Online Marketing: Can You Achieve SEO With A WordPress Site?
Online marketing consulting experts emphasize one primary goal: getting your site indexed and ranked with search engines.
Not long ago, they would have said that a blog could help you do that. They probably wouldn’t have recommended a blog serve as their main site.
However, thanks to advances in content management software, that is no longer the case. The line between conventional websites and blogs has almost disappeared.
Blogging programs have become some of the most powerful and flexible content management systems available. One of the leading packages, WordPress, is completely free.
WordPress for content management
Sites built with WordPress can easily include static pages and sections. Technically, you’ll have a “blog,” but it can be made to look virtually indistinguishable from any other site on the Web.
For new website owners who want to run their own sites without learning to code, content management systems like WordPress are particularly appealing.
Instead of compromising your available SEO options by running your site with blogging software, you’re actually getting some unique and affordable SEO perks and opportunities.
effortless structure
Content management systems allow material to be easily categorized. Search engines love structure. The categorization options will allow you to maintain a tidier site which will naturally perform better with search engine spiders.
By establishing and sticking to categories, you can effectively group relevant material together and keep up with the keywords and anchor text you are optimizing for. This includes:
– URLs with anchor text. Blog software makes it easy to create “crawlable” URLs that include your keyword phrases and anchor text.
– Relevant internal links. By grouping material into categories, you can ensure that your internal links are relevant and do the best job of spreading PageRank around your site.
(All trusted online marketing consulting professionals stress the importance of relevant internal linking.)
Creation of new content
Software like WordPress was specifically designed to handle frequent content creation. By regularly updating a part of your site, either as a “news” section or as a conventional blog comment, you will be able to:
– be crawled more often by search engines,
– cultivate regular readers to generate “word of mouth” traffic,
– more easily attract incoming links,
– and develop the “authority” of the site faster.
The “blogosphere” is a social environment. Studies show that blogs exchange links much more often than conventional websites.
By including a “blogroll” or list of links to relevant sites in your sidebar, you’ll find other bloggers organically returning the favor. Backlinks add PageRank to your site and create a greater perception of site authority.
Traffic and links through comments
Commenting plays an important role in link exchange on blog sites. Commenting and trackback features further encourage interaction between sites and increase overall visibility.
Keep in mind, however, that for comments to best serve your site, you’ll need to engage your readers by responding to their comments and visiting their sites and leaving comments of your own.
(Note that comments can be turned on and off for your entire site with the WordPress system.)
Links in “unconventional” locations
Distributing a site managed with blogging software via RSS is a largely automatic process. However, by actively managing your RSS feed, you can include links and generate traffic that doesn’t come directly from search engines.
Additionally, your site will be eligible for inclusion in blog directories and will be crawled by blog-specific search engines where your competition may not have a presence at all.
Content management software like WordPress:
– impose structure and order on your site,
– reinforce the use of anchor text in your urls,
– encourages the addition of new content,
– lead to organic links in the blogosphere,
– increase the frequency with which search engines crawl your site,
– gain visibility for the site in areas that your competition may ignore,
– and generate a greater sense of authority for you and your site.
So how can using software to manage your site be a bad idea in terms of SEO?
wrapping it up
Content management systems, when used with the basic principles emphasized by online marketing consulting professionals, are just another tool in an affordable SEO arsenal.
Such systems do not change the core purpose for establishing your site, they simply provide a different means of maintenance and improvement.
While you may spend money initially to customize your site’s WordPress installation, overall, you’ll save money that would otherwise go to a webmaster. Over time, that money can be spent on other SEO strategies.
With the ability to more easily and quickly manage your own site, you’re not at the mercy of someone else’s schedule. At the same time, the native controls built into the software will give you greater control over your search engine ranking efforts.
That’s win/win in anyone’s book.