Secure your site with an SSL
One of the best things you can do for your WordPress website is to snag an SSL for your domain. Not only does it improve your Google ranking, but it improves your site’s security.
We provide SSLs to all of our hosting clients for free, because we know how valuable they are. If you’re not hosting with us, you can work with your host to get an SSL set up. If they don’t offer them in your hosting plan price, expect to pay between $49 + $99 a year.
What an SSL does is encrypt the data you collect on your site. Whether that’s email addresses, names + phone numbers or payment information, this data that users are providing to you is precious + needs to be handled with care.
Because Google knows how important online security is, they are rewarding sites with SSLs. They do this by labeling them as “Secure” (vs the dreaded “Not Secure”) + giving them a small ranking benefit.
The best part is that once you have an SSL in place, you don’t have to do anything with it. (Unless your hosting company charges you annually, then you have to pay the bill each year.) It’s a pretty easy step to ranking better on Google AND protecting your site visitors.
Use H1s, sparingly
When writing your page content, pay attention to your headings.
Google prioritizes text on the page based on the number heading you assigned to it. Heading 1 is more important than Heading 2, for example.
Here’s the catch, some spammy sites realized that H1 text helped with keyword searches + decided to go hog wild, adding H1s alllllllll over the place. Google got smart to this + started doing something about it.
Aim to have a single Heading 1 on every page. Keep in mind that if you’re using a good WordPress theme, it will use H1 for page titles. This means that you’ll want to use an H2 or Heading 2 in the body copy instead of an H1.
Add content to improve your Google ranking
Let’s talk about creating content. I know it can take work, believe me. But at the end of the day, Google loves seeing fresh content on a website.
This is one of the reasons that WordPress is so great for SEO. It’s a blogging platform built to have content regularly added to it + Google knows that.
You don’t have to publish daily blog posts to get noticed by Google. Aim to add new content to your site consistently + you’ll be on track to ranking better. Especially if the content you create is focused on similar keywords.
And don’t forget to freshen up your static pages too! It’s way too easy to let your homepage display the exact same text for years.
Things that count as freshening up:
- update the services you offer
- add more detail to your bio
- simply go in to rearrange a few sentences
Once you do that, give Google a gentle nudge by re-submitting your sitemap.