EDITS.WS

Author: Camille Cunningham

  • WordPress 6.3: A more intuitive way to work on your site

    Yesterday, WordPress 6.3 was released! And this is definitely an update you want to check out. It comes with a renewed site editor, lots of new design options, and improvements in terms of performance and accessibility. Especially the updated site editor got us excited, it makes working on your website a breeze! In this post, we’ve listed the highlights of this week’s release that you will definitely want to know more about!

    The site editor has a few new features

    The site editor in WordPress has been a focus point for a while now, and the release of WordPress 6.3 brings it to a new level. Some of you might already be using the site editor to make changes to your website, and some of you might not use it at all. But with this release of WordPress, it’s definitely worth another look. You can easily access the editor by going to Appearance > Editor in the left side menu when you’re in the backend.

    So why should you check it out? Well, the editor in WordPress 6.3 doesn’t just allow you to change the style elements of your site, it also allows you to edit pages right away, create patterns and control your navigation menus. Meaning that the editor comes in handy when you need to make quick changes to your website. That being said when you make bigger changes to your content, we would recommend using the post or page editor to make sure you don’t miss out on any essential feedback by the Yoast SEO plugin. But for quick changes or improvements to your menu or design, this is a welcome improvement. Bringing all of this together in one place saves us some clicking around and it all works in quite an intuitive way.

    The new site editor in WordPress 6.3
    Change the navigation, style, pages, templates and patterns of your website right in the site editor

    New navigation in the site editor

    The menu on the left of the site editor has changed with this new WordPress release. As you can see in the image above, the menu now has several new items in addition to the Templates section. Now you can also select Navigation to manage your menus. You can use Styles to change up the design of your entire site or specific blocks. Click pages to browse and edit existing pages on your website, or even create a new one. Go to templates to create new ones or edit the ones you already have. Lastly, patterns gives you an overview of your patterns and template parts, also giving you the option to create a new one. It seems simple because it is, and that’s exactly why it works so intuitively.

    Get more control over your design

    This release comes with several features that allow you to take more control over what your pages look like. For one, WordPress 6.3 comes with enhanced padding and margin controls. You can select a block, click Dimensions in the right panel and use the slider to adjust the padding and margin per block. Making it easier to select the right padding and margin right away.

    New padding options in WordPress 6.3
    Use the Padding slider to see the change in padding right away

    There’s also the option to select different aspect ratios for your images. This will help you make the image fitting for your page, without stretching it unintentionally. This can be especially helpful with images you’re using in patterns. Just select the image of which you want to change the dimensions, and use the aspect ratio dropdown in the right panel to select the image size of your choice.

    Changes to the Cover block

    WordPress 6.3 also brings us a few new options in the design of the Cover block. It now comes with layout options, helping you take control of how the text in your Cover block is styled. This may seem like a small thing, but all of these ‘smaller’ improvements give you more freedom in what your pages look like. It’s also possible to select duotone filters for your Cover blocks and play with the different dimensions like padding, margin and block spacing. Go check it out!

    The Styles section and more

    There’s loads more, and you can find a lot of it when you go to the Styles section in the site editor mentioned above. Here you can change up the general style of your website and the style you’ve set per block. Use this to style your paragraphs, quotes, buttons, headings, etc etc. It’s all there.

    It’s also good to mention that the new release comes with style revisions. This means that you can keep an eye on the changes you’ve made to the design of your site and click through previous versions of your site. It also allows you to restore previous designs with one click.

    Two new blocks to play with

    Lately, every new release of WordPress comes with new blocks and this one is no exception. The two blocks that are added to the library this time are the Details block and the Footnote block.

    The Details block allows you to hide content that people can access if they choose to do so. This could be helpful if you want to elaborate on something but don’t want your page to become too long. The content that is initially ‘hidden’ can be text, images or other media. It’s also good to note that search engines will still be able to see the content you hide when using this block. So you don’t have to worry about that having a negative impact on your SEO.

    Detail block in WordPress 6.3
    Example of the Detail block with content hidden
    WordPress 6.3: detail block collapsed
    Example of the same Detail block with the content shown

    The second block that has been added is the Footnote block, which does pretty much what you expect it to do. It allows you to add a footnote (or multiple) to your post. Before, this had to be done by using a plugin, but now it’s possible with a block that’s part of the WordPress block library. Just select the text and click the arrow that points down in the toolbar to find the footnote functionality.

    WordPress 6.3: Footnote block
    Adding a footnote to a blog post with the Footnote block

    Reusable blocks are now patterns

    Reusable blocks allowed you to create a block (filled with content and/or media) and use it on different parts of your website by simply selecting it. These reusable blocks have gotten a sort of revamp and are now available in the form of Patterns.

    Creating a pattern in WordPress 6.3
    Creating a pattern in WordPress 6.3 with help from the block inserter

    A pattern allows you to choose whichever blocks you like, style them however you want them to look and save them to use throughout your website. Using specific patterns in different spots can save you time and help you keep your website and pages consistent. You can choose to sync a pattern, meaning that that one change will apply to all parts of your website. Keeping you in control.

    Meet the WordPress command palette

    Command Palette in WordPress 6.3
    Using the WordPress command palette in the post editor

    WordPress 6.3 introduces us to a new command palette. Access this palette by going to your post editor or site editor and using the ‘ctrl + k’ or ‘command + k’ keyboard shortcut. This allows you to type in a command (it will load suggestions as you type) and do what you want to do a lot faster. The command palette offers an API for third-party developers to (un)register commands, but it also comes with a list of core commands by default. To give a few examples:

    • Navigating the site editor
    • Creating new posts and pages
    • Toggling editor preferences (such as distraction-free mode)
    • Toggling UI elements.

    Dropping support for PHP 5

    With the 6.3 release, WordPress is officially dropping support for PHP 5. Meaning that PHP 7.0.0 is now the minimum required PHP version. That being said, the recommended version of PHP remains at 7.4 or higher. Until now, the minimum PHP version that is being supported is 5.6.20. Although there isn’t a specific usage percentage that the PHP version has to fall below to get dropped, historically the team has used 5% as the baseline. Now that the percentage of PHP 5.6 usage users is 3.9% (and dropping), it’s time to drop support for PHP 5.

    Technical enhancements in WordPress 6.3

    Of course, a WordPress release isn’t complete without several performance and technical enhancements. Also, as with the last few releases, there was a strong focus on accessibility. Making WordPress more accessible with every new version that’s being released. For example, tab and arrow-key navigation has been improved, the heading hierarchy has been tweaked and new controls in the admin image editor make it easier for assistive technologies to navigate WordPress websites.

    Rollback feature for failed plugin/theme updates

    WordPress 6.3 comes with a rollback feature, which is worth mentioning here. This feature restores the previously installed version when a manual plugin or theme update fails. That way, website owners can be sure that their website is still available to their users when an update fails. As mentioned above, this will happen when a plugin or theme is manually updated. This feature will also become available for automatic updates in a future WordPress release.

