Search engine optimization is often misunderstood so in my industry, my business, I spend a lot of time writing blogs and explaining what SEO is. I figure that if you understand it, you will understand its value and use my services, have a consult to learn more and do it yourself, or figure it out by reading my blogs and still do it yourself. Either way, I am hoping that you take the time to improve your website and when you need help (or have a friend who does) that you will remember how you learned all this awesome SEO magic.
So, with that being said, I often write blogs on how to optimize a WordPress website and the tools that can help with that process. I recently mentioned ‘Yoast SEO’ as one of those tools that can help. Yoast recently underwent some major changes and had some hiccups but the bottom line is, change happens so we must go with it. That being said, this post is geared towards the recent modifications. Please note that I have Version 3.0.7 and yes, it’s the free version, because we love FREE. If you opted not to update or haven’t, then yours might be a little different, but the principle is the same.
Be careful with trusting Yoast responses with your info
Now, I’m not saying Yoast is bad and not to use it, because as I said, I use it. But consider – ANY tool is only as good as the info/data that is fed into it. Now I’m going to explain how this also applies to Yoast SEO and how to use it. Yoast provides little red, yellow/orange and green lights – to mimic the traffic light and whether your content meets the checks.
Consider the ‘bad’
Let me share with you a not great example so you can see quicker where I am going. My most recent blog was about ‘Making your Content Skimmable’. I personally don’t use the focus keyword because I know what I am doing and my focus, however, let’s just say that I used the focus keyword as ‘skimmable’. I get 3 red lights, 1 yellow and 8 green lights. While that may seem better than it is worse, what am I
focusing on – skimmable and what is my focus of this blog? My blog is trying to tell people to make their blogs look good with header tags, different styles, use white space and pictures… that people don’t read it all the time, so make it look good and make it easy to skim. Is skim a keyword that I want to be ranked for? Not really. So are you seeing how getting 8 green lights, 3 red and 1 yellow, in this case isn’t as good as we might have thought?
Another case in point, I changed the focus to basketweaving.. which, if you read the blog, has NOTHING to do with my blog. I know for a fact, that word is NOT in my blog, at all and I got 5 red, 2 yellow and 5 green. I then tried to use a few other keywords, like heading, readability and even optimization and I
don’t get an overall green.
Sometimes you just aren’t going to get all green, it’s okay
You have to be okay with not getting an overall green or all green if you are using the focus and here’s why?
- It is better to have a catchy title than to have one that is keyword stuffed or at the frontFront loaded focus keywords are better, and while I agree, sometimes it just isn’t natural
- Similar with not having this focus keyword in the url, it’s not always natural
- Similar with not having this focus keyword in the url, it’s not always natural
- Subheadings are intended to help the consumer know what the next paragraph is and break up the text, your focus keyword might not be in any of them.
- This goes for the description too
- You might have content on another page that has the same keyword in it, and linked to it and that is so you can share other blogs and info with the consumer on your website. So what if we have the same focus as on another blog? The point is to keep the reader on your website with more information, if they’ll read it.
- Because it is the focus, the keyword density may be low, which is okay because you are writing to the consumer and sometimes other words might need to be used
- Never used focus keyword before? I got a green for this one, well duh, because it wasn’t relevant (basketweaving) so I got a green, but had no value, zip, zero!
That was just a few of the things that are okay if you get them and my reasoning why… however, I want you to consider the things that you should be looking for.
A tool can only be as good as what you put in it. #justsayin Click To TweetWhat you DO need to focus on
Now that we focused on some of the things you might get red, yellow or green for, that in my opinion might not be as noteworthy, depending upon the score you get, let’s look at the things you really need to be sure to get. (with or without red, green, yellow)
- Be sure you have a quality title and meta description
- catchy to draw the attention of the reader
- keyword rich but natural over spammy
- title within the limitation of at least 40 but no more than 70 characters (with spaces)
- description within the limitations, less than 160 characters (with spaces)
- You need to have enough keyword rich content
- Yoast says at least 300 though I would say 500+, at least get the point across
- You should naturally be using keywords that are important to you which helps with your keyword density, using a variety of forms of your words, but again, natural over spammy
- Make it pretty
- People are visual – have at least one complimentary image
- Be sure all of your images have alt tags
- Keep your content skimmable so folks can read what they want and browse your content easily
- This means to use white space and heading tags (h1, h2, each)
- Typically the important stuff is at the top. Of course you want to draw the reader and they read the who thing, but in case they don’t, they can find what they want
- Links
- Allow consumers the opportunity to read more about it or use other blogs to explain points you don’t have the time to in this blog (ie – there are several in this blog)
- This is to keep the reader on your website and help to further educate them about your topic, and industry.
- Plus, people learn differently, visuals, videos, how to screen captures or just saying it another way, so a similar blog might be what the reader needs.
