Wordpress SEO Expert

Peter Warwick-Mahoney

Homepage FAQ structured data to improve your SEO rank

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Using FAQs on your site to get extra traffic from search results

Google loves a good Q&A, and they’re great for your search engine optimisation.

This is an excellent technique that Google has been responding to very positively recently. It involves a fairly interesting type of structured data.

Structured data is a series of tags and what’s known as microdata that Google, Bing and Yahoo all use to work out what content on your site matches specific, common types of information like phone numbers. It primarily sits in your pages’ code – it’s not something the user sees directly. Although in the case of FAQs you do want them to be able to see them as well – that way your front-end information matches what’s happening behind the scenes. Google definitely wants to see that the information you’re supplying them is also what you’re giving to your users.

You may have noticed little ‘People also ask’ click-to-open sections like this on Google results pages before:

Those questions and answers are being pulled from web pages with ‘FAQ’ structured data on their homepages.

This technique involves adding an FAQ section to your own homepage, and then having the appropriate code added to those so Google can pick them up correctly.

I’ve tried this with a handful of clients and most have seen a 3-4 ranking place increase as a result! Even if Google doesn’t end up using your FAQs on their results page, the effect is the same; they just like to see the code in place.

So this is well worth implementing as part of your SEO strategy.

When writing FAQs for this purpose though it’s best to make them somewhat generic – they should be about your industry generally rather than about your specific offering. (If you take a look at the ones I wrote on my own homepage, you’ll see they’re predominantly about SEO and it’s advantages rather than being about the services I offer myself.)

If you’d like me to implement this for you please just get in touch – and of course I can do it all for you as part of an ongoing SEO campaign too.

Trust the WordPress SEO Expert to advise on your WordPress SEO

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No one should be surprised to hear blogging is good for SEO.

I had an unexpected email interchange with a client a few minutes ago.

I’d been recommending blogging to him for months. He keeps making excuses why he can’t; lack of time, what would be write about – the usual string of things. But I kept pushing because as we all know unique, topical, regular content is great for SEO.

It’s important to point out that while I call it blogging really it can be news, updates – whatever – just as long as you get well written topical content on your site regularly.

Here’s what you want from a blog post:

  1. Unique
    • It needs to be original content to avoid any possibility of a duplicate content issue.
  2. Topical
    • The copy needs to be related to your business. You can’t just write about your recent holiday if you’re trying to sell greeting cards. Having said that if you went exploring a variety of greeting card shops while abroad – that might be enough to make it on topic. (It wouldn’t be easy to do well though.)
    • Included in this is it needs to be interesting information, authoritative and useful.
  3. Regular
    • Posting something every week, or even better twice a week, is ideal. Search engines learn to come back and rescan your site for new content often, and it’s great if there’s something new for them to index every time. What’s no good is if you post just a few times a year at fairly random intervals; it’s better than nothing, but not by much.

This client thought he really had me on the issue today when we said he’d checked with his developer (not another SEO expert, just the person that pieced together his site) and he said not to bother. Because if you search for anything online you’ll very rarely see a blog post on page one.

He’s half right. You do rarely see blog posts on page one. But everything else there is wrong.

Just because a blog page might not rank highly on its own merit doesn’t mean it’s not adding to your overall domain authority. In fact it’s definitely adding to it. There’s a reason sites with lots of well written content tend to have homepage’s that rank more highly than other sites.

If everything in SEO was purely on a page-by-page basis it would be enough to have a single page website that ticked all the boxes and expect it to rank in the top spot. But we all know in industries with any competition that’s simply not going to happen.

Good content on your site all adds up towards the overall SEO authority of the domain. Those weekly blogs might not be found a lot, but they’re a large part of the reason your homepage is.

A few ‘key words’ about keywords

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A lot of SEO professionals are still selling their services based on a very outdated idea of how SEO works.

Anyone telling you they target a set number of keywords really isn’t doing SEO right.

Firstly, an important terminology definition. The term keywords has meant a few different things over the past 20+ years in the Search Engine Optimisation industry. As such I prefer not to use it and try to use other words that do a better job of explaining what I mean. So when it comes to describing the concept of ‘phrases you want to rank highly with in search results’ I use the term search queries. That does a much better job of conveying what we mean – the words people search for that your website gets found for.