    A lot of the technical enhancements and features are focused on improving the performance of your website. If you’re interested in reading more about this (and what else you can find in WordPress 6.3), check out the Field Guide.

    WordPress 6.3: A short recap

    This release wraps up the second phase of Gutenberg, but that doesn’t mean it’s done. It’s onwards to the next phase of Gutenberg, which will probably once again bring us lots more in terms of intuitive features and accessibility. We can’t wait and hope you enjoy this new update of WordPress as much as we do!

    Read more: WordPress is 20 years old: The CMS that revolutionized the web! »

    The post WordPress 6.3: A more intuitive way to work on your site appeared first on Yoast.

  • Yoast SEO 20.13: A few more enhancements

    The latest update of our plugin is here: Yoast SEO 20.13. This release is packed with crucial fixes that improve your SEO workflow. We’ve focused on enhancing compatibility and performance, making your SEO efforts smoother and more effective. So, let’s dive into the details of our latest release.

    Compatibility with WordPress 6.3

    Today, the new version of WordPress will be released. This WordPress 6.3 release would cause a small issue in the form of a design overlap in Google, Facebook, Twitter, and Insight preview pop-ups when using our plugin. That’s why today’s Yoast SEO release comes with a fix for this compatibility issue. We understand how important these previews are for your workflow, as they allow you to see how your content will appear on these platforms. With this fix, you can continue to enjoy a seamless preview experience, ensuring your content always looks its best.

    We’ve also made improvements to the Premium version of our plugin. We’ve fixed a performance issue on hosts with limited object caching that was caused by autoloading of redirect data. This enhancement means faster loading times and a smoother user experience.

    Update to Yoast SEO 20.13

    These updates are designed to make your SEO efforts more efficient. This allows you to focus on what truly matters: creating quality content that resonates with your audience. We encourage you to update to the latest version of Yoast SEO. Not only will you benefit from these enhancements, but you’ll also be equipped with the most up-to-date SEO tools to optimize your website effectively.

    We’re committed to continuously improving our plugin, ensuring it remains your go-to SEO solution. Thank you for your continued support and trust in Yoast SEO. We can’t wait to see how these updates will help you take your website’s SEO to new heights.

    Video SEO 14.8

    In other news, we’re also releasing a new version of our Video SEO add-on that comes with some bug fixes. It contains a fix for a few of our users (with large websites) that got a timeout when reindexing. We also fixed a few other bugs that some users with specific situations encountered, so make sure to update if you are a user of Video SEO!

    Sneak peek at our upcoming Yoast SEO release…

    At the moment we are still dotting the i’s, but we’re working on something awesome in Yoast SEO and are bursting to share it with you! It’s almost ready to go, so keep an eye on our upcoming release post and for now, see what you can make of this short teaser:

    The post Yoast SEO 20.13: A few more enhancements appeared first on Yoast.

  • Yoast SEO’s hidden features that secretly level up your SEO

    If you use Yoast SEO on your site, you’re probably familiar with features like the SEO analysis or the snippet preview. You might also know our inclusive language analysis, and how easily you can link to related posts or create redirects in the premium version of the plugin. But there’s (much) more! For instance, the Yoast SEO plugin has so-called hidden features. You won’t find them in your settings, but they do great work. Today, we’ll dive into these hidden features: which ones do we have and how do they lighten your load?

    Why hidden features?

    You can optimize a website in many different ways. Imagine having a toggle for all these options! That’s why, when developing our Yoast SEO plugin, we decided not to translate all these options into settings. If we believe something is beneficial for every Yoast SEO user, we turn the feature on. We call these features hidden features because as a user you’re not necessarily aware of their existence. You might even think we don’t have certain features because there’s no setting for it. But the opposite is true! We’re quietly taking care of things for you.

    The hidden features of Yoast SEO

    To help you understand what Yoast SEO does for your website in the background, we’ve listed some of the hidden features for you below. Let’s go through them one by one!

    1. A structured data graph

    Yoast SEO outputs a fully-integrated structured data graph for your posts and pages. But what is a structured data graph? And how does it help you optimize your site? To answer these questions, you first need to know what Schema is.

    A few years ago, search engines came up with something called Schema.org to better understand the content they crawl. Schema is a bit like a glossary of terms for search engine robots. This structured data markup will help them understand whether something is a blog post, a local shop, a product, an organization or a book, just to name a few possibilities. Or, whether someone is an author, an actor, associated with a certain organization, alive or even a fictional character, for instance.

    For all these items there’s a set of properties that specifically belongs to that item. If you provide information about these items in a structured way – with structured data – search engines can make sense of your site and the things you talk about. As a reward, they might even give you those eye-catching rich results.

    How does the Yoast SEO plugin help?

    Adding structured data to your site’s content is a smart thing to do. But as the number of structured data items grows, all these loose pieces of code can end up on a big pile of Schema markup on your site’s pages. Yoast SEO helps you prevent creating a big and unorganized pile of code. For every page or post, our plugin creates a neat structured data graph. In this graph, it connects the loose pieces of structured data with each other. When the pieces are connected, a search engine can understand, for instance, that a post is written by author X, working for organization Y, selling brand Z.

    You can even build full how-to articles and FAQ pages using the free structured data content blocks in Yoast SEO!

    A structured data graph: Yoast SEO connects blobs of Schema markup in one single graph, so search engines understand the bigger picture.

    If you want to learn more about structured data, we’d advise reading Edwin’s story on how Yoast SEO helps search engine robots connect the dots.

    2. Self-referencing canonicals

    Canonicals were introduced as an answer to duplicate content quite some time ago. So, what’s duplicate content? Duplicate content means you’ve published content that is the same or very similar to other content on your site. In other words: it’s available on multiple URLs. This confuses search engines. They start to wonder which URL they should show in the search results.

    Duplicate content can exist without you being aware of it. In an online store, for instance, one product might belong to more than one category. If the category is included in the URL, the product page can be found on multiple URLs. Another example would be campaign tags. If you add these tags to your URLs when you share content on social or in your newsletter, it means the same page is available on a URL with and without a campaign tag. And there are more technical causes for duplicate content such as these.

    The solution for this type of duplicate content issues is a self-referencing canonical. A canonical URL lets you say to search engines: “Of all the options available for this URL, this URL is the one you should show in the search results”. You can do so by adding a rel=canonical tag on a page, pointing to the page that you’d like to rank. In this case, you’d need the canonical tag to point to the URL of the original page.

    How does the Yoast SEO plugin help?

    Should you go through all your posts now and add the canonical tag? Not if you’re using Yoast SEO. The plugin does this for you, everywhere on your site: single posts and pages, homepages, category archives, tag archives, date archives, author archives, etc. If you’re not really a techy person, the canonical isn’t easy to wrap your head around. Or perhaps you simply don’t have the time to focus on it. Why not let Yoast SEO take care of it? Then you can move on to the more exciting stuff!

    Read on: rel=canonical: the ultimate guide »

    3. Paginated archives with rel=next / rel=prev

    Another hidden feature in Yoast SEO is rel=next / rel=prev. It’s a method of telling search engines that certain pages belong to an archive: a so-called paginated archive. A rel=next / prev tag in the header of your site lets search engines know what the previous and the next page in that archive is. No one other than people looking at the source code of your site and search engines see this piece of code.

