7 Best WordPress Image Compression Plugins Compared (2021)

Are you looking for the best WordPress image compression plugin for your website?

Image compression plugins allow you to easily optimize images in WordPress for better speed and performance automatically.

In this article, we have compared the best image compression plugins for WordPress.

When Do You Need a WordPress Image Compression Plugin?

Images are larger in size than plain text which means they take longer to load and can slow down your website.

However you’ve probably heard the saying: “a picture is worth a thousand words”. Images make your content more engaging and interactive.

To improve your WordPress website speed, you need to optimize your images for the web.

Since optimizing your images can make your site load faster, it will improve your WordPress SEO, and help you get more traffic.

The best way to do this is by using Photoshop or another image editing software before you upload the image to WordPress. This gives you a lot more control on the quality of images on your website.

However, not all users are comfortable working with an image editing program. For some people, optimizing every single image they upload sounds like a lot of work.

Luckily, there are several WordPress image compression plugins that can help you with that. These plugins optimize your images by automatically compressing them and using the smaller sized version on your website.

That being said, let’s take a look at the best WordPress image compression plugins, and how they stack up in terms of image optimization, performance, and quality.

1. EWWW Image Optimizer

EWWW Image Optimizer is the best WordPress image compression plugin. It is easy to use and can automatically optimize images you upload on the fly.

It can also compress and optimize your previously uploaded images in bulk.

Even though your images are being compressed, it’ll be very hard to tell the difference between compressed and uncompressed in terms of quality.

Plus, the entire process of compressing and optimizing is automated. This includes image scaling to fit the right size page and device, lazy loading, and even conversion into the next-gen WebP image format.

It can also optimize images generated by other WordPress plugins and stored outside your media library folders. This plugin support JPG, PNG, GIF, and even PDF optimization.

There is also a free version of the plugin available, which lets you perform image optimizations on your own server. This can be great for WordPress website owners concerned about privacy.

However, sites with a lot of images or sites that get a lot of traffic will want to opt for the paid plan, since it includes an image optimizing CDN, which will automatically compress and convert images as they are viewed.

Best of all, EWWW Image Optimizer is very affordable. Plans start at $7 per month and support unlimited images. If you have more than one site, then you’ll need a higher priced plan.

Included in your plan is a caching engine, CSS/JS optimization, and Google Font optimization to help your site load even faster.

2. Optimole

Optimole is another excellent option for a WordPress image compression plugin.

Using this plugin requires a quick account creation and API key setup. After that, it’s straightforward to use and gives you complete control over your image optimization.

Optimole is powered by an image CDN, so your images will load quickly no matter where your visitors are coming from. With a CDN, your images are optimized in real-time and delivered to your website visitors in the perfect size.

You can view all of your optimized images in a single dashboard, making it easy to customize compression settings for individual images.

It lets you adjust things like the compression quality, large image resizing, lazy loading, and more.

There’s even a unique setting that will automatically watermark your images for you. This is great for photographers who are trying to protect their work.

Pricing is based on the number of visitors you have per month. The free plugin allows for up to 5,000 visitors per month. While the paid plans start at $19.08 per month when billed yearly and support up to 25,000 visitors per month.

3. ShortPixel Image Optimizer

ShortPixel Image Optimizer is another great WordPress image compression plugin.

It’s packed with advanced features and gives you the ability to choose compression formats. It starts compressing images as soon you as activate plugin and stores your original images in a separate folder.

If you’re using the free plugin, then it requires you to get an API key by providing your email address.

The basic free account allows you to compress up to 100 images per month, and you will need to upgrade to their paid plans to increase this limit.

You can even simply convert PNG to JPEG and vice versa with the click of a button.

It’s also compatible with WooCommerce, NextGEN Gallery, and the WPML translation plugins.

If you’re using Cloudflare as your WordPress CDN, then you can integrate the service, so your images will be automatically updated with the new version.

ShortPixel is also very affordable. Plans are based on the number of images and start at $4.99 per month for up to 5,000 images per month.

4. reSmush.it

reSmush.it is another great choice for a WordPress image compression plugin. It allows you to automatically optimize images on upload as well as offer a bulk optimization option for older images.

You have full control over the image quality and compression with an easy to use slider.

It uses the reSmush API to optimize images and allows you to choose the optimization level for your uploads.

The downside is that it doesn’t have different compression levels. It also limits optimization to uploads lower than 5MB in size. You can exclude individual images from compression in case you need to add an image in full size.

5. Compress JPEG & PNG images

Compress JPEG & PNG is created by the team behind TinyPNG, and you will need to create an account to use the plugin. You can only optimize 500 images each month with the free account.

