Onpage Optimisation

Onpage Optimisation efforts serve as a bridge between the insights gathered from Keyword Research and the website’s content strategy, applied on a per-landing-page basis. In other words, Onpage Optimisation uses insights from Keyword Research on prospects, their search queries and the intent behind them to optimise the single most relevant landing page on the website by adapting the content elements of the page to the unique language used by those prospects.

The practice of Onpage optimisation is fuelled by the last phase of Keyword Research, called Keyword Mapping. Keyword Mapping stands for mapping every target keyword to a landing page. It’s worth noting that Keyword Mapping brings the side-benefit of preventing keyword cannibalisation, whereby multiple landing pages sub-optimally compete for the same keywords.

Once the Onpage Optimisation is being carried out, it is important to have appropriate tracking and reporting in place to measure the results, build a more granular understanding of what works and continuously refine the onpage optimisation practice.

Onpage Optimisation Elements

To optimise a landing page for a particular string of keywords, intents and users, one must consider the website’s Internal Ranking Factors which are determined by the elements found on the website landing pages and are under the full control of the publisher. The Internal Ranking Factors do not directly affect the ranking positions the website occupies in SERPs when competing with other websites, but instead they determine which of the website landing pages will show up for what string of keywords.

On a per-landing-page basis, Internal Ranking Factors are determined predominantly by the Onpage Elements, each having a relative propensity to influence organic rankings. Each Onpage Element also has an individual purpose which must be respected and some generally accepted practices which may also uplift the value of the page. These onpage elements are:

1. Page Title
2. Meta Description
3. URL
4. Page Headers
5. Body Content
6. Internal Links

Page Title Optimisation

Being the first element both users and search engines see in search results, the Page Title is the single most important element in determining what a landing page is about. Thus, how Page Titles are written and structured has a great effect on organic rankings.

More specifically, writing a good Page Title begins with Keyword Research that can help answer such questions as what keywords to use and in what order. But it goes much further than that, incorporating such aspects as the recommended Page Title lengths and consistent use of branding. It also considers the implications of using keyword modifiers or synonyms, capitalisation, and nontraditional characters or avoiding negative practices like keyword stuffing and the negative impact of missing or duplicated Page Titles. Optionally, it may also extend to the benefits of using supplementary titles for Social Media.

Editing Page Titles in WordPress

There are a number of ways to edit Page Titles in WordPress. Let’s begin by exploring how to edit the Page Title when creating a new Page or Post within WordPress.

Editing Page Titles from the “Page” or “Post” view

From the “All Pages” or “All Posts” tab within your WordPress backend navigate to the Page you’d like to edit the Page Title for and click “Edit“. On the Page or Post, you’ll be able to edit the title at the very top of your content editing area.

It is not uncommon to want to edit multiple Page Titles in a row, after the pages in question have already been published. The most convenient way to accomplish this is to “edit”Quick Edit” them directly from within the “All Pages” or “All Posts” view.

Editing Page Title using “Quick Edit” within “All Pages” or “All Posts” view

Chances are you’re working on a big website, so in certain situations editing the Page Titles directly from your “All Pages” or “All Posts” menu can come in handy. Open “All Pages” or “All Posts” view in WordPress, navigate to the Page or Post you want to edit and Press “Quick Edit“, then Edit the Page Title within the “Title” field.

Optimising Page Titles for Search Engines

There are various WordPress plugins that support title editing featuring additional benefits.

Employing the RankMath WordPress plugin for editing Page Titles

One such tool for editing metadata, including Page Titles, is RankMath that also allows a Preview of the Page Title in the Google SERPs. This is useful for writing Page Titles of just the right length and testing them right in the editing window.

Rankmath overwrites the default WordPress Page Titles

If you’re using RankMath, the Page Titles specified in Rankmath will overwrite the default specifications in WordPress. If you’ve installed RankMath, you should normalise writing your Page Titles using the Rankmath field.

Installing Rankmath

After you’ve installed the Rankmath SEO plugin, you will need to click the Rankmath icon in the top-right corner of your view. Upon click, your Rankmath editor will likely appear below your content field the first time around. It is recommended to drag it to the top-right corner of your screen from below the content editing area.

Editing Page Titles using Rankmath

1. Once you’ve clicked on the “RankMath” icon in the top right corner, you will see the following screen on the right-hand side.
2. The “General” tab is pre-selected by default and displays your current Page Title, URL and Meta Description, the way they’re visible in Google Search.
3. Click “Edit Snippet” to be presented with the editing controls.