    Not so long ago, Google announced that it isn’t using rel=next/prev anymore. Does this mean we should do away with this feature? Certainly not! Bing and other search engines still use it, so Yoast SEO will keep on adding rel=next / prev tags to paginated archives.

    Keep on reading: Pagination and SEO: best practices »

    4. Nofollow login & registration links

    If you have a WordPress site, you most likely have a login link and a registration link for the backend of your site. But the login or registration page of your backend are places that visitors and search engines don’t ever need to be.

    Therefore, Yoast SEO tells search engines not to follow links for login and registration pages. Yoast SEO makes sure that search engines will never follow these links. It’s a tiny tweak, but it saves a lot of unneeded Google action. 

    5. Noindex your internal search results

    This hidden feature is based on Google’s Search Essentials documentation. Google wants to prevent users from going from a search result in Google to a search result page on a website. Google, justly, considers that bad user experience.

    You can tell search engines not to include a certain page in their search results by adding a noindex tag to a page. Because of Google’s guidelines, Yoast SEO tells search engines that they shouldn’t display your internal search results pages in their search results with a noindex tag. But the links on these pages can still be followed and counted, which is better for your SEO. The plugin tells them not to show these pages in the search results; the links on these pages can still be followed and counted which is better for SEO.

    Read more: Which pages should I noindex or nofollow on my site »

    6. Removal of replytocom variables

    This last hidden feature is quite a technical one. In short, it prevents your site from creating lots of URLs with no added value. WordPress has a replytocom feature that lets you reply to comments without activating JavaScript in your browser. But this means that for every comment, it creates a separate URL with ?replytocom variables.

    So what happens if you get a lot of comments? Search engines then have to index all those URLs, which is a waste of your crawl budget. Therefore we remove these variables by default.

    But that’s not all..

    Our plugin comes with loads of features and settings that will benefit the online visibility of your website. The free version of Yoast SEO already gives you access to a lot of features that will help you do well in the search results. Yoast SEO Premium gives you access to additional tools, like the internal linking suggestions or the redirect manager. This makes many SEO-related tasks much easier and saving you time.

    Buy Yoast SEO Premium now!

    Unlock powerful features and much more for your WordPress site with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin!

    Get Yoast SEO Premium Only $99 USD / year (ex VAT)

    Keep reading: Why you should buy Yoast SEO Premium »

    The post Yoast SEO’s hidden features that secretly level up your SEO appeared first on Yoast.

  • How to prepare yourself for Google Analytics 4

    A new Google Analytics is coming to town, and it’s time to get ready! This new Analytics will replace the good old Universal Analytics on the 1st of July, 2023. So if you haven’t started with Google Analytics 4 yet, don’t put it off any longer. Because from July on, your Universal Analytics will no longer process any new data. You will have to have your new analytics set up to make sure you keep collecting data! In this post, we’ll tell you more about what you can expect from Google Analytics 4 and how to prepare for it.

    Why set up your Google Analytics 4 now?

    Good to know: If you have a 360 Universal Analytics property (the paid version of analytics), you will receive a one-time processing extension until the 1st of July, 2024.

    A few years ago, Google first mentioned Google Analytics 4. The reason for creating this new type of analytics is the complexity of collecting and analyzing data. People’s online journeys are becoming more intricate (and spread over several platforms or devices). In addition, privacy is becoming increasingly important in how you collect data.

    It’s good to know this new property can happily coexist with your current Analytics property. Getting started with Google Analytics 4 doesn’t mean you won’t be able to use your Universal Analytics anymore. This property will continue to function and collect data until the data we mentioned above. But from that date on, you will have to make the switch, so let’s dive into what this new version of Analytics (formerly known as “App + Web”) entails.

    As we mentioned, you can use Universal Analytics until July 1, 2023. From that day on, it will no longer process any data. But that doesn’t mean you should wait until that date to create your new Google Analytics 4 property. We strongly advise you to create it now to ensure your property is set up in time. Ideally, you would have set it up months ago. This will also allow you to start collecting data on your new property. The earlier you start, the more historical data you have to give you context when making decisions regarding your website.

    What to expect from Google Analytics 4

    Google calls this “the next generation of Google Analytics”. On their help center page, they name a few advantages over Universal Analytics:

    • It’s durable for the future and privacy-focused
    • It uses machine learning to get you insights into customer journeys across platforms and devices
    • It has enhanced integrations with Google’s advertising platform to optimize campaign performance

    However, it is good to know that this newest version of analytics seems to have been built with data analysts in mind. Where Universal Analytics was a tool for marketers, this new generation seems more difficult for the average user. Ecommerce expert Luke Carthy did an interesting talk on Google Analytics 4 during YoastCon 2023, in which he also explained how to make it work for marketers:

    Interested in hearing the rest of what Luke says? Go to Yoast SEO academy and watch his talk on Using GA4 to boost ecommerce conversions. You can find ten more talks by SEO experts we invited to YoastCon there. If you don’t have an account yet, you can sign up for free to watch these videos and check out our other courses!

    How to prepare yourself…

    There’s no way around it; Universal Analytics is being replaced by Google Analytics 4. Google encourages people to set up this new property (alongside your current one) as soon as possible. So how can you prepare yourself? We’ll discuss setting it up when you’re already using Analytics. But also how to set it up when you’re not using Analytics yet.

    When you’re already using Analytics

    The very first step is to create a Google Analytics 4 property for your website. This can be done from your Google Analytics account. Setting up this new property doesn’t mean losing access to your analytics setup. This setup will remain the same and functional. The new property will collect data next to your existing property; you can access them both.

    To help you set up your new property, Google has introduced a GA4 Setup Assistant wizard. You must have an editor role on your Google Analytics account to use this wizard. The steps to get to this wizard are thoroughly described on Google’s page on how to add a Google Analytics 4 property (to a site that already has Analytics).

    When you’ve created your new property, there are a few more things you can do to ensure you’re getting the most out of it. This new version is focused on giving you more insight into the complex customer journey and improving your marketing efforts. Google’s page on how to switch to Google Analytics 4 gives a great overview of what you can do to properly set up Google Analytics 4. If you want to learn even more, you can take their Skillshop Course to discover what’s new with Google Analytics.

    When you’re new to Analytics

    If you aren’t using Analytics, you must start by setting up an account. Go to google.com/analytics and click ‘Get started today’. When logged in, you can go to Admin (the cogwheel in the bottom left corner) and click the blue button ‘Create Account’ in the top left corner. You must set an account name and decide on what data you want to share with other Google services.

    After that, you click ‘Next’ and add a property to your new account. Google explains how to do this on their page on setting up Analytics for a website and/or app. After you’ve set up your new account and property, you can start getting familiar with Analytics and dive into the data to get more insights into your site visitors and their behavior. Of course, it can be overwhelming at first. But you can find loads of information and training in Google’s training and support section.

