When it comes to writing content, you have a lot of things you need to take into consideration before publishing that final draft onto your blog. The one thing you need to consider before publishing anything is whether or not your article is ready to be seen by many people.
There are a lot of ways an article can bring in traffic. It can be from social media websites, a mention on another blog, link directories, newsletters, etc. However, there is one method of driving traffic to a blog that is pretty difficult to wrap your head around.
Search engine traffic.
Search engine optimization (SEO) is a tricky subject to say the least, but it’s a method that can bring thousands of visitors to your blog easily. Do you know what the only thing you need to do to achieve SEO greatness is? Keep writing blog content.
When it comes down to it, all that truly matters for good SEO is good content. It’s not about writing content that humans will enjoy for SEO, it’s about writing content that search engines will enjoy (but don’t get me wrong, always put the humans first).
Because of the confusion that this topic causes, there are many bloggers out there who simply do not understand how SEO works. With that lack of understanding, many ignore it, and many approach it the wrong way. Lucky for us (yes, I consider myself a pretty dumb SEO’er), there are people who understand how search engines work and are nice enough to help us dumb-dumbs rank better within the search engines.
For you today, I have a list with three of the absolute best tools there are out there for making SEO seem almost easy and effortless. I use all three of them here on Blogussion, and so far I have been pretty pleased with the results of each.
1. The Thesis Theme for WordPress
You guys are probably tired of hearing about it, but Thesis has had such a huge impact on the SEO of my blog that I can’t help but mention it anytime I bring up search engines!
I won’t go over the millions of things Thesis does to help your SEO, but I will tell you the one feature that is particularly useful to your content.
One of the coolest things that Thesis has to offer are the extra options it adds into the post screen section of your blog. You can add a custom title tag, meta descriptions and post tags to match the content of your article. Those three things have an impact on how well your content can rank in the search engines, and Thesis makes dealing with those important things easy.
A simpler alternative
If you don’t own Thesis (what are you, crazy?), you’re still in luck. There are plugins out there that have the same features Thesis does to your post screen to help you better your SEO for articles. There is a plugin for WordPress called All in One SEO which is a must have plugin for any WordPress user not on Thesis (as Thesis eliminates the need for All in One SEO).
2. Scribe SEO
I have just recently started using Scribe SEO to optimize my articles, but I have to tell you — it is one of the most useful services I have signed up for in a long time.
Scribe basically acts as your very own SEO instructor. It analyzes your content, and grades you on the optimization of your article. It then works with you, generating a list of things you can do to improve your article for the search engines until you have a “perfect SEO score.”
What a post with a perfect grade will appear as after review by Scribe
Did you know, for instance, that a good SEO practice is to add at least 1 – 2 hyperlinks towards the beginning of your article? I didn’t, but Scribe has taught me little tricks like that, and so much more.
The only thing is, Scribe is a paid service. There are monthly subscriptions, but it is well worth the money to have a tool that will help you with the SEO of your articles as much as Scribe does. I will write a more detailed review of Scribe later, because I just flat-out love this service.
Like any good service, there is a free trial for Scribe available if you would rather try it out before you buy it.
Useful Scribe Links:
3. Insights Interlinking Plugin
Insights is a totally free plugin that helps you do one thing: interlink. Interlinking blog posts is a technique that helps older articles on your blog with a few main things:
- Drive traffic back to your older articles.
- Helps search engines get to your older content and increase PageRank, index them (if for some odd reason they were never indexed), etc.
- If you choose a specific set of keywords to link back to that article, those links will help you rank for those chosen keywords in search engines.
Interlinking without any tools to guide you can be tricky if you have a lot of posts on your blog. We can’t remember every single article we write on our blog to interlink, so that’s where Insights comes in.
The plugin adds a new menu to your post screen that has a search bar in it. With this search bar, you can type in keywords of posts you want to find so you can interlink to in your current article. Not only that, you can search Google and many other sources right from your admin panel.
This plugin makes interlinking a breeze, and I recommend it to every single one of you reading this article.