Once you click “Edit Snippet” you will reach “Preview Snippet Editor” which will allow you to edit your Page Title, Meta Description and URL slug.

If you have certain target keywords set up within the “Focus Keyword” section of Rankmath, these will be highlighted in bold for Page Titles and the other onpage elements, exactly the way you would expect for them highlighted in Google Search when users search for those particular keywords.

Rankmath will pull the default WordPress Page Title by default using a formula

A noteworthy insight is that when the Rankmath Page Title field is left empty, by default it will use a formula composed of the WordPress-specified Page Title (%title%) followed by a separator (i.e. dash) and the website name (%sitename%). The Rankmath formula used to generate the Page Titles across all pages or posts can be modified within the main settings of the Rankmath plugin, but anything you change within the “Preview Snippet Editor” for the page will overwrite it.

Meta Description Optimisation

The Meta Description is a short fragment of text that can only be found right underneath the landing page URL in SERPs. A good Meta Description supports the Page Title in attracting users to the website by offering a slightly more in-depth picture of what the landing page is about. Although the Meta Description is a pseudo Internal Ranking Factor, meaning that it does not directly influence organic rankings, it can and does influence the click-through rate to the landing page.

Like in the case of Page Titles, a good Meta Description strategy must be grounded in thorough Keyword Research, while incorporating a similar list of factors. These include the appropriate use of keywords, respecting the recommended Meta Description lengths, and optional tags for social media. Given the higher lengths of meta-descriptions, they also allow more scope for the use of synonyms and keyword modifiers where appropriate.

Editing Meta Descriptions in WordPress

While WordPress includes default functionality for title tags, it does not provide a built-in, user-friendly field to manage meta descriptions for individual posts or pages without using a plugin or custom code. One such plugin that allows easy editing of Meta Descriptions, in addition to the other SEO elements is Rankmath.

Employing the RankMath WordPress plugin for editing Meta Descriptions

There are multiple ways to edit the Meta Descriptions using Rankmath, but the basic requirement before proceeding is ensuring you have the Rankmath plugin installed.

1. You can edit the Meta Description of a particular Page or Post directly from within that Page or Post’s view, as illustrated below.
2. Using the “Quick Edit” expanding panel in “All Pages” or “All Posts” which allows quick editing of selected pages or posts, without tthe need to access the Page or Post in question.

Editing the Meta Description using Rankmath directly in the Page or Post view

Visit the Page or Post you want to edit the Meta Description for.

1. Click on the “RankMath” icon in the top right corner to see the following panel.
2. The “General” tab is pre-selected by default and will display your current Meta Description (if any) alongside your Page Title and URL, the way they’re visible in Google Search.
3. Click “Edit Snippet” to open the “Preview Snippet Editor” which will allow you to edit your Meta Description.

As you make edits, the RankMath Preview section will display in real-time how your Meta Description will look like in Google SERPs. This presents a great opportunity to ensure your Meta Description is of the right length.

If you have certain target keywords set up within the “Focus Keyword” section of Rankmath, these will be highlighted in bold for Meta Descriptions as well as Page Titles and URLs, exactly the way you would expect for them to be highlighted in Google Search when users search for those particular keywords.

Once Pages or Posts have been published, the need to change the Meta Descriptions for multiple pages in a row is not at all uncommon. If you’d like to change the Meta Descriptions for a few pages, the most convenient method is through the “Quick Edit” panel within the “All Pages” or “All Posts” view.

Editing Meta Descriptions using “Quick Edit” within “All Pages” or “All Posts” view

Open your “All Pages” or “All Posts” view in WordPress and navigate to the Page or Post you want to edit and Press “Quick Edit“, then Edit the Meta Description within the “SEO Description” field.

The latest specified Meta Description within the Page view or within the Quick Edit view will take precedence. So when adding a meta description within the “Quick Edit” view, Rankmath will also replace the meta description that was previously specified within the Preview Snippet Editor of the Page or Post and vice versa.

Page URL Optimisation

The Page URLs are the links displayed in the search results alongside the Page Title and Meta Description and are also visible in the browser’s “Address Bar” while on the web page. Like other onpage elements, Page URLs rely on keywords to give clues about the content on the page, but a more important role is played by its structure which defines the relationship of the landing page to other pages on the website. The process of writing search-optimised URLs should take place alongside the optimisation of other onpage elements and consider the same research processes.