It can automatically compress images upon upload, and you can also bulk optimize older images.

The plugin settings allow you to choose which image sizes you want to optimize. You can also set a maximum size for your original uploads. Images larger than that size will be automatically resized by the plugin.

You can also choose to save image data like time and date, copyright information, and GPS location on JPEG files.

6. WP Rocket

WP Rocket is the best WordPress caching plugin in the market. It’s very beginner friendly and will help to make your site blazing fast.

There are image optimization features within WP Rocket, like lazy loading, which will only load images when they are viewed.

They also developed a plugin called Imagify. This plugin lets you optimize all of your images with a single click. It will also resize your images on the fly and lets you restore your images to their original size.

You also have full control over your image optimization and compression settings. All of your images will be optimized to your preferences.

7. Jetpack

Jetpack is a powerful WordPress plugin suite that combines essential WordPress features into a single plugin. The primary focus is security, performance, and marketing.

The image optimization features fall under the performance category. To enable image compression, all you have to do is turn on a single setting. There are no additional settings for you to set up.

What it does is automatically optimize your image and serve images to your visitors using a CDN. This reduces your server load and provides faster image loading for your visitors.

To access the image optimization, you can use the free version of the plugin as well.

If you like the idea of Jetpack, but are looking for plugins to replace all of Jetpack’s features, then see our guide on the best alternatives to the WordPress Jetpack plugin.

Comparison Test Scores for Image Compression Plugins

Now that you know about the different WordPress image compression options, let’s take a look at how they compare against each other in terms of performance.

To measure this, we ran test by uploading the same image using each of these plugins.

Testing JPEG Image Compression

We used the following JPEG image for our tests, it is 118.3 KB in file size.

We didn’t touch any of the plugin settings and tested the compression with out of the box settings. Here are our test results:

Plugin	Compressed Size	Saved (%)	Method
EWWW Image Optimizer	64 KB	54.24%	Lossless
Optimole	64 KB	54.24%	Lossless
ShortPixel Image Optimizer	72 KB	39.30%	Lossless
reSmush.it	78 KB	20.81%	Lossless
Compress JPEG & PNG images	118.1 KB	2 %	Lossy

Testing PNG Image Compression

Next we wanted to test a PNG image to see how our contenders optimize it.

We used the following PNG image for the test, and it is 99.4 KB in file size.

Here are our test results:

Plugin	Compressed Size	Saved (%)	Method
EWWW Image Optimizer	97 KB	1.9%	Lossless
Optimole	41 KB	64%	Lossless
ShortPixel Image Optimizer	36 KB	56%	Lossy
reSmush.it	36 KB	56%	Lossless
Compress JPEG & PNG images	34.3 KB	54%	Lossy

Which is The Best Image Compression Plugin for WordPress?

If you are looking for the best image compression plugin, then EWWW Image Optimizer is the best choice.

It offers high levels of compression that don’t sacrifice image quality, plus it’s equipped with an image CDN and other features that will optimize your website for speed.

Another great option for sites that get less traffic is Optimole. It operates entirely in the background and takes care of image optimization for you, plus it’s free up to 5,000 visitors per month.

If you’re looking for an affordable plugin that offers high levels of compression and image conversion, then ShortPixel is worth checking out.

We hope you found this comparison of best WordPress image compression plugins useful. You may also want to see our beginner’s guide to image SEO to optimize images for search engines, and our expert picks of the best email marketing services for businesses.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post 7 Best WordPress Image Compression Plugins Compared (2021) appeared first on WPBeginner.

October 15, 2021 at 04:30PM

How to Exclude Pages from WordPress Search Results (Step by Step)

Do you want to learn how to exclude pages from the WordPress search results?

By default, the internal search on your WordPress site will include all posts and pages in the search results. To make it easier for your site visitors to find what they’re looking for, you may want to exclude certain content, so it never appears in those results.

In this article, we’ll show you how to exclude certain pages from the WordPress search results, step by step.

Why Exclude Pages from WordPress Search Results?

The default WordPress site search includes all of your posts, pages, and custom post types in the search results. This works well enough for many WordPress website owners.

However, if you’re running an online store, then you may want to hide pages like your account page, checkout page, thank you page, and more.

The same goes for those running membership websites or online courses. You may want to hide subscriber-only content from appearing in search.

With that said, let’s show you how to exclude pages from your sitewide WordPress search results.

Note: This guide covers on-site search results, when a visitor to your website uses a search box to search through your website content. If you’re looking to exclude pages from Google search results, then you should see our guide on how to hide a WordPress page from Google.

Create a New WordPress Search Algorithm with a WordPress Plugin

The easiest way to exclude pages from the WordPress search results is by using the SearchWP plugin. It’s the best search plugin for WordPress used by over 30,000 websites.