That’s what I use
Those are the three amazing tools I use here to prepare my articles for a run in the search engines. Even though two of them are paid for, they will pay off for you immensely with proper use. If a 16-year-old kid can afford them, I’m sure you can too.
Are there any SEO tools you use in particular? There are more that I have found, but I chose to limit this article to just these three major ones. But I would love to hear what you guys use to optimize your content.
35 Discussions
Thanks for sharing these resources. Another good thing about SEO techniques provided by these tools is that they also help the site become more usable. Descriptive titles and descriptive link texts, for instance, help the user in quickly understanding the contents of your pages.
Julius´s last blog ..A Day Through The Eyes of a Blind Woman: Part 3
Exactly, I never thought of the benefits they actually have on site usability – but you’re right. My article titles, I like to think, are a lot more attention grabbing ever since I started using Scribe, and my content more useful once I started interlinking more.
Interlinking… love it. I agree, this is one area that most bloggers fall short on, and it pays off huge. It keeps google and visitors moving around your site. It ups your page visits, keeps them on your site longer, and opens up new topics and other interests the visitor might not have known. Excellent tool. I use it a lot.
Isn’t it amazing what just one link can do? Do you use Insights at all on your blog?
Hmmm.. I never read about putting links in the beginning of your articles. I know that the first couple of words in your title are important for SEO purposes. Maybe the two are related.
Tony´s last blog ..Q&A: A Career in Web Design
The beginning of your article (usually the first few paragraphs) are most important to search engines I’m pretty sure. That’s where you want to open the post with your primary keywords, and if possible – links with anchor text of a useful keyword.
First time heard of the Insight Plugin. I will have to check it out. Recently my SEO is a little bad.
Agent Deepak´s last blog ..Interview with James Richmond – The InfoPreneur
Same, here. Heard about it for the first time.
King Sidharth´s last blog ..Ego v/s Self – War of the Worlds
I currently use thesis as my wordpress theme, I know I’m not using it to its fullest potential. Thanks for the link to the thesis tutorial; I will put it to good use. I had never heard of insights before, but I am going to give it a try, thanks for the suggestion!
Do you have any stats that illustrate how effective scribe is with seo? Is it likely to improve my google PageRank?
Shannon O | Confessions of a Loving Wife´s last blog ..Quick and Easy Cleaning – Get Your Home Ready for Last Minute Guests
Hey,
I don’t have any statics for Scribe, but it cannot increase your PageRank since it depends on the links coming from other sites.
But it can target keywords for sure, so people find you more often when googling about related stuff.
King Sidharth´s last blog ..Ego v/s Self – War of the Worlds
Thanks for the info!
Shannon O | Confessions of a Loving Wife´s last blog ..Quick and Easy Cleaning – Get Your Home Ready for Last Minute Guests
Cool Alex!
I didn’t know you were using Scribe. We can use a full review perhaps? Though you’ve done that (almost) in this super post.
I don’t agree with you when you say you are a bad SEO’er. Great content, internal linking, PR4+, awesome community. What else can you think of?
They say that if people love your content, so will Google. And we love Blogussion.
Thanks for sharing awesome plug-in. Second one this week.
King Sidharth´s last blog ..Ego v/s Self – War of the Worlds
I will be writing about Scribe as a Wired Weekend post next week.
Thanks for the reassurance bud. Maybe I don’t give myself enough credit, as I think about SEO so much that I should have a decent understanding of the things I should do and shouldn’t.
I love finding and sharing plugins with you guys, it’s my pleasure.
Hey Alex! Thanks for sharing these. I’ve been considering using Scribe for awhile… Does it check for SEO more than what you already add? I guess you can answer that question in your review.
Also, do you recommend using Insights over Internal Link Building? Because I use the latter and there have been a few problems with it.
Nick Tart´s last blog ..Interview: Keith J. Davis Jr., Entrepreneur of All Trades
Are you asking if it checks older content as well? If so, yes.
I have only used ILB briefly, but if I recall correctly – it doesn’t have a search function? Insights will actually search through your whole blog and find posts matching the keyword you set. So, I recommend using Insights over ILB for that reason. It just saves time.