Page URL is by far the most complicated element to optimise for a number of reasons:

• It has more ground rules and limitations
  • Case sensitivity
  • Reserved and extraneous characters
  • Foreign language characters
• The structuring of URLs involves understanding the relationship between the pages on the website which requires a bit more technical expertise to manage effectively.
  • The appropriate use of protocols
  • Correct enforcement of the preferred domain
  • The use of subdomains and its implications for SEO
  • The use of subdirectories
  • The use of file extensions
  • URL parameters
  • Domain names and the top-level domains implications for SEO

Apart from main considerations on URL optimisation, you may find useful the generally accepted SEO best practices that reflect on URLs in particular, such as:

1. The accepted scenarios for using subdomains versus subdirectories as alternatives
2. The accepted scenarios for using static versus dynamic URLs

Optimising the Page URL in WordPress

As outlined, there are quite a number of things to consider when optimising URLs, but URL structure is mostly set up once and then reused across your publishing. There is one single thing that you will have to optimise every time you publish a new Page or Post and that is the URL slug or the last portion of the URL in the URL path.

Editing the URL Slug in WordPress

You can specify the URL Slug using the default WordPress Settings for the Page or Post. Just open the Page or Post Settings on the right-side of your Top Toolbar and find “Slug“, under the “Page” Settings.

Once you edit the URL Slug, you will seee how it fits within the Permalink, which will also show the other elements of the URL.

• The protocol
• Preferred / canonical domain
• Domain name + Extension
• Subdirectories

You can also edit the URL Slug using the “Quick Edit” feature on the “All Pages” or “All Posts“. Just find the Page or Post > “Quick Edit‘ > Slug.

Employing the RankMath SEO plugin for editing URLs

One such tool for editing metadata, including the URL, is RankMath that also allows a Preview of the URL as seen in the Google SERPs. This is useful for writing URLs of just the right length and testing them right in the editing window.

Installing Rankmath

After you’ve installed the Rankmath SEO plugin, you will need to click the Rankmath icon in the top-right corner of your view. Upon click, your Rankmath editor will likely appear below your content field the first time around. It is recommended to drag it to the top-right corner of your screen from below the content editing area.

Specifying the URL using Rankmath directly in the Page or Post view

Visit the Page or Post you want to specify the URL for.

1. Click on the “RankMath” icon in the top right corner to see the following panel.
2. The “General” tab is pre-selected by default and will display your current URL (if any) alongside your Page Title and Meta Description, the way they’re visible in Google Search.
3. Click “Edit Snippet” to open the “Preview Snippet Editor” which will allow you to edit your URL.

As you make edits, the RankMath Preview section will display in real-time how your Meta Description will look like in Google SERPs. This presents a great opportunity to ensure your Meta Description is of the right length.

If you have certain target keywords set up within the “Focus Keyword” section of Rankmath, these will be highlighted in bold for Meta Descriptions as well as Page Titles and URLs, exactly the way you would expect for them to be highlighted in Google Search when users search for those particular keywords.

Do not attempt to create subdirectories using the URL Slug field

• You will be editing only the URL Slug of the page, which could be placed under one or several subdirectories. Although they can be selected, they can not be edited from this view.
• Do not attempt to create subdirectories using the URL slug field by adding forward slashes (/). If you do need a new subdirectory for the page you’re working on, follow the proper subdirectory set-up process to prevent SEO issues in the future.

The last entry of the URL slug will take presedence across all methods

Unlike in the case of the other onpage elements, it doesn’t matter what method you use for writing the URL Slug. The last entry you put in, either in WordPress’ default URL Slug field or Rankmath’s field, will overwrite what you have specified earlier using any other method.

Body Content Optimisation

Although Onpage Optimisation generally focuses on the three main onpage elements: Titles; Meta Descriptions and URLs, it is generally acceptable to extend the Onpage Optimisation to also include some visible content elements from the body:

1. Headers
2. Introduction Paragraph

It’s important to draw the line on what can be considered part of Onpage Optimisation and separate it from the writing of the body content itself. Content Writing is a standalone topic outside Onpage Optimisation as it can follow objectives outside SEO and thus must be explored separately, as part of Content Marketing. If Onpage Optimisation is predominantly meant to bring in more users to the landing page, Content Marketing should predominantly be employed to keep them engaged and convert them as customers.