It’s very easy to use and gives you complete control of your WordPress search results.

First thing you need to do is install and activate the plugin. For more details, see our step by step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Upon activation, navigate to Settings » SearchWP and then click the ‘License’ menu option.

Then, you can enter your license key into the ‘License’ box and click the ‘Activate’ button. You can find this information in your account on the SearchWP website.

After that, you need to click on the ‘Engines’ menu option.

This takes you to a page where you need to set your default search engine settings. Think of it like creating your own Google search algorithm that’s only for your website.

With SearchWP, you need to create a sitewide search engine before you can start excluding pages from the WordPress search results.

You can change the search engine settings by clicking on the ‘Posts’, ‘Pages’, ‘Media’, and other custom post type drop downs.

Each section has a weight multiplier that will change how the search engine ranks your website’s content.

For example, if you move the ‘Title’ slider down and the ‘Content’ slider up, then the content will hold more value than the title.

You can also completely remove all pages from appearing in the WordPress search here.

Simply click the ‘Remove’ button in the ‘Pages’ section.

This brings up a popup where you need to uncheck the ‘Pages’ box.

Then, click the ‘Done’ button to remove all pages from appearing in search.

After you’re done customizing the default search engine settings, you need to click the ‘Save Engines’ button to create your first engine.

Exclude Specific Pages From the WordPress Search Results

If you only want to exclude specific pages from the search results on your website, then this section is for you.

To do this, we’ll be using the Exclude UI extension from SearchWP. When you’re logged into your SearchWP account, go to the Exclude UI download page and click ‘Download Extension’.

Then, install and activate the extension as you would any other WordPress plugin.

After that, open up the page that you want to exclude from the search results.

Next, make sure the ‘Page’ option is selected in your right hand menu, and simply check the ‘Exclude from search’ checkbox.

Then click the ‘Update’ button, and that page will now be
hidden from the search results. Even if your visitors enter the exact title of the page into your search bar, it will not appear.

If you want to hide more individual pages from the search results, then simply follow the above steps again.

To exclude specific blog posts from WordPress search results, you can follow the same steps above. The only difference is that the right-hand menu will say ‘Post’ instead of ‘Page’.

We hope this article helped you learn how to exclude pages from the WordPress search results. You may also want to see our beginner’s guide on how to get a free SSL certificate for your website and our best business phone services for small businesses.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post How to Exclude Pages from WordPress Search Results (Step by Step) appeared first on WPBeginner.

October 14, 2021 at 01:30PM

How to Properly Move from Ghost to WordPress (Free Tool)

Do you want to move your website from Ghost to WordPress?

Ghost is a website builder that allows you to easily create websites. Due to its limitations, many users realize that they would be better off with WordPress.

In this article, we will show you how to easily move from Ghost to WordPress.

Moving From Ghost to WordPress

There are many similarities between Ghost and WordPress, but Ghost lacks certain features that make WordPress the best website builder on the market. You can read more about these features in our side-by-side comparison of Ghost vs WordPress.

When we say WordPress, we are talking about self-hosted WordPress.org and not WordPress.com which is a hosting service. To understand the difference, see our guide on the difference between WordPress.com vs WordPress.org.

Many users who start with Ghost soon realize the limitations of the platform and want to move to WordPress. This article will help you do that.

Here is what we will cover in this article:

• Getting Started with WordPress
• Export Content from Ghost
• Converting Ghost Export File to WordPress Format
• Import Content in WordPress
• Import Images from Ghost to WordPress
• Pointing Your Domain to WordPress
• Setting Up Permalinks
• Essential WordPress Plugins and Tools

Step 1. Getting Started with WordPress

To start a WordPress website, you need a domain name and website hosting.

A domain name is the name of your website (e.g. wpbeginner.com), and it’s what users will type in their browsers to visit it. A web hosting account is where all your website files are stored.

While WordPress itself is free, both domain name and web hosting come at a cost ($14.99 / year for domain and $7.99 / month for web hosting).

Thankfully, Bluehost, an official WordPress recommended hosting provider has agreed to offer our users a free domain name and over 60% off on web hosting.

→ Click Here to Claim This Exclusive Bluehost Offer ←

Note: You may already have a domain name for your Ghost website, which you can point to WordPress after moving your website. However, if you don’t have a domain name, then you can get one for free when signing up for Bluehost.

Once you have signed up for a hosting account, you can follow our instructions on how to install WordPress.

Tip: If your Ghost website uses a custom domain name that you would like to keep for your WordPress website as well, then you can still install WordPress on a temporary subdomain. We will show you how to add your domain to your WordPress hosting account later in this article.

