do you want your visitors to do?
That’s what a call to action is all about. Every page or post should include one, maybe two. Okay, perhaps not on your legal pages, but you should add one to the rest of them.
Pages
Depending on the type of business you have, it could be
- Asking people to sign up for a free discovery call with you. Don’t forget to add a button or link to the actual sign up form or scheduling tool.
- Making them aware of your products. Again, add a button, link, or even an image of the product that will take them to the product’s landing or overview page.
- A sign-up box for your Newsletter
Blog Posts
- Add a freebie that matches the type of content you’re sharing. If people sign up for it, you will add them to your newsletter list and send them the freebie.
- Note: Please be transparent and make people aware that you’ll add them to your list if they request the freebie. Let them know that they can unsubscribe at any time.
Is your new page or post responsive?
As more and more people use phones and tablets these days, you also have to check that your new page or post design looks good on these devices.
Finalize your desktop layout. After that, check how it looks on a tablet and mobile phone. You can immediately adjust it if needed. You can do that from within your WordPress website; here an example for Astra and Elementor:
I hope this was enough but not too much information to help you tackle your ongoing on-page SEO maintenance efforts.
Thanks for reading.
Diana
Photo Credit: cottenbro (Pexels)
