Search engine optimization is a vast field and you need to take one step at a time while optimizing your website for Google and other search engines. WordPress is one of the most renowned content management systems in the market and today I will discuss the ways to compose SEO friendly URLs for any website based on WordPress CMS.
Go for SEO friendly permalink structure: It is essential to add keywords in the URL of the page/post. The keyword not only informs Google what your web page is all about but also helps the readers get an idea of the content by checking the URL. For example, if you are writing about fried chicken recipe in a web page, then instead of www.xyz.com/123, create a URL like www.xyz.com/fried-chicken-recipe. In order to change the permalinks in WordPress, go to settings>permalinks, and then select “post name” because it allows you to personalize each URL to match the content topic.
Use plug-ins to ensure the URLs are SEO friendly: WordPress offers tons of plug-ins to automate the SEO process but if your focus area is only URLs then install Yoast SEO plug-in. This particular plug-in notifies you if your URL structure works properly for your focus keywords. In case the URL is not well optimized, Yoast shows you the red flag so that you can make the necessary changes before uploading the content on the web.
SSL certificate is a must: Google has already informed the webmasters and SEO practitioners that SSL certificate is a sign of trust and they are considering HTTPS as a ranking signal. So, suppose your website URL begins with HTTP and your competitor’s website URL starts with HTTPS, then Google will offer your competitor a better rank on SERP. Hence, you must ensure that all the pages in your website have the HTTPS for data security and better ranking.
Conclusion
While writing the URL for your website, you must pay attention to two things. Keep the URL brief and make sure that the formatting is same across all the pages. For instance, if you use a hyphen (fried-chicken-recipe) to separate words in the URL then this rule should be applied to all the web pages. Keep writing keyword rich and descriptive URLs and your website will start gaining better position on SERP.