After installing WordPress, you will see the WordPress admin dashboard which looks like this:

Step 2. Export Content from Ghost

Ghost allows you to easily export content from your account.

Simply log in to your account dashboard and click on the Settings icon located at the bottom of the left column.

From here you need to click on the Labs menu. This will bring you to Ghost features that are still under development. Click on the Export button next to the ‘Export your content’ section.

Your browser will now download an export file in JSON format. However, this format is not supported by WordPress importer tools, so you’ll need to convert it to WordPress XML format.

Step 3. Converting Ghost Export File to WordPress Format

The default Ghost export file does not use a format supported by WordPress, and there used to be no reliable way to safely convert it into the correct format.

We decided to fix this issue and created the Ghost to WordPress Importer tool. This tool is completely free to use and allows you to convert your Ghost JSON export file into a WordPress compatible XML file.

Simply go to the Ghost to WordPress migration tool website and fill in the form. Next, you need to select the Ghost export file you downloaded earlier.

Click on the Generate WP Import File button to continue.

The Ghost to WordPress migrator tool will then convert your Ghost export file into WordPress XML format. Once finished, you’ll be able to download the file to your computer.

Now you’re ready to start importing content to your WordPress website.

Step 4. Import Content in WordPress

From your WordPress admin area, you need to visit the Tools » Import page and click on the Install Now link below the WordPress importer.

WordPress will now install the importer plugin. Once finished, the install link will change to say ‘Run Importer’. Go ahead and click on the Run Importer link.

On the next screen, you need to click on the Upload file button to select the WordPress XML file you downloaded in the previous step.

Click on the Upload file and import button to continue.

WordPress will now upload the import file. After that, you will be asked to assign authors.

You can import an author from your Ghost website, create a new author, or assign all content to an existing WordPress user.

Don’t forget to check the box next to ‘Download and import file attachments’. It will attempt to fetch images from your Ghost website and import them into the WordPress media library, so you can use them later.

Once the importer has finished running, you will see a success message.

In rare cases, you might see an issue like some posts are missing, or the importer timed out. Don’t worry, you can run the importer as many times as you like. It will automatically avoid duplicate imports and will only import items that it missed.

Depending on how much content you have, the importer may fail to import images inside posts and pages to your WordPress media library

Let’s see how to easily fix this and import images from Ghost to WordPress.

Step 5. Import Images from Ghost to WordPress

The WordPress importer will try to import images from your Ghost website to your WordPress media library.

However, it may miss some images or not import any images at all. Your website would still show images from your Ghost website, which would become an issue if your Ghost website is deleted.

Luckily, there is an easy way to import external images into the WordPress media library using a plugin.

Simply install and activate the Auto Upload Images plugin. For more details, see our step by step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Upon activation, you simply need to edit and update your blog posts and the plugin will then import any external images in those articles to your media library.

You can also bulk update all your blog posts to quickly import images from your Ghost site. For more details, see our tutorial on how to easily import external images in WordPress.

Step 6. Pointing Your Domain to WordPress

Once you have successfully migrated content from Ghost to WordPress. It is time to start pointing your users to the new WordPress website.

If your website was using a Ghost branded sub-domain (e.g. yourwebsite.ghost.io), then you cannot point that link to your new WordPress website. Instead, we recommend editing your Ghost website and add a plain text notification informing users to check out your website on the new location.

On the other hand, if you were using a custom domain like yourdomain.com, then you can change its DNS settings and point it to your new WordPress hosting provider.

In order to change domain settings, you will need to log in to your domain registrar account and find the option to change the DNS settings.

In the DNS settings area, you need to enter your new WordPress hosting provider’s nameserver information. Usually, it looks something like this:

ns1.bluehost.com
ns2.bluehost.com

For other domain registrars, see our complete guide on how to easily change DNS nameservers.

Once you change the DNS name server, your domain will start showing your WordPress website instead of your older Ghost website. Note that it can take a couple of days for the changes to take effect.

Step 7. Setting Up Permalinks

The next step is to redirect users from each page of your Ghost website to the correct post or page in WordPress.

By default, Ghost websites use the post or page name as the default permalink structure. You can match them on your WordPress site by simply going to Settings » Permalinks and choosing Post Name as your URL structure.

Don’t forget to click on the Save Changes button to store your changes.

Note: If your Ghost website used a subdomain, then you’ll not be able to set up redirects by changing permalinks.

Step 8. Essential WordPress Plugins and Tools

Now that you have transferred from Ghost to WordPress, it’s time to take advantage of WordPress plugins and tools to grow your website.

1. WPForms – WPForms is the best WordPress contact form plugin. It allows you to easily create any type of form on your WordPress website without writing any code.