In a perfect world, your keywords are in your url, your title, your description and several places, in several tenses and various references in your content, with a few links to other blogs, with 500-1500 words, using title and meta descriptions within their character limitations, using pictures that have alt tags, headings to make the content more skimmable and the reader.. well, they read the whole blog AND buy your product and service. Well, we can’t have it all… but best to do what we can, that is natural, right?
Bottom line:
YOAST IS A GREAT TOOL, this post wasn’t to bash Yoast, but consider what it is measuring and YOU focus on your keywords and catching the attention of the reading in using your title, meta title, descriptions and etc. Just don’t be so hard on yourself if you aren’t getting an overall green score or getting mostly green.. it is ok! It was meant to be a guideline for those who are less familiar. If you have been following me for awhile, you read to the end AND you already got the gist! 😉
Should you have any questions about this plugin, search engine optimization or website readability, contact me as I would be happy to help.
~Kristen
That’s definitely very insightful. I always thought I already knew all there is to know about SEO. This plugin is definitely new to me!
You are welcome Elizabeth.. as an industry expert.. I don’t even know everything there is to know about SEO! lol
Oh, thank you for this! I needed to hear from someone other than my own thoughts that it’s ok if you don’t get all green lights 🙂 I’m still working on SEO and never seen to get the H2 clearance. Back to scratching my head – lol!
YAY! So glad Sandra that this was helpful. Keep on keeping on, you’ve got this!
You are welcome Sandra, nope.. you are good to go. Glad you feel better now!
You are so refreshing! Most SEO experts are all about keywords without regard to pretty or catchy. I love what you said: It is better to have a catchy title than to have one that is keyword stuffed or at the frontFront loaded focus keywords are better, and while I agree, sometimes it just isn’t natural. Thanks for being unique and sharing your great opinions, Kristen!
YAY! Thanks Beth. I am all about natural over spam, ANY day… plus, things have changed, it’s all about the consumer experience, hands down! YAY, I’m unique! 😉
Oh, this is good and something I am working on for my website. I am going to take time and compare my yoast setup with your tips. Thanks a bunch!
Excellent Teresa, yes, please do compare and take a look at yours. 😉
Great post, Kristen. I use Yoast. I don’t worry too much about the opinions of the Yoast app. I am more concerned that the post is titled correctly and appears well on social media sites.
I do have a question for you though. A few months ago, they had a major update and it really messed with all my old Snippet titles that is used for all my social media posts. It removed all my snippet titles – 4 years worth and replaced it with one focus keyword, ugh. Any ideas on how to correct this in bulk without having to open each post and change it there? I did it this way for about 1/2 of 2015, and it took a long time. Any help would be appreciated.
I am glad Sabrina, on both accounts, you use Yoast and you aren’t too worried about it.
On your question… I would say to reach out to Yoast first… as they might know of a quick fix. That’s horrible that it happened to you. I hadn’t noticed mine, but I’ll have to go look now. urgh. Or, check with a web designer because if you are using WP, which you are, there would likely be backups and you might be able to have coded a back up restore of just that meta info. Good luck
This is very helpful. the seo stuff still baffles me, but you help me make sense of it!
SEO stuff confuses everyone Susan, you aren’t alone, but glad this helps. 😉
Kristen, I am so glad I have you working on my SEO! I’d be lost without you. BUT I have already learned a lot and gradually implementing things. I know you’re not looking for testimonials here but I just need to tell people: Kristen is amazing. If you need help with SEO, don’t waste any time, give her a call.
Thanks Lisa and you can always leave a testimonial on my site too. 😉 Glad to be working with you! 😉
I used to get upset that I couldn’t get all green lights, & then I was told not to worry about it. Your post confirms what is important. What I want to see happen in 2016 is organic traffic to blogs.
I can see that Roz, but glad you stopped worrying about it. It’s our OCD. 🙂 YOU WILL see an increase in your organic traffic… catch is.. for what? 😉 So, be careful how thin you spread yourself.
Thanks for the explanations, and I actually I was getting rather annoyed already about the focus word…so good to know that you do not really need to use that.:-)
You are quite welcome Katarina! You were getting annoyed? lol Hang in there girl!
I have seen ads for SEO but have not focused on it in any depth, yet. I am, however determined to learn about this marketing tool – at least enough so that if I hire a marketing consultant, I can ascertain if he/she is knowledgeable (is there an Angie’s list for marketers?!) I feel that in the world of social media and digital marketing, I am in my sippy-cup stage, and my learning curve is a vertical line. I will definitely follow your blog, and probably read many of the posts twice. I can tell that you have put original thought into this piece; it’s not just a summary of other articles about SEO. Thank you.