    To summarize

    Now is the time to add a GA4 property to your account. This helps you get used to this new way of analyzing your data, and it comes with new features that give you more insight into your audience and the performance of your marketing campaigns. Adding this new Analytics property won’t change anything in your current Analytics setup; you can use and view both properties until July 2023. After that, your old property won’t process any new data, and you will have to switch to Google Analytics 4. So start immediately and get the most out of this new version of Google Analytics!

    The post How to prepare yourself for Google Analytics 4 appeared first on Yoast.

  • What is quality content and how do you create it?

    Writing quality content should be a key aspect of every SEO strategy. But when is your content considered high-quality? And does high-quality mean the same for your users as it does for Google? In this article, we’ll discuss what quality content is and how you can make sure your content hits the mark. It will require some creative writing skills. But don’t worry, you don’t have to become the next Hemingway! By focusing on the right things, you can create high ranking quality content that your users will happily read.

    What is quality content?

    That is the million-dollar question. Knowing how to write good content helps you get more visitors, higher conversions, and lower bounce rates. But who determines the quality of your content? The easy answer: your users. However, this also makes creating the right content more difficult. Because every user is different and has a different search intent. But they have one thing in common: every user knows what they want. Meanwhile, you’re still figuring out what your audience wants to read about!

    That’s not how you would expect an article about writing quality content to start, is it? Don’t worry, we’re not done yet! Although the quality of your content is eventually determined by your users, there are a few steps you can take to make sure you end up with well thought-out, readable, and attractive content. In other words: content that’s eligible to be considered as high-quality by your users and search engines. And yes, this will take some time. But it’s time well spent.


    Yoast SEO helps you create quality content!

    The content analysis in Yoast SEO Premium is designed to help you create quality content:

     

    • Optimize your text for related keyphrases and synonyms
    • It recognizes different forms of your keyphrase, so you can focus on writing naturally
    • It recognizes singular and plurals, and also tenses of verbs
    • Check if your keyphrases are well distributed through the text

    Yoast SEO Premium also gives you access to all the Yoast SEO academy courses, including our expert SEO copywriting training! Want to know more? Take an in-depth look the Yoast SEO Premium analysis.

    Why is quality content important?

    First and foremost, you should make good content for your users. People are unlikely to stick around for long if your website is full of bad content. But that’s not the only reason; low-quality content is bad for SEO too.

    Google is getting smarter all the time. Recently, they said they’ve figured out a way to detect low-quality content. With the ‘helpful content update‘, Google wants to start measuring the amount of low-quality pages on your site. If the overall quality is not good enough, all of your pages could end up ranking lower. So you need to focus on making quality content now more than ever.

    How to create quality content

    1. Write for your readers, not yourself

    If you have an ecommerce site, you want readers to know about the products or services you offer. If you’re a blogger, you want readers to get to know you and the topics that interest you. However, it’s also important to take into consideration what your users actually want to read about. What interests do they have? What events or news do they follow that you can relate to your business?  And what ‘problems’ are they trying to fix that have led them to your site?

    The first step in creating high-quality content is to make sure that it contains the information your audience is looking for. To find out what information your users are looking for, you have to conduct proper keyword research. This will help you determine what subjects to write about and what words your audience uses. Keyword research also helps your rankings, as more visitors and lower bounce rates tell Google that your page is a good result to show in their search results.

    2. Make your content readable and engaging

    Do you want to get your message across? And do you want people to read your entire blog post or page? Then make your content easy to read. This means that you should:

    • Think about the structure of your text and the words you use. Too much text without any headings or paragraphs tends to scare people off, so make sure you use them. It will give your readers some air while reading.
    • Try to limit the use of difficult words and be cautious of the length of your sentences. Both can make your content harder to understand, which in turn will slow down your reader.
    • Use variation in your text to make it engaging. Use synonyms, and alternate longer sentences with shorter ones.

    Another important thing to focus on: Have fun! And be personal in your writing. This helps you write quality content that’s different from your competitor’s, and it helps users get to know you and your brand. Want to know more? In this article, we dive deeper into these tips for writing readable blog posts.

    3. Think about search intent and your goal

    Let’s start with the basics. What does search intent mean? Search intent is the reason why someone conducts a specific search. It’s the term used to describe their purpose. For example, do they have a question they need answered? Or do they want to buy something online? Someone’s search intent makes a difference in how they consider the quality of your content. If it fits their need at that moment, then they will stay on your page longer. But if they need an answer to a question and the page they land on only tries to sell them products, they’ll be gone before you know it.

    Match goals to different search intents

    It’s important to take search intent into consideration while you’re creating the content for a specific page. That’s why we advise you to match your goals to the different search intents users might have. Is one of your goals to get more subscriptions to your newsletter? Then you should add that subscription button to pages where users with an informational intent land.

    Does a visitor have a transactional intent (meaning: they want to buy something)? Make sure they land on the right page. If someone searches for the term “Product x”, you don’t want them to land on a blog post discussing a topic related to that product. Ideally, you want them to land on a page dedicated to “Product x”. However, a category page when you have multiple variations of “Product x” works too.

    Of course, experience tells us it’s not always that black and white. Still, it’s good to consider the search intent your users might have. It will help you determine the focus of your content and what call-to-actions you want to add to a specific page or post. A great way to get started is by adopting a content design mindset. This mindset helps you produce user-centered content based on real needs. Also, for some input, we recommend having a look at the search results to create great content.

    4. Be trustworthy

    When people land on your page, it’s also important to build trust. Especially when they’re not familiar with your site yet. You have to show your audience that you’re trustworthy. How? By doing the following three things:

    1. Write in a clear and user-oriented way.
    2. Try to stay away from stock photos, as genuine photos create more trust and give your site a personal feel. The same is true for your ‘About us’ page. Try to use actual photos of your team. 
    3. Add ratings to Google, testimonials to the right pages, and set up HTTPS. This will help your users and Google to understand that your site belongs to an actual business or person, which allows them to happily and safely browse your site.

    Do you own an ecommerce site? Then have a look at these 7 ways to increase sales by creating trust.

    5. Keep your content up to date

    Another key element of writing quality content is making sure it’s up to date and relevant. This means you have to update your content from time to time to make sure people are able to find the right information. But why is this so important? Because it shows your users that you’re on top of recent developments and can always provide them with accurate information. In other words: it builds trust and keeps your audience coming back to your site.

    Keeping your website and blog posts up to date is also important for SEO, as this shows Google that your site is ‘alive’ and relevant. So, make sure you schedule in a time to update your content regularly.

    Read more: 10 tips to improve the quality of your page »

    Bonus: Invest time in site structure

    The five steps we’ve discussed so far will help you write content that is easy to read and user-centered. Next, we’d like to highlight an extra step that is equally important: working on your site structure. It’s important, because it will help users and search engines find your quality content.