Wow, that was a very poorly worded question on my part… What I meant to ask was: Does it check for more than just the standard meta tags and hierarchical structure that you were already doing on Blogussion?
Nick Tart´s last blog ..Interview: Keith J. Davis Jr., Entrepreneur of All Trades
Hi Alex,
I’ve been thinking about getting the thesis theme, but haven’t decided yet. I am always looking for ways to improve my blog. I hadn’t heard of scribe before. Sounds like a great tool!
Thanks – Heidi
Heidi Passey´s last blog ..Building A List Fast Through JV Giveaways
Heidi,
You can never go wrong with buying Thesis. You will fall in love with it. It can do wonders!… The sweet beauty…
Scribe is fault (read: creation) of same people who creates Thesis. It’s super cool too. Rock with it!
King Sidharth´s last blog ..Ego v/s Self – War of the Worlds
I always heard about Thesis Theme is good for SEO and much more easier to customize. However, i do not have any budget to own one. May be i do buy one in future to get the best benefit from it. Thanks for sharing!
Kok Siong Chen´s last blog ..3 Basic Ways to Relieve Cancer Pain
It’s a shame that you can’t get your hands on something as beneficial as Thesis because of money holding you back.
I know for sure that when I get a contest running on Blogussion, Thesis will definitely be one of the prizes.
Useful resources Alex, Interlinking provide you SEO advantages and also it will helps to decrease the bounce rate of your blog. Interesting Plugin
Bounce rate is also a great benefit of interlinking. Thanks for the comment.
Great ideas for this! Haven’t seen a lot of articles about content optimization, these are some really intriguing thoughts.
Inside the Webb´s last blog ..How StumbleUpon Advertising has Increased Traffic
Glad you liked it! So, do you use any of these plugins on your own blog?
I recently purchased scribe as it was on special – went right for the yearly.
i haven’t hooked it up yet, but once I do I’m sure to be reviewing it as well…should be good to read yours as well.
Dennis Edell´s last blog ..DEDC Updates – What the (Near) Future Holds for You and I!
I have the Advanced plan for $27 a month too! I’m absolutely ecstatic about that, because I think it’s a pretty expensive service otherwise.
It’s so great thought Dennis, when you use it and start figuring it out – you’ll love it.
The more you use Thesis the more you will love it without doubt. Have started the free trial with Scribe and have to stay it is a handy tool to use!
Bradley Davis´s last blog ..Pakistan Taxi Driver
I can’t run a blog without Thesis now, I’m just so accustomed to it I don’t think I’d know what to do otherwise!
Do you think you will be purchasing Scribe?
Great post, and I too use those tools as well, there are many times when I see blog posts that are just randomly named and the permalinks have no keywords in them, and it’s obvious that no research or thought was put into optimizing that post. This is a shame as that blogger is really missing out on that precious organic traffic, without which, it’s just a dead blog that does not target any kind of visitor.
JR ´s last blog ..Make Money Online for Free: How-To Build Money Sites Quickly With Wordpress
You’re right JR. The older your blog becomes and the more you continue writing content, the more of these things you learn. It took me a few months to understand the importance of a great headline, but only until recently that I started paying attention in such high amount of detail.
Yes, this is definitely a learning process that does take experience and practice to perfect, but always well worth it.
JR´s last blog ..Make Money Online for Free: How-To Build Money Sites Quickly With Wordpress
It’s really nice to know that there are tools like scribe that helps you optimize every articles that you make.
How to blog´s last blog ..Top 5 Reasons Why People Started to Blog
Thesis Theme is the best option to rank higher in Search engines. There is no substitute of having a stunning thesis theme.
yeah alex i agree with you .
Thesis Theme Design´s last blog ..A preview of Thesis Theme Version 1.7 {(thesis theme 1.7 beta 1) video}
O sorry to forget to mention that i use All in SEO plugin for the SEO works. It’s a awesme plugin as well.
@Thesis Theme Design
You do not need All in one seo plugin when u use thesis as your theme. It’ll only add redundant code to your site.
Technology Blogger´s last blog ..Crysis On iPad Now
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