I don’t believe there is an Angie’s list for marketers.. but word of mouth is powerful and following someone that after a period of time you begin to know, like and trust them. It is definitely similar to other content out there as it isn’t new.. but all my blogs are my own creation… blogs need to be… hate spinners. ;( Thank you for your comments too Joan.
Thanks so much for this post, Kristen, as I have been spending way too much time lately attempting to make Yoast SEO happy. I never have my keyword as the first word in the title and often not even in my first paragraph, so those are always red. Recently it didn’t even pick up the keyword in my alt tag for several of my photos and I “wasted” time trying to figure out what I needed to do to get it to read accurately. It still doesn’t.
I also use my own judgement and intuition as to the best titles and how keyword dense my post reads best. Also linking to another page on my blog makes sense to me, but not to Yoast. I REALLY appreciated reading all this from you “Grand Dame of SEO experts”, as it clarified a lot of confusion about the plugin AND in the future I will not try so hard to please Yoast SEO. 🙂
Using your best judgement is key Beverley… and thank you for the “Grand Dame of SEO experts”.. I love it. Glad you are getting it. 😉
This was very helpful. The old Yoast system was so much clearer and easier to use. I try to write clearly and keep the vocabulary for general reading, but I never understand the Fletcher reading score as being too difficult. Any thoughts on their paid version?
I’m with you Joyce, I preferred the older version… hopefully more folks will say the same and they might update to an older version. lol I have used their SEO Local and don’t really see that it is worth the $69/year. Haven’t used any other paid version… can’t imagine what they would do differently for money… that you can’t do?
Hello Kristen.
How are you?
We are a husband and wife, from Mumbai, India and new to blogging. We started just a couple of weeks ago, but we know how important SEO is to the blogging process.
Very interesting information this…
Title within the limitation of at least 40 but no more than 70 characters (with spaces). What happens if the Title is longer? Is it negated by Google? Should the title have the name of the blog in it?
Also, when you say.. description within the limitations, less than 160 characters (with spaces)….What Description are you referring to?
Also, you say this… with a few links to other blogs, with 500-1500 words, what are you referring to? Which content???
Hope you do not mind us asking. Thanks for the wonderful information you have shared on your blog, it will definitely help us build a better blog.
Enjoy your weekend.
Regards.
Vee N Ric
Thanks Vee/Ric, this might be better to have a marketing consultation so I can answer all of your needs but here goes.
SEO IS very valuable as long as you are hoping to be found on search engines organically.
Title – it could be the name of the title if it is catchy and maybe keyword rich. It depends. If too long, Google or other search engines will shorten it. The description is the meta description as noted in the SEO Yoast plugin.
Links – you might want to check out some of my blogs on links, that may help. But I’m referring to internal links.
Thanks again for stopping by… enjoy your weekend as well. 😉
I use this plugin and find it very helpful. I”ll be honest, I’ve never gotten all of the lights to turn green. Just like you, I use it as a tool but only as a guide.
You are not alone Stacey… but glad you know to use it as a tool!
Thank you so much for all of this! I just moved to WordPress and I’m using Yoast SEO now. I’m trying to learn everything I can about it!
So glad you have your own website Angie, Yoast is a great tool for your site.
We have been using Yoast for over a year now and have had such tremendously good results with it. You touched upon a very important point, though, when you said that any tool is only as good as the information you feed into it.
Yes, Holly.. very true. love Yoast, but so what if you don’t get green, as long as you are putting the necessary things in.
I have Yoast on my website. I use some of the features but not all. I should look into utilizing it better.
Excellent Heather and yes, you should definitely utilize all of it’s functions.
Looks Great Tool Will try this. Thank you for sharing
Plugins are GREAT functionality for your website!
I just started using Yoast, and I do agree in the need vs not need of the keyword flood. Thanks for posting!
Awesome, thanks Lily, glad you see the value of keywords, but w/o being spammy! 😉
I try REALLY hard with my Travel/leisure site to get GREENS. With my coupon (multiple a day posts) site, it’s really too hard to focus on SEO on every post.
That is great Mary, that you use Yoast but all Greens aren’t nec. Just be sure you get what YOU need in there.
This post is so helpful! I’ve almost given up understanding the new Yoast but I’m glad not stressing about it TOO much is working for me. I’ll figure it out as I go along.
Thanks so much Sherisa, glad to help.. no, don’t stress!
Love it, love it, LOVE IT! YOAST is a great tool to maximize your SEO if you use it right.
YAY! Glad you LOVE IT and know there is value there.
I’ve been using SEO Yoast plug-in since I started blogging. This helps me in formulating a meta description and calculates the flesh reading ease score, which indicates the readability of your article. If you write a relatively SEO-friendly text you will see a green bullet that can help for better rankings.
Great Deynn, however the score you get is based on the focus keyword that you put in, so if the focus keyword doesn’t have much real value, then, it’s pointless.