Years ago SEO services would be sold based around (in part) a concept of how many search queries your site would be optimised for. But search doesn’t work like that anymore (and hasn’t for a number of years). It’s not as simple as having a list of a few terms we target – since Google brought their Rankbrain (artificial intelligence system) online for website indexing, everything is far more nuanced.

Technically a site can rank and be found for ANY of the words and terms on it.

I’ve blogged about a few of these issues before, so these articles might help give useful background:
https://peterwm.com/googles-rankbrain-and-seo/
https://peterwm.com/does-google-use-meta-keyword-tags/

SEO work is all about reinforcing your key content so it stand out for search engines. But anything within the content can (and often is) indexed by them. As an example if you ever get a chance to see the Google Search Console performance report you’ll often see hundreds of things a site is found for.

For example my site is clearly about being a WordPress SEO expert, and services around that. But in search results it comes up for over 1000 different searches, and a lot of those aren’t related to my core offerings. But they’re all related to words, brands or nouns I’ve used in the past. Googles does a great job of working out the context of your site, but with good SEO you can be found for just about anything.

Using WordPress as a static site generator

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My WordPress site is so fast, I’m not even sure I can call it WordPress anymore.

Static site generators are awesome.

They create blindingly fast sites, with very few drawbacks (more on those later).

But I’ve been using WordPress since it was a small blogging platform call b2. I’m used to it, I like it, and already have a swag of sites built on it for myself; not just my clients.

Because I work in SEO speed is really crucial to what I do. I do a lot of caching and optimisation work for people, but wanted to see what would happen if I really pushed the envelope out.

Initially I was keen to make a front-end that pulled data out of a basic WordPress install using JSON. I set up a proof-of-concept successfully, but wasn’t so keen on remaking all my layouts and front-end design from scratch for it. Besides, basic things like the WordPress menu editor, text widgets etc. are something I very much enjoy using.

I did some research, and came across a plugin called WP2Static. It’s a slick plugin that basically does just what I wanted – it packages up WordPress sites as static sites you can deploy anywhere. With a bit of configuring you can actually use it to output to a folder on the same server, and use some basic .htaccess rules so that becomes the public facing side of things.

Which is cool, but I wanted to go for MAXIMUM SPEED. My end goal was to get the site hosted on GitHub Pages, and then use Cloudflare to CDN it around the world.

(WP2Static does actually have a system to deploy to GitHub Pages built-in, but I found the deployment process just too slow.)

So when I considered everything I was trying to achieve, which included keeping the live site on the same URL it was already on, I opted to do the following:

  • move the WordPress install of my site off its current server, onto my localhost machine (it’s fast and I back it up regularly)
  • use WP2Static to output the site to a local folder
  • use git via the terminal to publish the site

In theory, for a nerd, it seems fairly straightforward. And on the whole it worked much more easily than I anticipated. The main glitches to overcome were that a number of font files weren’t being picked up by the plugin for inclusion in the static site. But it has a configuration option to force it to include certain file paths, so that was easily overcome.

I did need to create a manual 404.html page (GitHub Pages looks for that in the top directory of a site) but that’s neither here nor there.

There were a few other tiny things that were really specific to my own WordPress setup – like realising my sitemap.xml file needed to be a flat XML file rather than an index linking to other XML files – because they weren’t going to be wrapped up by the plugin.

The thing you really lose with any static site system though is (logically) user interaction. In my case that was just forms, but I was happy to replace my contact form with a simple email address – anything else I might need in the future I can do by embedding forms directly from another system like Google Forms.

I used to sell a couple of SEO packages directly through my site, but Woocommerce was always overkill for that anyway. In the future I’ll just use a combination of Paypal buttons to replicate the same functionality – and in fact it’ll be simpler for the end user because I don’t need to know all their billing address information to start an SEO job with them.

The really big day-to-day drawback is that clicking ‘Publish’ in WordPress doesn’t publish anything anymore. The process to run a new export with WP2Static and then send it to GitHub Pages takes about two minutes. But considering how often I blog or change anything on the site that’s not a major issue. Like with anything, you need to weigh up the processes, pros and cons against how you actually use something to determine if it’s right for you.

The site I did all this too, fyi, is the one you’re on right now. This is a static site, hosted for free on GitHub Pages and replicated on servers around the world using Cloudflare.

Google PageSpeed Insights gives a 99% speed rating for Desktop. And the missing 1% is simply because I include an external file that I can’t set an expiration header for – ironically that file is the script for Google Analytics.

