5 Steps to Optimize a Blog Post

Written by Syed Abbas from Technology Nerd on July 18, 2008

Optimizing an article for search engines is as important as writing a great post. This is especially important for sites which do not have high PR or thousands of RSS subscribers, in other words for sites which are trying to come up but are not there yet.

If the article is not properly optimized then the chances of it making to Google’s front page are not impressive and that’s exactly how a great post is lost in millions of articles generated everyday.

Following is the list of simple yet powerful things one should keep in mind while writing a post to make it Search Engine friendly.

Keyword Research:
Research for high-traffic keywords and use them appropriately in the article. I do not recommend optimizing the post for more than two Keywords. Article should be focused around the keywords you choose, at the same time it should not be overloaded or stuffed with the chosen keywords.

Tools I use for this activity are Google Trends and Google Keyword Tool

Optimized Post Title:
The keywords (chosen ones) which the post is based on should preferably be in the initial part of the article as it not only carries lot of weight from the search engine point of view, but, as most of the readers who will reach the article through a search engine and seeing the keyword in the title will help users get a better idea of the post.

Post Slug:
Wordpress by default copies the title of the post and converts it to a post slug or permalink. This slug or permalink can (should) be edited. After the title of the post search engine gives a lot of importance to the URL/Slug/Permalink, so make full use of it by using keywords in the slug (be reasonable; don’t overdo it.)

Post Slug

Tags:
Tags are one of the best and easiest SEO tools. Tags have a lot of advantages; they generate a new page for each tag, the more pages you have in the index the higher the chances of getting more visitors. I do not recommend having more than 3 tags per post.

20 Responses so far | Have Your Say!

John Young | We Have Contact | July 18th, 2008 at 9:19 am #

This is good info for those just starting out or looking to generate some more traffic.

Out of curiosity, why is not recommended to use more than 3 tags per post? I use a bunch and just want to make sure that I’m not sabotaging myself. Thanks!
Syed Abbas (Post Author) | July 18th, 2008 at 9:44 am #

Hi John,

Using a lot of tags with each article has no negative affects but I personally do not recommend having more than 3 or in some cases 4 tags per article as the ratio of tag pages in search engine index would be more than 3:1 which means in every 100 pages indexed only 25 pages have the actual article and rest of the 75 pages more or less have similar content if not same.

In addition if you restrict yourself to 3-4 tags per article then you will force yourself to choose the best ones and not all.

What do you think? Would you like to stick to 3-4 tags per article?
John Young | We Have Contact | July 18th, 2008 at 11:06 am #

Interesting - that makes a lot of sense. I’ll investigate a little further and perhaps I’ll utilize it. Thanks!
slold | July 18th, 2008 at 1:52 pm #

your tips really helpful for a newbie like me.. I’ll visit this blog regularly..
Todd Andrews | July 18th, 2008 at 3:05 pm #

All In One SEO plugin handles a lot of elements.
Bibit | July 18th, 2008 at 4:22 pm #

Very useful tips !!

http://bibitcanus.blogspot.com
gout | July 19th, 2008 at 1:34 am #

I already using social bookmarks tg…but not powefull, do you have some suggestion thnaks
Barbara Ling, Virtual Coach | July 19th, 2008 at 5:03 am #

One of my favorite tips is to ensure your keywords are in your blog title…and then comment at other blogs which has CommentLuv enabled. Boom - instant deep linking with anchored keywords.

Enjoy, Barbara
Ganesh | July 20th, 2008 at 12:46 am #

Another tip - Your blog post should be small, attractive and SEO friendly. I found out that using a number at the beginning of the title helps in rankings.

One more tip - Make sure there are social bookmarking options at the bottom of the post. Not too many. Just a few like StumbleUpon, Digg and Reddit. It would be better if those icons are large. Anyway, a very good post.
gout | July 20th, 2008 at 4:54 am #

I am not sure…. just with 5points can get big result……. you need extra work
Syed Abbas (Post Author) | July 20th, 2008 at 7:12 am #

Hi Gout,

I agree with you, but there is never enough optimization for a post/site there is always something more that can be done for better ranking.

I wrote about the steps I thought are basic and should be followed by each one of for better results.
moserw | July 21st, 2008 at 10:05 am #

Good points, but only 5 to optimize a blog? Well every little bit helps so will get a move on with these 5. Thanks for sharing.
John ONeill | July 21st, 2008 at 10:06 am #

I found this article very helpful. I have one query though. You say that you recommend keeping tags to a limit of three. I have many, many more tags than that. Indeed, most of my individual posts have multiple tags. I am not so sure who is right on this one so I am not disagreeing with you but I find posts on my blog receive a fiarly high visibility very soon after postng. However, if someone can clarify the best tags number approach I would much appreciate it.

Thanks
John
Syed Abbas (Post Author) | July 21st, 2008 at 10:20 am #

Hi John,

There is no right or a wrong number of tags as such (as far as I know), however, having a lot of tags on a post makes the site/post look messy, shows obvious desperation for traffic, etc…

In addition please read my following comment.. a more reasonable argument why I think 3-4 tags on each post are enough.

http://www.bloggingtips.com/2008/07/18/5-steps-to-optimize-a-blog-post/#comment-210606

That said, optimization is a trial and error process. Experiment, practice and implement what works for you

Good Luck!
earn online | July 21st, 2008 at 8:08 pm #

All true, and all valid
RB! | July 22nd, 2008 at 7:02 pm #

“I do not recommend having more than 3 tags per post.”

The more related tags you have for a post the better; by having more related tags to a post, it’ll help Web surfers find your article better and will generate more pages, therefore improving your search results

You mentioned “shows obvious desperation for traffic, etc”, what does that matter, the more traffic you have the better, I don’t think a post with up to ten tags shows obvious desperation for traffic, and if so, big deal, people will not leave your website because a post has a bunch of related tags, by having a lot of related tags to a post, it would actually increase traffic and page views and that’s what you want

You also mentioned “you will force yourself to choose the best ones and not all.” There is no such thing as picking the “best” keywords, people interpret things differently, that is why it is better to come up with a bunch of related tags for a post because what we think is best may not be the best for someone else
Syed Abbas (Post Author) | July 24th, 2008 at 9:17 am #

Most of the optimization techniques I write about come from my own experience or experiments I do on my blog.

Even I thought the same.. the more tags the better it is.. but the reason I mentioned about 3-4 tags per post is because of what I noticed on my blog in the last couple of months. My blog lost 50% of the traffic twice in 2 months and when I dug a little deeper I found that I lots traffic on my tags. Now I don’t think Google would stop sending traffic for any good reasons.

I think the reason I lost traffic could have been because the tag pages lost its value as similar content was found on most of them.

And Yes, there is such thing as best or better keywords that is precisely why keyword research and all the services around it exist.

I hope this answers a few questions.
Tom Walsh | July 29th, 2008 at 7:51 am #

Great info thanks, I’m just starting out with my blog and I use a plugin for my wordpress blog called All in one SEO. Apparently this plugin optimizes your blog for the search engines, there are some things I don’t understand though. It has the option to use no index for Archives, Categories and Tag Archives. I’m not sure which would be the best to select though, could you help me out here?

Thanks in advance if you can.
Syed Abbas (Post Author) | July 31st, 2008 at 3:45 am #

Hi Tom,

I would allow Tags to be Indexed. Archives and Categories should be disallowed from being indexed.

Hope this helps