2. All in One SEO – AIOSEO is the most comprehensive WordPress SEO plugin on the market. It is super easy to use and comes with a set up wizard, SEO audit tool, TruSEO score for posts and pages, and other features to help you get more traffic.

3. PushEngage – Want to send instant notifications to users on mobile and desktop devices? PushEngage is the best push notification service on the market and helps you bring back website visitors, increase pageviews, and boost conversions.

4. MonsterInsights – MonsterInsights helps you easily install Google Analytics in WordPress and shows you easy-to-understand website traffic reports right inside your dashboard.

Need more tools and tips to grow your new WordPress website? See our full list of essential WordPress plugins for all types of websites.

We hope this article helped you move you properly move from Ghost to WordPress. You may also want to see our checklist of things to do after installing WordPress or see our tips on how to make money online with your WordPress website.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post How to Properly Move from Ghost to WordPress (Free Tool) appeared first on WPBeginner.

October 13, 2021 at 03:00PM

How to Make a Separate RSS Feed for Each Category in WordPress

Do you want to make a separate RSS feed for each category in WordPress?

Categories allow you to easily sort your content into major sections. Adding category RSS feeds can help your users subscribe to specific areas of your website that interest them.

In this article, we will show you how to easily make a separate RSS feed for each category in WordPress. We’ll also talk about how you can use them effectively to grow your website.

Locating RSS Feed for Categories in WordPress

Categories and tags are two of the main default taxonomies in WordPress. They allow you to easily sort and organize your content into different subjects and topics.

By default, each category on your WordPress website has its own RSS feed. You can locate this RSS feed by simply adding ‘feed’ at the end of the category page URL.

For instance, if you had a category called ‘News’ with a URL like this:

https://ift.tt/3DwEp9r

Then its RSS feed would be located at the following URL:

https://ift.tt/3FBxxtn

Tip: You can find your category URL by visiting Posts » Categories page and clicking on the View link below a category.

Display Your Category RSS Feed Links in WordPress

Now that you have located the RSS feed URLs for your categories, let’s take a look at some of the ways that you can share them with visitors on your WordPress website.

1. Add Links to Category RSS Feeds in WordPress

The easiest way to point users to a category RSS feed is by adding a link to the category feed.

You can simply edit a post or page and add a plain text link anywhere you want.

You can use this method to manually create a list of links to all your category RSS feeds.

However, what if you add, delete, or merge categories in the future, then you will have to manually update that list.

Wouldn’t it be nice if you can show a dynamic list of category RSS feeds that is automatically updated? Next we’ll show you how to do just that.

2. Manually Display a List of Category Feeds

This next method allows you to display a list of categories with links to the category-specific RSS feed. Best of all, the list will update automatically if you add or remove a category on your site.

For this method, you’ll need to add some custom code to your WordPress website. If you haven’t done this before, then take a look at our guide on how to easily add custom code snippets in WordPress.

First, you need to find an image that you want to use as the RSS feed icon. For this tutorial, we are using the RSS feed icon that is 32×32 pixels in dimensions.

After that, you need to upload that image to your website. Simply go to Media » Add New page to upload your image and then click on the ‘Copy URL to Clipboard’ button.

Now paste this image URL in a plain text editor like Notepad or TextEdit. You’ll need it in the next step.

After that, you need to paste the following code to your theme’s functions.php file or a site-specific plugin.

function wpbeginner_cat_feed_list() { 
$string .=  '<ul>'; 
$string .= wp_list_categories( array(
        'orderby'    => 'name',
        'show_count' => true,
        'feed_image' => '/path/to/feed-image.png'
        'echo' =>
    ) );     
$string .= '</ul>'; 
return $string; 
}
$add_shortcode('wpb-cat-feeds', 'wpbeginner_cat_feed_list' );

You will need to replace the ‘/path/to/feed-image.png’ with the URL of the feed icon image you copied earlier.

Now you can use the [wpb-cat-feeds] shortcode anywhere on your WordPress website to display the list of categories with the RSS feed icon next to each category.

3. Show RSS Feed Subscription Option on Category Pages (Advanced)

Normally, WordPress category archive pages don’t have an option to subscribe. You can easily change that by adding a link to the RSS feed subscription on each category page.

To do that, you’ll need to make changes to your WordPress template files. Simply add the following code to the category.php or archive.php template in your WordPress theme.

<?php                
if ( is_category() ) { 
$category = get_category( get_query_var('cat') );
if ( ! empty( $category ) )
echo '<div class="category-feed"><p><a href="' . get_category_feed_link( $category->cat_ID ) . '" title="Subscribe to this category" rel="nofollow">Subscribe</a></p></div>';
}
?>

After you save your changes, you can visit any category page to see the subscribe link in action.