    Site structure refers to the way you organize your site’s content. It’s a vital part of any solid SEO strategy. When you structure your site well, search engines will be able to index your URLs better. It helps Google determine the importance of your individual pages and which pages are related to each other. Additionally, a good site structure will allow users to find their way around your site more easily. It will help them find your quality content in the search results and on your website. That’s why there’s quite a lot to gain from perfecting your site structure. Read more on how to work on your site structure and the importance of doing so.

    A quick recap on quality content

    Although well structured and readable content might not instantly take you to the top position in Google, it’ll definitely have a positive effect on your SEO in the long run. So, before you start publishing post after post (or page after page), it’s worth it to consider a few steps.

    Make sure to write for your readers, make your content readable, match search intent with your goals, be trustworthy, keep your content up to date and work on your site structure. The end result? Attractive content that your readers will appreciate. This will have a positive effect on your number of visitors, bounce rates and conversions. If you want to find out if there are still areas of content SEO you can improve, you can take this short test. Or take a look at our guide to SEO copywriting for more tips and tricks!

    Keep reading: SEO copywriting: the ultimate guide »

    The post What is quality content and how do you create it? appeared first on Yoast.

  • Don’t miss these amazing speakers at YoastCon 2023!

    YoastCon 2023 is right around the corner and we can’t wait for you to hear from our fantastic lineup of speakers. They will be sharing their expertise on a range of topics to help take your digital marketing to the next level. Will you join the greatest experts in the world of SEO on Thursday, May 11th, in Nijmegen? Here’s a quick rundown of some of the speakers and their presentations.

    Bring a friend at 30% off!

    Share the YoastCon experience! Bring a colleague/friend/relative and save 30% on a second YoastCon ticket! Simply get a ticket yourself and we’ll send you your unique discount code to share.

    The absolute top of the SEO industry

    If you looking to take your SEO knowledge to the next level and achieve your business goals, YoastCon 2023 is the perfect opportunity to do so! You’ll learn from the best SEO experts in the world, including the current #1 and #2 in SEO, who will share their expert insights and strategies on our main stage. Plus, a representative from Google will be joining us for an interactive fireside chat. Don’t miss this awesome opportunity!

    Overview of all YoastCon 2023 speakers

    More info & tickets YoastCon â–¸

    The world champions in SEO

    One of our speakers is Jes Scholz, currently ranked #1 in the world championship SEO. She will talk about “Google’s glow up: Why you need to optimize beyond search.” As the Head of SEO at Ringier, Jes has a deep understanding of Google’s ecosystem and will share her insights on why it’s important to optimize beyond search. She will convince you why you need to stop running in the rat race for rankings and focus optimizations on the bigger picture.

    Our own Jono Alderson, currently ranked #2 in the world championship SEO, will provide a behind-the-scenes look at Yoast SEO. As head of SEO at Yoast, Jono has unique insights into how Yoast SEO works. And how to get the most out of it. He has tons of tips on how to fix websites, implement growth strategies, prepare for the future and win markets!

    The web, and in fact, humanity, is at a crossroads. We’re struggling to keep our planet healthy. We, as creators of the web, have a responsibility to be conscious about what we do. The recent developments in AI, for example, make creating content and in fact, websites and code, easier and easier. But with every new develoipment, we have to keep asking ourselves one simple question: Does this make the web better?

    In their talk, Joost de Valk (Founder of Yoast & partner at Emilia Capital) and Marieke van de Rakt (Chief Growth Officer at Yoast and partner at Emilia Capital) will dive in and ask the questions that need to be answered by content creators and web developers.

    Get as close to the source as possible and join the fireside chat with Googler Thierry Muller

    Thierry Muller is part of the Web Platform team at Google. During a fireside chat, we’ll talk to him about the state of performance on the web, user experience, and whether WordPress should worry as it is falling behind on performance. He’ll also share a few first thoughts on how AI could make its way into web development and performance. Don’t miss out and learn more about what Google is doing to help site owners make the right decisions.

    YoastCon for everyone!

    From copywriting & local SEO…

    A well-written sales page, email series, chatbot, or video can sell your products and services while you sleep. Let Kate Toon tell you all about conversion copywriting tactics! Or learn all about local SEO during Greg Gifford’s talk and leave with a detailed playbook that outlines specific strategies and tactics that will help you dominate local search results for 2023 and beyond.

    … to news SEO & GA4

    News takes a special place in Google’s ecosystem. Users expect Google to show the latest and best articles on any given topic. This provides us with detailed insights into Google’s crawling and indexing ecosystem and the signals it uses to determine authority and expertise. Let Barry Adams share (almost) all he has learned about Google’s inner workings.

    Want to learn how to catch huge opportunities in the world of ecommerce? Luke Carthy tells you exactly how you can use Google Analytics 4 (GA4) to collect custom and super-powerful data to boost conversion and grow sales.

    User research, WordPress and SEO agency landscape

    User research expert Els Aerts tells you all about ‘The Good, the Bad and the Ugly of user research’. In this talk, she highlights the most important pitfalls to be aware of when doing research.

    And in Miriam Schwab’s talk, she’ll examine five trends that keep WordPress relevant and exciting to a wide range of users. Trends that can play a role in keeping WordPress the leading CMS for many years to come.

    If you want to dive deeper into the SEO agency landscape, Hannah Thorpe will talk about what to do – and what not to do – whilst setting up your SEO team and how to tackle those common problems. This actionable talk is great if you’re looking for inspiration on what makes an agency successful.

    YoastCon workshops: put theory into practice straight away

    Want to sharpen your keyword research skills or enhance your SEO copywriting? Attending the YoastCon workshops is your chance to learn from the best in the industry. Seats for these workshops are filling up quickly, so make sure to get your hands on your YoastCon ticket and register for the workshop of your choice!

    Don’t miss out on all these top-notch talks

    Are you ready to be blown away by the amazing talks at YoastCon? With such a fantastic lineup of topics, we’re curious – what are you most excited about? Get your thinking cap on and take in this unforgettable experience at YoastCon 2023 in Nijmegen! And, don’t forget, you can get 30% off every second ticket to bring a friend and share your YoastCon experience!

    Get your ticket(s)for YoastCon â–¸

    The post Don’t miss these amazing speakers at YoastCon 2023! appeared first on Yoast.

  • WordPress 6.2: A new site editing experience

    It’s here, WordPress 6.2 has been released and with this update comes loads of stuff for you to enjoy! Staying true to the format, this release is named after jazz musician Eric Allan Dolphy Jr. WordPress 6.2 “Dolphy” comes with an updated site editor that gives you more control over what your website and pages look like. But there’s also a focus on performance, with this being the first WordPress release that had a performance lead! And lots of other enhancements, like fixes for accessibility issues, PHP8 compatibility and more. Read all about it, right here!

    The site editor

    WordPress 6.2 comes with lots of new features and improvements to the block editor. Updates to the interface, a better overview of the possibilities and improved blocks. It’s all there for you to discover and take the next step in website editing. And a fun fact, with this WordPress release, the site editor is now officially out of beta! Meaning that the site editor is now more stable than ever.