Page Headers Optimisation

After the three main onpage elements and namely the Title, Meta Description and URL, the most important elements collectively are the Headers. Unlike the three main onpage elements, the Headers show up as part of the HTML body and have the collective role of structuring the content on the page itself.

• The page headers are hierarchical, with a single page header at the top called H1, meant to briefly describe the content of the entire page and being the most important for SEO. The Title and H1 often end up being highly similar because they’re both meant to describe the contents of the page.
• The rest of the hierarchy is represented by multiple levels of nested headers (H2 to H6), particularly important for optimising the page for long-tail keywords as subtopics of the core content.

Optimising the Page Headers in WordPress

In WordPress the Title specified at the Top of the page doubles as the H1 header. You may add subsequent headers in any numbers in order to effectively structure your page content.

Use a single H1 header per page, but any number of H2 – H6 headers

Although WordPress allows you introduce multiple H1 headers, SEO best practice is to use a single H1 header per page because the role of the H1 is to describe the contents of the entire (single) page. There are no such restrictions on any of the subsequent headers (H2 – H6). The best practice for the use of the subsequent headers (H2-H6) is that they should be employed to hierarchically nest the content under increasingly niche subtopics. In other words:

1. A single H1 header to describe the content of the entire page
   1. The content of the page can be split into subtopics using H2 headers
      1. The content of any subtopic may be split into sub-subtopics of their own using a H3 headers
         1. etc (H4-H6)

Do not use H1-H6 merely for styling text

It is generally discouraged to employ the Headers for styling the text (increse the Font Size or change the Font Weight) outside the purpose of creating a hierarchichy for the page content.

Introduction Paragraph Optimisation

The introduction paragraph is the single most important paragraph for SEO on the page in question. Search engines weigh the first 100 words of a page more heavily than the rest of the content on the page to validate their assumptions about the page content. Introduction Paragraph Optimisastion involves placing the target keyword within one of the first few sentences. It also presents the best opportunity on the page to use keyword variations or synonyms for your target keywords.

Internal Linking Optimisation

Internal Linking Optimisation stands for the optimisation of your website’s internal hyperlinks that lead from one internal page to another. It’s important to distinguish Internal Links from External Links which lead from your website to other websites or from other websites to yours.

Internal Linking serves as an additional onpage hint to Search Engines about:

1. Which pages are more important, based on how many internal links they have
2. How different pages on your website are related to each other, based on the way they’re interlinked
3. What the page is about and what keywords it should rank for, based on the anchor text as part of the links that point to them

It may also be useful to know that search engines may employ the internal links differently in their algorythm based on their type: navigation; footer; content; breadcrumbs. While there may be a number of issues commonly associeted with the Internal Linking, some of the most important issues to watch out for are broken internal links and orphan pages (lack of internal links to indexable pages).

Insert an Internal Link on WordPress

To place an Internal Link in WordPress just select the text to be used as Anchor Text, click the Link icon and enter your Destination URL.

Optimisation of Images

Image Optimisation entails a number of code elements that help describe them to Search Engines, including the image’s File Name, Title and ALT tag. The image’s File Name and Title are placeholders for the image title, while the ALT text is meant to describe the image to Search Engines or visually impaired users. It’s important to write these according to their intended purposes, making them descriptive enough for Search Engines and visually-impaired users.

Uploading Images to the Media Library

Before uploading ensure your title your image file using lowercase letters. Also illustrated and photographic images, each have a preferred format for uploads.

• Normalise writing your image titles in lowercase, as all images will automatically create URLs that should use lowercase letters.
  • This is to prevent future cross-platform issues caused by alternative case-sesitivity and case-insensitivity settings applied to your image URLs.
• The illustrated images should be uploaded in the PNG format, which is a lossless format
• The photographic images should be uploaded in JPEG, also known as lossy format.

Using the suggested image format depending on the kind of image you upload ensures the images will be displayed with all their properties and in all the richness they were envisioned.

Editing the Image Title And ALT Tag In WordPress

1. In order to edit the Image Title and ALT Text navigate to the “Media” > “Library” section of WordPress.
2. Select the image you want to edit the metadata for.
3. Edit the Image Title and Alternative Text from within the corresponding fields.
4. You will also be presented with options for Description (a longer image description) and Caption (shown directly under the image).
5. RankMath also provides the option to exclude the image from the XML sitemap.