Tip: Need help finding out which file to edit in your WordPress theme? See our complete WordPress template hierarchy cheat sheet for beginners to figure this out.

How to Take Advantage of Category RSS Feeds in WordPress

Category RSS feeds allow your users to subscribe only to areas that interest them the most.

For instance, if you have a technology news blog, then your users can choose to subscribe only to news about the devices that they use.

However, a plain RSS feed isn’t readable without a feed reader. And nowadays, most users don’t use a feed reader to subscribe to their favorite websites.

This is where it gets tricky. How do you use your category RSS feeds if your users don’t use feed readers?

Luckily, you can use your category feeds to deliver content to your users anywhere they want.

For instance, you can ask users to sign up for your email newsletter with an option to get updates only for specific categories.

With an email marketing service like Constant Contact, Sendinblue, and others, you can easily set up an automated RSS-to-email newsletter only for specific categories. See our guide on how to notify subscribers of new posts for step-by-step instructions.

Similarly, you can also allow users to get instant push notifications for each category using PushEngage. It is the best push notification service on the market and allows you to send messages directly to your users’ devices (desktop as well as mobile phones).

PushEngage allows you to set up automatic push notifications using RSS feeds. You can simply enter your category RSS feed URL, and a push notification will go out whenever a new post is published in that category.

We hope this article helped you learn how to make separate RSS feed for each category in WordPress. You may also want to see these easy tips to grow your blog traffic or take a look at our comparison of the best live chat software for small business.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post How to Make a Separate RSS Feed for Each Category in WordPress appeared first on WPBeginner.

October 12, 2021 at 05:00PM

11-Point WordPress SEO Audit Checklist to Boost Your Rankings

Do you want to perform an SEO audit of your WordPress website so you can improve your search engine rankings and get more traffic?

Search engine optimization can be tricky if you don’t know what’s working and what’s not. By performing an SEO audit, you can analyze your site, find opportunities for improvement, and resolve critical issues.

In this article, we’ll go through a WordPress SEO audit checklist to boost your rankings.

What Is an SEO Audit?

Optimizing your WordPress website for search engines is important for attracting more visitors and growing your audience. However, many business owners don’t know if their SEO strategy is working or not.

This is where SEO audit comes in handy. It is a process of finding out if your website is properly optimized to rank better in search results.

By conducting SEO audits, you can also uncover critical issues on your WordPress website that might be stopping you from ranking higher in search engine results.

Then, based on the results from the audit, you can make adjustments to your WordPress SEO strategy, resolve any issues, and optimize your site.

How to Perform an SEO Audit in WordPress

There are many SEO tools in the market that can help you audit your WordPress website. However, not all of them will let you conduct an audit inside WordPress, so you don’t have to leave your site.

To perform an SEO audit of your WordPress website, we recommend using the All in One SEO (AIOSEO) WordPress plugin.

It’s the best SEO plugin for WordPress and helps you optimize your site for search engines without any technical knowledge.

The plugin offers an SEO Analysis Tool that allows you to perform a complete website SEO audit in your WordPress dashboard. It monitors your site and highlights critical issues, and then offers actionable insights to help you boost your organic traffic and keyword rankings.

You can get the SEO Analysis Tool in the AIOSEO free version. There is also a premium version of AIOSEO that offers advanced features like a redirection manager, schema markup, local SEO, powerful sitemap tools, and more.

First, you’ll need to install and activate the AIOSEO plugin. For more details, you can follow our guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Once the plugin is active, you can head over to All in One SEO » SEO Analysis from your WordPress dashboard.

Then under the SEO Audit Checklist tab, you’ll see an overall site score and a complete SEO checklist. A score of 70 or above is good, and it means that your site is well optimized for search engines.

AIOSEO will check your website on different parameters. It will then highlight critical issues on your site that could hurt your SEO and provide suggestions for improving your rankings.

AIOSEO is a great tool to use to continuously monitor your site, so you’re aware of any big SEO issues that could hurt your rankings and traffic.

Besides that, it’s smart to do your own SEO audit once or twice a year to make sure everything on your site is working as expected.

The SEO audit checklist below can also help you troubleshoot any sudden drops in traffic, so you can fix the issue and recover your rankings.

That being said, let’s look at the SEO audit checklist for your WordPress blog.

1. Make Sure Your Website is Visible to Search Engines

When conducting a WordPress SEO audit, first you’ll want o make sure that your website is visible to search engines like Google and Bing.

WordPress has a built-in option to prevent search engines from crawling your website. If you’ve enabled that option, then Google or any other search engine will not list your site in the search results.