Pingdom (my preferred speed testing system, because you can choose a server location for the real-world load-time to be tested against – so if your clients are predominantly in London then choose that server to get an idea of the speed as they’ll see it) gives the homepage a 0.212 second loading time. For something ultimately based on WordPress as a content management system, that’s impressive.

Fill in your social media profiles

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Far too many WordPress sites end up with empty social links

I see this all the time; in the header or footer of WordPress sites, a series of little social media icons that links to – nothing.

A lot of WordPress themes have sections for you to fill out your social profiles, so those little buttons can link to them correctly. But a lot of those themes will show them regardless of whether or not you’ve entered proper URLs. Some go a step further, and by default will have a link entered as #. That just means it links back to the page you’re on, but it’s enough to get the buttons showing and essentially linking to nothing.

It’s an easy enough oversight to make. But it means you have dead links which isn’t great for your SEO, and if visitors notice then it just seems wildly unprofessional.

If you have social buttons, they really need to link to social sites. It’s not hard to do – these sorts of WordPress themes are intended to make everything as simple as possible – but at the very least have a quick check of your own site and make sure your social button links, well, link.

In all honesty I see this in perhaps a third of WordPress sites overall, so there’s a good chance it affects your’s.

How to find your Google rank

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Searching for yourself is a terrible idea

I still get asked a lot about discrepancies between what a client sees when they search for themselves, and either the official stats, or what their friend might see, etc.

So this is a refresher about why you shouldn’t search for yourself as a way to measure your ranking.

Google does all kinds of personalisation on your search results (based on your network’s IP address, if you’re logged into any Google accounts, even your location) and the more often you look for your own site, the more skewed those results will be.

To give an example, most people searching for “peter mahoney” see my site on the first page. But I see myself on the fourth. Essentially because I’ve searched for myself so often – and then not spent much time on my site or even bothered to click it – Google has “learnt” that I don’t like it and therefore ranks it down for me, uniquely.

The right place to get Google’s official rank for your site is their own monitoring systems, which is where I get my stats.

Their stats are actually an ‘average’ of your rank which is the statistically most useful approach. Because of personalisation, not everyone sees your site in the same position. Where someone is searching from geographically for example has an impact. So the average rank is the best indicator of where you rank.

There’s a commonly held belief that if you use a private browsing window somehow you’ll see the proper rankings in the search results. But all that does is prevent Google from knowing your account – they still know where you live, your IP address, in some cases the unique code for your network card – there’s *plenty* for them to skew your results with.

Moving email between servers

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There are plenty of reason to move servers for your website, but email is often an afterthought. Even though it’s something we use hundreds of times a week.

Speed issues, cost and possibly (hopefully) needing to upgrade to cope with all your traffic are all excellent reasons to consider a server move.

Moving the website is one thing, files, databases and DNS work all need to be done – but what about all your emails? Inbox, folder, sent items, drafts. How do you get those across?

And if you’re a server admin with full control over them, then this post isn’t for you. Because you have some clear pathways to move email from the old server to the new one.

But what about everyone else? The 99% of people who just pay for shared space with an existing hosting company, who just have a web based control panel (like Plesk or cPanel) they log into?

If that’s you, prepare for pain. Well, to varying degrees.

Simply put there’s never been a decent tool made to move email from server to server.

If you connect to your email currently via POP, that will mean you’re downloading your email to you local computer and therefore have a local copy. So losing the email from the existing server wouldn’t be a problem.

If you connect via IMAP (and most people do) then all your email is stored on the server, and would be lost. In this case you have 3 courses of action*:

  1. Be prepared to lose your existing email.
  2. Change it so you do connect via POP, then have all that email download to your local machine. The downside with this is usually you’d only end up with the emails on one machine. If you’re used to checking the same email accounts via perhaps two computers and a mobile, then you’d lose the option to have old emails on those.
  3. Get the new server setup and running. Set up the new email address (using IMAP too) and get those all setup on your computer. Then connect to the old email accounts again (you’ll need to change the server address to the IP address, which is a tad cumbersome). But then the really awful bit comes in, you have to drag the emails from the old accounts to the new – and because they’re set up on your local machine it downloads them all then uploads them as it copies them across. Sometimes I can copy a folder at a time, sometimes you need to do emails one at a time – it depends on the setup of the old server.