    A new interface for the site editor

    The site editor has an updated interface which gives you more control over your site editing experience. It allows you to navigate through your templates and template parts and edit parts of your site in one place. It’s also possible to add a new template or template part by clicking the plus icon next to Templates. This new interface gives you an overview of the templates (for example your 404-page, search results page and archive pages) and template parts (for example your footer or header) to edit.

    Site editor interface in WordPress 6.2
    The site editor interface in WordPress 6.2

    You can find the site editor by going to Appearance in the sidebar and clicking on Editor below that. It’s good to know that the site editor is only available on websites that use a block theme. So if you don’t see the option Editor, you might be using a theme that doesn’t support the site editor.

    A smoother experience for the block inserter

    WordPress 6.2 comes with a renewed block inserter, which you can access by clicking the blue plus icon at the top of any page or post you’re editing. The new look feels simpler and we mean that in a good way. You can now use the block inserter to add blocks, patterns and media directly to your content. You can just drag and drop the image of your choice into the page. The block inserter also gives you a preview of the blocks, patterns, or images while keeping the categories in your view. This makes it easier to weigh your options and access the content that you’re looking for.

    Another new feature that’s part of the renewed block inserter is the option to add media from OpenVerse. OpenVerse is an extensive media library with over 600 million free, openly licensed images and audio. This can help you find a suitable image (or audio fragment) and import it directly into the page.

    Block inserter interface in WordPress 6.2
    Inserting an image with the block inserter

    WordPress 6.2 comes with a Style Book

    This new version of WordPress comes with a Style Book, which gives you a complete overview of how every block in your site’s library looks. Just click on the Styles icon at the top of your page (next to your Publish/Update button and the Settings icon) and select the style book icon which will show up below that. This makes it easy to change the appearance of the blocks you’re using on your page, for example, the styling of your headings or paragraphs. Having all of this in one place makes it easier to edit all these elements and keep your styling consistent.

    The new Style Book in WordPress 6.2
    The new Style Book in WordPress 6.2

    Add a sticky block to your page

    It’s now possible to keep a block fixed to the top of the page as a site visitor scrolls down your page. Right now, this only works for top-level group blocks. To try it out, simply add a group block to your page or post and you should be able to see the Position tab in the block settings. Select ‘Sticky’ instead of default and this block will become sticky and will stay at the top of the viewport at all times. Kind of cool, right?

    An improved navigation block

    The navigation block was already available in the block editor but has become a bit easier to use with this latest release. It allows you to add, remove and edit the separate items in your menu in the block settings of your navigation block. You can also drag and drop the menu items to change the order in which they’re shown. You can choose to show an existing menu or create a new one right there (select the menu of your choice by clicking the three dots in the block settings). What’s also cool is that it’s possible to add ‘Search’ to your menu, which adds a search function to your navigation block. There are also other elements you can add, just click the plus icon in the block settings and give it a try!

    The introduction of Block Settings and Styles tabs

    The options that are being added to Block Settings sidebar keep growing and growing. Which is great, as it gives us more control over the blocks we use on a page. But it was becoming a bit crowded. That’s why WordPress 6.2 is introducing Block Settings and Styles tabs. When a block is selected, the sidebar will show you two tabs, one for the more general settings and one for styles. The latter will show you all the options you have to change the appearance of your block. This will help keep the sidebar more organized and help users understand where they need to be to make changes to the block.

    Distraction free mode

    The name says it all, this feature helps you work on your page or post with no distractions around. Or at least, any distraction that WordPress can remove for you. Click on the three dots at the top right corner of your page (next to Publish/Update and settings) and select Distraction free to give it a try. This hides all the toolbars that you normally see when you’re working on a page in WordPress. Bringing you some more peace and quiet to focus on your content. If you want to exit the distraction-free mode, just move your mouse to the top of your page and the three dots will appear again (together with your Publish/Update and settings button). This allows you to disable this mode by clicking Distraction free again.

    Pro-tip: we also recommend activating Fullscreen mode (which hides your admin UI) for an even cleaner and less distracting screen.

    distraction free mode in WordPress 6.2
    Go to Options in the top right corner to activate Distraction free mode

    Performance improvements

    The performance of your website is essential nowadays. That’s why this update also comes with many performance improvements, visible in the benchmarks for both Web Vitals and Server Timing metrics. The WordPress 6.2 field guide also tells us that performance is further improved for block themes with around 20% faster TTFB (time to first byte, a metric for determining the responsiveness of a web server) and around 14% faster LCP (how long it takes for the largest piece of content to appear on the screen). On pages with hero images, the LCP improvements are even greater at around 19%.

    Also good to know: This was the very first WordPress release with a performance lead appointed! The performance lead with this release was Felix Arntz. With a performance lead joining the release team, we can safely assume that performance will continue to be an important part of future WordPress releases.

    Under the hood

    In addition to performance improvements, there’s a lot of other stuff that’s been worked on which is a little less visible. Let’s dive into a few highlights and show you what’s going on under the hood of WordPress 6.2.

    Improved PHP8 compatibility

    WordPress aims to support new versions of PHP as much as possible. This means that WordPress Core contributors try to identify any potential compatibility issues and work to prevent these as much as they can. This release isn’t any different. Significant effort has been put toward making WordPress compatible with PHP8 and reducing the risk of WordPress users running into any problems.

    Accessibility improvements

    We also want to mention that this release of WordPress also comes with a lot of fixes for accessibility bugs and regressions. To give an example, one of the improvements that are part of this release is the realization of more consistent accessibility behavior across different browsers. It might seem like small stuff, but every improvement we make in regard to accessibility is another step towards a web that is accessible for everyone. With no exceptions.

    Google fonts in default themes

    Default WordPress themes will offer better privacy with Google Fonts now locally included. Beforehand, these fonts were loaded from a remote source (Google Fonts). The themes Twenty Twelve through to Twenty Seventeen now include font files in the theme folder. This update ensures that the themes follow current recommendations for fonts from a privacy perspective, making them GDPR-compliant.

    Faster plugin & theme updates

    A long, long time ago, WordPress 2.5 introduced copy_dir() for copying a directory from one location to another. However, this method took up a lot of memory, disk space, time and file operations. Which is not ideal at all. Thanks to the introduction of a move_dir function in this release, you will now be able to save time and disk space.

    Update to WordPress 6.2

    Those were the most important features in the latest release of WordPress, but that doesn’t mean we covered everything. We would recommend updating to this latest version of WordPress and trying it out for yourself! Let us know what you think about all the changes to the block editor in the comments below. We can’t wait to hear about your experiences!

    Read more: The WordPress block editor: Why you should be using it »

    The post WordPress 6.2: A new site editing experience appeared first on Yoast.

  • Yoast SEO reduces your site’s carbon footprint with crawl optimization

    Today, we’re very excited to be releasing Yoast SEO 20.4. With this release, we’re bringing our crawl optimization feature to Yoast SEO Free. With this feature, you can improve your SEO and reduce your carbon footprint with just a few clicks. This blog post will tell you about this feature and why we’ve brought it to Yoast SEO.