To view the setting, you can head over to Settings » Reading from your WordPress dashboard. After that, ensure that the ‘Search Engine Visibility option is not checked.

If it is enabled, then simply uncheck the ‘Discourage search engines from indexing this site’ option and click the ‘Save Changes’ button.

You can check and see if your site is indexed in Google by searching site:example.com in Google. Just replace “example.com” with your own domain.

If you just launched your site or recently changed the setting above, then it may take a few days to get indexed. You can also see our guide on how to get new content indexed faster.

2. Ensure That Your Site is Using HTTPS

The next SEO audit checklist item is to find out if your website has an SSL certificate. An SSL certificate encrypts the connection between your user’s browser and your website server.

Google and other search engines will give priority to secure website that use HTTPS over those that are still using HTTP.

You can check if your site is secure by looking for a padlock sign in your browser’s search bar.

If you don’t have an SSL certificate, then see our guide on how to get a free SSL certificate for your WordPress site and how to move your site from HTTP to HTTPS.

3. Check If All Versions of Your URL Lead to the Same Site

Now, you should check that the www and non-www versions or HTTP and HTTPS versions of your URL are redirected to the same website.

For example, if someone enters https://www.example.com, https://example.com, http://www.example.com, or http://example.com in their browser, then they should see the same website.

You can check your primary WordPress URL by going to Settings » General and then look at the address in the ‘WordPress Address (URL)’ and ‘Site Address (URL)’ fields.

If different versions of your site’s URLs don’t redirect to the same location, then Google will consider the two URLs as separate websites.

As a result, it won’t know which URL to prioritize while indexing and could lead to duplicate content issues.

If you’re using AIOSEO, then it will automatically set the proper canonical URL in your site header, which will let Google know of your preference and prevent any issues.

4. Improve Indexing with an XML Sitemap

The next thing to check is whether there’s an XML sitemap and if it’s submitted to search engines.

An XML sitemap helps search engines to find and index your website pages easily. It also allows website owners to tell search engines about the most important pages on their website.

While having a sitemap won’t instantly boost your search engine rankings, it will help search engines crawl your website better.

For example, suppose you’re starting a new website. In that case, a sitemap will help Google or Bing to quickly discover new content on your website, as you won’t have many backlinks initially.

To create sitemaps, you can use the AIOSEO WordPress plugin. Simply head over to All in One SEO » Sitemaps from your WordPress dashboard and go to the ‘General Sitemap’ tab.

After that, make sure that the toggle for ‘Enable Sitemap’ is switched on.

You can also preview the sitemap and use different options provided by the WordPress plugin to edit the sitemap. Besides that, the plugin also allows you to create video, news, and RSS sitemaps for your WordPress site.

Once the sitemap is created, you can submit it to different search engines like Google and Bing. For more details, check out our guide on how to create a sitemap in WordPress.

5. Find and Fix Broken Links on Your Website

A broken link or dead link occurs when a link goes to a page that no longer exists at that URL. In such cases, you’ll see a 404 not found error when you click on the broken link.

Some commons reason why you see a 404 error is because the WordPress site was moved to a new domain, the page was deleted, or it was moved to a new location.

Having a lot of broken links can be bad for your site’s SEO. They can have a negative impact on your keyword rankings and user experience, since search engines and website users won’t find the page they’re looking for.

That’s why when you’re conducting an SEO audit, it’s important to look for dead links and fix them.

To find broken links, we recommend using MonsterInsights. It’s the best Analytics solution for WordPress and it automatically tracks 404 errors on your site in Google Analytics.

MonsterInsights monitors broken links without slowing down your website like other broken link plugins do.

Once you’ve found broken links on your website, you can fix them by setting up 301 redirections.

The easiest way to redirect dead links is by using AIOSEO’s powerful redirection manager. It will also logs 404 errors on your website and allows you to set up redirects.

You can check out our complete guide on how to find and fix broken links in WordPress.

6. Check If You Are Missing Meta Tags

Meta tags are snippets of HTML code that help search engines like Google to understand what a page is about, so it can rank it for relevant searches.

There are different types of meta tags, but the two most important tags are the title tag and meta description. Search engines will use this information to understand the content of the page.

Usually the title tag and meta description are displayed in search results, though Google may sometimes change the text depending on various factors like what that user is searching for.

When performing an SEO audit, you should ensure that the meta tags aren’t missing from your blog posts or product pages.

That’s because your title is the first thing people will read in the search engine page results and decide whether they want to click on your link or not.

Similarly, meta descriptions are short text that appears under your post title and URL on search engine page results. They help in describing your article to search engines and users.