That last one is a horrible job. I’ve done it on request before, but for an average small office email setup it can easily take a day.

My preference is to start again. Suck up that there’s going to be email lost, make sure you have copies of any current message threads and communication, and bite the bullet.

 

* = If you’re moving from one type of hosting control panel to another one that’s the same (for example cPanel to cPanel) – you have another option fortunately. Again it’s messy: you need to download your mail folder then recreate all the same email accounts on the new server and upload the mail folder to the same place on that new server. This often falls down though because of permissions issues, or server settings you can’t control (where mail is stored, etc.)

 

Turning off comments in WordPress

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I get asked this a lot. You’ve made your WordPress site, launched it, then noticed all the empty comment sections and wondered where they came from.

Commenting in WordPress is turned on by default.

To switch it off, got to:
Dashboard > Settings > Discussion

and untick:

  • Allow link notifications from other blogs (pingbacks and trackbacks) on new articles
  • Allow people to post comments on new articles

That sorts out all your future posts and pages. But what about the ones you’ve already published?

For all current posts you have to do each manually. The easiest way is to go to:
Dashboard > Poststhen click “Quick Edit” under them one by one, and unticking these options:

Being sure to “Update” after each one.

It’s a faff, especially if you’ve already published a lot of content. But a learning experience nonetheless.

Comments on this post are (incidentally) open.

🙂

3 Approaches to PPC Advertising

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I don’t actually offer PPC advertising services (Pay per click). I’m very specialised at what I do already, but clients do regularly ask me for advice garnered from 18 years experience across a variety of technologies.

So I do have some thoughts to share with you.

One very effective technique with PPC is to target what is known as a “spread” of search queries and phrases. That’s based on making the most of the three different “tracks” people take when planning PPC campaigns.

  1. Many people make the mistake of just targeting the most popular searches, which of course is a valid technique but places them firmly, exclusively, in a very competitive market. It also costs a lot more to run campaigns of this nature.
  2. Conversely some people will try to do the opposite, target only the less common searches to save themselves money spent on the campaign, but of course they see a lot less traffic.
  3. There is a third-road, which is trying to find searches with a statistically slightly higher popularity, but lower competition. However, the vast nature of Google Adwords and other PPC markets tends to even these “gaps” out pretty quickly, so even when they can be found the gap is very narrow.

I prefer to approach these campaigns as a spread, to include some targets from all three of these categories. That way you achieve a good mix of results, financial outlay, and it gives you greater scope to track the success of your campaigns and decide which of these might be worth higher future investment.

Basically, you get more options, more data and therefore in the long run a much more strategic and lucrative approach.

Lies

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Here’s a pretty typical advert you’ll see online when searching for SEO, “I can create 33 SEO backlink Panda Penguin safe from PR10”.

The trouble is it’s all LIES.

I know I bang on about the trouble with buying backlinks to try to help your SEO. Regular readers will be familiar with my disdain for people selling the impossible—since Google’s Panda algorithm tries very hard to find people buying links, saying any scheme like this is “Panda safe” or even worse, “Panda friendly” is a massive fib.

So at the risk of repeating myself, I’m going to say some things I’ve said before – albeit in a more concise and succinct form.

It is true that Google does like to see links to your site. But they are excellent at discerning real links (where someone liked your site or service enough to link to it) from purchased ones. Those bought ones are usually just low quality directories and profiles. When I say profiles I really mean it, user accounts get created on the Apple website that have your domain in the user description and the scam-sellers have the nerve to say that’s a PR10 link from a high quality domain. As if Google can’t tell the difference between say, a news story on the BBC and a bunch of comment-user accounts.

I generally stand against buying backlinks because of my SEO ethos. My ethos is simple by the way – Google have given us a swag of information regarding what search engines do and do not want – so I say we give them what they’re after. But on the flipside we need to be sure to avoid what they don’t want.

I have about three jobs a week come in from people who bought back links and got caught – and dropped off Google completely. When they penalise you, they really hit you hard.

Technically speaking really awesome backlinks would certainly help your SEO. But 99% of the time buying them is not awesome, and I recommend avoiding it.

I (like Google) see SEO as a long game, if done properly. But also, if done properly, it “sticks”. A site with good SEO that’s risen to the top should stay at the top.

And with that, I shall get down from my well-trodden soap-box.

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