    Before we explain this Yoast SEO feature, it’s good to start with a quick reminder of what crawling is. Search engines like Google or Bing use crawlers, also known as bots, to find your website, read it and save its content to their index. They go around the internet 24/7 to ensure the content saved in its index is as up-to-date as possible. Depending on the number of changes you make on your website and how important search engines deem your site, the crawler comes around more or less often.

    That’s nice, but did you know crawlers do an incredible amount of unnecessary crawling?

    Let’s reduce unnecessary crawling

    As you can imagine, search engine crawlers don’t just visit your website but every single one they can find. The incredible number of websites out there keeps them quite busy. In fact, bots are responsible for around 30% of all web traffic. This uses lots of electricity, and a lot of that crawling isn’t necessary at all. This is where our crawl optimization feature comes in. With just a few simple changes, you can tell search engines like Google which pages or website elements they can skip — making it easier to visit the right pages on your website while reducing the energy wasted on unnecessary bot traffic.

    The carbon footprint of your website

    You might be wondering why we want to help you reduce the energy consumption of your website. Does it make that much of a difference? The answer is yes! Regardless of the size of your website, the fact is that your website has a carbon footprint. Internet usage and digital technology are two massive players in pollution and energy consumption.

    Every interaction on your website results in electricity being used. For instance, when someone visits your website, their browser needs to make an HTTP request to your server, and that server needs to return the necessary information. On the other side, the browser also needs the power to process data and present the page to the visitor. The energy needed to complete these requests might be small, but it adds up when you consider all the interactions on your website. Similar to when a visitor lands on your site, crawlers or bots also make these requests to your server that cost energy. Considering the amount of bot traffic (30% of web traffic), reducing the number of irrelevant pages and other resources crawled by search engines is worth it.

    Take control of what’s being crawled

    The crawl optimization feature in Yoast SEO lets you turn off crawling for certain types of URLs, scripts, and metadata that WordPress automatically adds. This makes it possible to improve your SEO and reduce your carbon footprint with just a few clicks.

    Check out this fun animation to get an idea of what this feature can do for your website:

    The crawl optimization feature was already part of Yoast SEO Premium, but today we’re also bringing it to the free version of our plugin. We do this to make as much of an impact as possible. There are over 13 million Yoast SEO users, so if everyone’s website crawling is optimized, we can have an enormous impact!

    How to use the crawl optimization feature

    How do you get started with crawl optimization for your website? Just go to Yoast SEO > Settings > Advanced > Crawl optimization. Here you will find an overview of all the types of metadata, content formats, etc., that you can tell search engines not to crawl. You can use the toggles on the right to enable crawl optimization.

    screenshot of crawl optimization settings in Yoast SEO
    Screenshot of the Crawl optimization section in Yoast SEO settings

    The crawl optimization settings in Yoast SEO 20.4 allow you to:

    • Remove unwanted metadata: WordPress adds a lot of links and content to your site’s and HTTP headers. For most websites, you can safely disable these, making your site faster and more efficient.
    • Disable unwanted content formats: For every post, page, and category on your site, WordPress creates multiple types of feeds; content formats designed to be consumed by crawlers and machines. But most of these are outdated, and many websites won’t need to support them. Disable the formats you’re not actively using to improve your site’s efficiency.
    • Remove unused resources: WordPress loads countless resources, some of which your site might not need. Removing these can speed up your site and save energy if you’re not using them.
    • Internal site search cleanup: Your internal site search can create many confusing URLs for search engines and can even be used by SEO spammers to attack your site. This feature identifies some common spam patterns and stops them in their tracks. Most sites will benefit from experimenting with these optimizations, even if your theme doesn’t have a search feature.
    • Advanced: URL cleanup: Users and search engines may often request your URLs using query parameters, like ?color=red. These can help track, filter, and power advanced functionality – but they come at a performance and SEO ‘cost.’ Sites that don’t rely on URL parameters might benefit from these options. Important note: These are expert features, so ensure you know what you’re doing before removing the parameters.

    Would you like to know more about using this feature and the separate toggles? Check out the help documentation on the Yoast SEO crawl optimization settings.

    Update to Yoast SEO 20.4 now

    That’s it for now. Make sure to update to Yoast SEO 20.4 and optimize your website’s crawling immediately! It’s not only better for your website, your site visitors, and search engines. It also has a positive impact on our environment. Especially when you realize how many we are, if all 13 million of us optimize the crawling on our website, we can reduce the amount of energy used by a ridiculous amount. So let’s start right now!

    The post Yoast SEO reduces your site’s carbon footprint with crawl optimization appeared first on Yoast.

  • 404 Not Found error pages: the do’s and don’ts

    A “404 error” page is an essential part of any website. It informs your users the page they requested had been moved or changed. Do you need to pay attention to your 404 page and give it some love? Absolutely yes! In this post, we’ll go through the dos and don’ts of a 404 page and help you get more value out of it.

    What is a 404 page, and why do we need it?

     A 404 page, also known as an “error page”, or “page not found” page, is the content your visitors see when they land on a page that doesn’t exist.

    The number 404 is the status response code for that page. The 404 response indicates that your visitor’s browser could communicate with your web server, but the server could not find what was requested.

    There are many reasons why a requested page can’t be found. It may be that:

    • The page was deleted.
    • There are typos in the URL.
    • The permalink structure has changed.
    • The domain name was changed.

    Whatever the reasons, remember that it’s probably your fault and not your users’ fault. So keep that in mind and create content based on that assumption.

    It’s worth noting that, sometimes certain pages need to go down temporarily. In that case, it’s much better to serve a 503 Service Unavailable message than serve a 404 error not found.

    What to include on your 404 page (the Dos)

    When users click on a link, they expect to land on a page that answers their questions or gives them the necessary information. For whatever reason, the page they land on returns a 404 message. In that case, what should they do next? 

    If you don’t help your users take the next step after they land on a 404 page, they might still browse your site for information. But nothing is stopping them from leaving and browsing other websites. In that case, you’re not providing users with what they need while losing traffic to your competition.

    A better way to utilize your 404 page is to help users navigate to other useful pages on your site. There are many ways to go about that. For instance, you could:

    • Include a search bar so users can quickly search for other information.
    • Include a button that takes users to the homepage.
    • Include links to other important/popular sections on your website.
    • Include links to popular product or category pages.
    • Guide them to read your popular or most recent blog posts.

    As for the error message, make it perfectly clear that you can’t find the requested page. A simple “We may have deleted or moved this page” should be fine.

    Examples of nice 404 pages

    Below are examples of good 404 pages. These pages provide extra value — or enjoyment! — to visitors by including options to help them navigate the website, whether via the search bar, shop page links, or popular blog posts.

    Ebay.com’s 404 page
    Lego’s 404 page is still awesome
    Our own 404 page

    The value of your 404 page

    Many marketers and website owners don’t see the value in the 404 page, which shouldn’t be the case. If you have a website, you want to keep your visitors on your site. You want them to engage with your content, browse other pages or check out your offers. But if they land on an error page with nothing to point them in the right direction, they’ll most likely turn back and leave.