You can add meta tags to any blog post or landing page using AIOSEO. Simply scroll down to the ‘AIOSEO Settings’ meta box in your WordPress editor and add your title and description.

7. Ensure You’ve Got Internal and External Links

The next thing to check during an SEO audit is to make sure that the pages you’re trying to rank have internal and external links.

Internal links are links from other pages on the same website, while external links or outbound links are links to other website. They’re are crucial for your SEO success, yet many business owners overlook their importance.

Search engines follow different links to find and index new pages in the search results. Creating internal and external links allows search engine crawlers to discover new content on your website and boost rankings easily.

Not only that, but links also help your readers to navigate your website or find source for stats and other information.

You can use an SEO tool like Semrush to run a site audit, which will show you any pages that could use more internal links.

If you need help adding links to your site, then check out our guide on how to add a link in WordPress.

8. Measure Your Website Loading Speed

Google uses your website loading speed as a ranking factor. When you’re performing an SEO audit, it’s important to check for things that can slow down your website.

First, you’ll need to find out how fast your website loads for your users.

If you’re already using MonsterInsights, then you can check the Site Speed report inside your WordPress admin area.

Once you’ve connected Google Analytics to your WordPress website, simply head over to Insights » Reports from your WordPress dashboard and click the ‘Site Speed’ tab.

You can see a score for your site’s load time for desktop and mobile. Besides that, the report also shows different metrics that are important for measuring how fast your website is.

Next, if you scroll down, then you’ll notice that MonsterInsights offers recommendations and benchmark goals that you should aim for on your website.

Using the report, you can audit your site and find how to load your web pages faster. For example, you can use a caching plugin to improve the server response time or use a content delivery network (CDN) to boost website speed.

For more tips, you can check out our guide on how to run a site speed test, and then see our ultimate guide to boost WordPress speed and performance.

9. Make Sure Your Site is Mobile-Responsive

The next item to check in a WordPress SEO audit is whether your website is mobile responsive or not.

Google uses your site’s mobile version for indexing, instead of desktop. If you want to boost your rankings, then your website needs to be mobile-ready.

To find out how mobile-friendly your website is, you can use Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test tool. Simply enter your site’s URL and click the ‘Test URL’ button.

The tool will now analyze your website and show the test results whether your site is mobile-ready or not.

If your website isn’t optimized for mobile, then you can change your website theme and select a responsive WordPress theme. See our guide on how to properly change your WordPress theme so you don’t lose any data or traffic.

10. Scan for Malware and Unwanted Vulnerabilities

Another essential thing to check while conducting an SEO audit is to scan for security risks. If Google Safe Browsing flags your website for malware or unwanted software, then it will show a warning to your visitors.

This can hurt your SEO, as people will avoid visiting your site. Google will also lower your rankings since your site contains malware and harmful programs.

To remove malware and other suspicious files from your website, you’ll need a WordPress security scanner.

At WPBeginner, we use Sucuri as it’s the best WordPress firewall and security service. It checks your website for malicious code, malware, spam injection, and other vulnerabilities and helps clear your site.

Sucuri also monitors your site for potential threats 24/7 and blocks any suspicious activity, hacking attempts, DDoS attacks, and more. Not only that, but it also helps in protecting the server-side.

If Google Safe Browsing flags your site as unsafe, then check out our guide on how to fix ‘this site ahead contains harmful programs’ error in WordPress.

11. Track Your Keyword Rankings for Drop in Traffic

Finally, it’s important to keep track of your keyword rankings when conducting an SEO audit and check their positions in case there’s a drop in traffic.

Keeping an eye on your keyword rankings not only helps you see which search terms people use to find your website, but you can also find opportunities to get even more traffic.

To track your keyword rankings, you can use Google Search Console. First, you’ll need to add your WordPress site to Google Search Console.

Once that’s done, you can log in to your Google Search Console account and head over to the ‘Performance’ report. Next, scroll down and see the search queries your site is ranking on.

Besides using Google Search Console, you can also use an SEO tool like Semrush to track keyword rankings.

Semrush is a popular keyword rank tracker tool that’s used by many professional marketers and SEO experts. All you have to do is enter your site’s URL in the ‘Organic Research’ option and click the ‘Search’ button.

From here you can view your top keywords, track their positions, and even monitor position changes.

If you’re seeing your rankings decline, you can use our guide on how to optimize your blog posts for SEO so you can recover your traffic and rankings.

We hope this article helped you learn how to perform a WordPress SEO audit using the checklist and boost your rankings. You may also want to check out our guide on the best email marketing services and our comparison of best keyword research tools.

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The post 11-Point WordPress SEO Audit Checklist to Boost Your Rankings appeared first on WPBeginner.

October 11, 2021 at 03:30PM