    That’s why you need to help visitors navigate your site when they land on a 404 page. By doing so, your 404 page may help to:

    • Reduce bounce rate and keep people on your site longer;
    • Engage your visitors with other content or offers on your site;
    • Make it easier for visitors to navigate your site;
    • Maintain a consistent branding experience while building up your brand image.

    Content management systems like WordPress or your web server include a default 404 error message page. But these default pages are ugly and very bare bone. There’s nothing there besides the error message, not even traces of your branding. That’s why you need to customize your 404 page, which can be easily done via plugins if you’re a beginner. A quick search on WordPress.org gives you many options.

    The default 404 page that WordPress creates

    What not to do on a 404 page (the Don’ts)

    Many websites do a 301 redirect from a 404 page to the homepage, which is not a good practice. What you’re doing is putting people on a train they did not choose themselves. Why send them to London if they want to go to Paris? If a visitor wants to find a particular page on your website, please give them that page or an explanation of why you can’t.

    Being funny is a good thing. But when it comes to a 404 page, we would instead create an actual page that’s helpful to users instead of a funny one that provides no value. Fun is great, and it could fit well with your brand image. But you need to make it work. Please don’t put a picture of a giraffe licking the screen and think your visitor will like your website regardless of not finding what they want. Help them get back on track. Or point them to your homepage to start over again (but don’t redirect them!).

    Another thing we strongly suggest against is not customizing your 404 page at all. As mentioned above, the default 404 page that WordPress or your web server includes is lackluster. It doesn’t provide any extra value to your visitors. That’s not what you want! So make sure your website has a custom 404 page, and make sure it helps visitors navigate your site somehow.

    Examples of 404 pages that can be better

    Below are examples of 404 pages we think can do better, whether by including a search bar, links to popular pages or categories, or just a better copy for the “error not found” message itself.

    IMDB’s 404 page
    South Park’s 404 page

    404 pages and impact on SEO

    It’s worth noting that having some 404 errors on a website is not necessarily a cause for concern. It’s common for websites to have broken links or pages that are removed or renamed over time. Google also said that having some 404 pages doesn’t hurt your overall website ranking. However, if a significant portion of your web pages returns 404 errors, this could indicate more significant structural issues that may affect SEO.

    You can closely monitor your 404 pages by using tools such as Google Search Console or Screaming Frog. Make sure to monitor and fix 404 errors regularly. That helps ensure your website is properly crawled and indexed by Google and may help improve your overall SEO performance.

    It’s also essential to ensure that any internal links to a missing page are updated to point to relevant content on your site. Doing so ensures that your users and search engines are directed to the most relevant pages. It also prevents them from encountering additional 404 errors.

    Why do you think your 404 Not Found page is great?

    Or perhaps you have some great examples, good or bad. We’d love to see these, so please drop a link in the comments!

    Read more: Website maintenance: 404 error pages »

    The post 404 Not Found error pages: the do’s and don’ts appeared first on Yoast.

  • Where SEO and UX meet on your site

    At Yoast, we believe that the best SEO strategy is a holistic approach. With a holistic approach, SEO has a lot of “teammates” that have to work together. Simply optimizing your page titles isn’t enough. You also need to work on aspects like site speed, great content, and user experience (UX). In this post, we’ll focus specifically on the areas where SEO and UX meet. Why? Because both are vital topics to pay attention to if you’re running a website.

    Common page elements that influence both SEO and UX

    If you look at the basic elements on a page that influence your SEO, you’ll find a close relationship between SEO and user experience (UX). Below, we’ll discuss a few of these elements.

    Page titles and headings

    In general, understanding how to use the headings on your site is quite important. Why? Because they benefit your SEO and your users. An optimized page title and a related, visible <h1> element will tell Google what your page is about. But the page title and <h1> element also inform your visitors what the page is about. In addition, subheadings such as <h2> also help both Google and your visitors to scan a page and grasp the general idea of that page’s content.

    What about external links? They’re great for SEO, because they tell Google that you respect your sources. Plus, external links can increase the odds that your sources will link back to you in their content. For your users, however, external links provide a way to access background information. They also give you credibility, because external links show visitors that you’ve done your research.

    Great content

    If you provide quality content, people want to link to you, and visitors want to read what you have to say. Plus, they’re more likely to stay on your site. That’s great, because these incoming links and time-on-page are things Google will notice. In fact, Google could even start to consider your content as the main source of information on a certain topic. So focus on creating that quality content! For example, you can add images and videos to your posts and pages, which will make both Google and your users happy.

    Site structure

    Let’s say your post or page hasn’t fully answered the user’s question, then it’s great to point them to another page on your site. Why? Because you want to prevent users from clicking back to the search result pages. This is otherwise known as a bounce. A high bounce rate can have a negative influence on your SEO. It indicates to Google that you may not be answering your visitors’ search query.

    One way to prevent a bounce is to make sure your site structure is clearly reflected on your page. In other words: No matter which pages a user visits, they know where they are on your website. It’s especially important that visitors know there’s more to explore on your site. So, how do you achieve this? Partly by creating (and maintaining!) an optimized menu, but also by making sure your website has a good structure. You can show your structure by using breadcrumbs, but you can also think along the lines of related posts and products. If you want more in-depth information, take a look at our site structure course!

    And there’s another benefit to having a nice, hierarchical site structure: You make sure that Google can efficiently crawl your pages!

    Site speed

    You might already be familiar with site speed. Still, it’s good to address the topic again, because it heavily influences your SEO and UX. How? First, visitors don’t like waiting for your content to load. Just think about it: How long do you want to wait for a page to load? A few seconds at most, probably.

    Second, Google only wants to spend a certain amount of time on your site to crawl it. That’s why it’s important to optimize your site speed. Try different techniques, such as lazy loading images. In addition, you can defer parsing of JS and CSS files where possible. That way, you make sure your page will show something as soon as possible.

    Mobile experience

    Nowadays, having a good mobile experience is extremely important. Luckily, the same rules that apply to your website also apply to its mobile version. It should be fast, well-designed, and have an easy-to-use navigation. After all, you want both users and search engines to quickly find what they’re looking for.

    So think hard about the mobile version of your homepage! Does it cover the main areas of your website? Does it invite your visitors (and any search engine) to explore the rest of your website as well? Even button sizes could influence a user’s experience. You can always ask Google’s opinion on your mobile website via their mobile-friendliness test, or read our post on how to improve the mobile version of your site.

    Conclusion: SEO and UX go hand in hand

    As you can see, there are many areas where SEO and UX meet. It’s probably fair to say that almost every optimization that benefits your users (UX) will also have a positive effect on your SEO. And it’s the other way around too! If you deliver a poor user experience, you might see this reflected in the search result pages. Obviously, the impact may differ from optimization to optimization. But SEO and UX are clearly a great match in our larger concept of holistic SEO!

    If you want to learn more about user experience (UX) and other essential SEO skills, you should check out our All-around SEO training! It doesn’t just tell you about SEO: it makes sure you know how to put these skills into actual practice!

    Read more: What is UX (and why bother?) »

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