joomla seo, hosted by semrush

JOOMLA SEOHOW TO MAKE JOOMLA WEBSITES PERFORM WELL IN SEARCH ENGINES

BY: SIMON KLOOSTRA

POWERED BY: SEMRUSH

Presentation by Simon Kloostra, joomla-seo.net, Powered by SEMrush

SIMON KLOOSTRA

Blog: Joomla-seo.net

(E-)book: Joomla 3 SEO & Performance


CHOOSE AND USE CORRECT KEYWORDS (1) Choose specific keywords for your audience

Brainstorm, and use Google search for related searches

Use tools to find out competition and nr. of monthly searches, difficulty

Google Adwords keyword tool

SEMRush:


CHOOSE AND USE CORRECT KEYWORDS (2) Use your keywords in body tekst, but also in important locations like:

Domain, URLs, titles, headings, metadescription, etc

Don’t optimize every page for all keywords, make specific pages for specific purposes


GLOBAL CONFIGURATION Site name

SEO Settings

Metadata Settings


METADESCRIPTION FOR EVERY URL (1) Used in Google search results as the description of your site

Every URL should have a unique metadescription (not only articles)

No ranking parameter, but good for CTR


METADESCRIPTION FOR EVERY URL (2) Can be set in both article or menu-item: avoid setting both

Use keywords, max 160 characters

Set it in the Publishing tab of the article or menu-item:

For large sites, use a metadata manager extension


OPTIMIZE PAGE TITLE (1) Used as the main headline in Google:

Important ranking parameter

Max 60 characters


OPTIMIZE PAGE TITLE (2) Optimizing page titles can be complicated:

often the name of the menu-item is used for the page title

This can lead to a page-title called “Home” for the homepage menu-item

You can override this using the Page Display options in the menu-item:

Extensions can be used to set correct page titles


HEADINGS (1) This means the <h1> tag in HTML

Preferably, use one H1 heading on every page, followed by 2-3 H2 headings and possibly some H3’s on larger pages

In Joomla, article title is H1, menu-item H2, while often article title should be most prominent

With a combination of article settings and menu-item Page Display settings, correct this for individual pages, or:

Disable all generated headings and create H1 in editor window of the article

Use template override (see joomla-seo.net)

Use extensions


HEADINGS (2) EXAMPLE SOLUTION Article title: All about Joomla SEO

Linked to menu-item called: About

Use the following settings in the menu-item:


OPTIMIZE URLS In Joomla, URLs are created based on article alias or menu-item alias

Default alias is name of article or menu-item in low caps and dashes for spaces

Override alias for improved SEO. Example:


OPTIMIZE URL STRUCTURE Build a logical structure by breaking up articles in logical categories /

menu’s

Keep category structure and menu structure consistent

In global article options: show category and make it linked

Breadcrumbs to link to parent menu-items

Also use internal linking in body tekst (use correct anchor tekst)


AVOID DUPLICATE URLS (1) Joomla generates multiple URLs for the same article

These are ‘technical’ URLs, not that much of a problem for SEO

Examples:/sample-pages/index.php/sample-pages/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&Id=2Etc.

Joomla 3 uses canonical (=preferred) URLs to fight these (still to be improved)

Some extensions remove these duplicates


AVOID DUPLICATE URLS (2) Joomla generates URLs based on menu-items, also if article is linked to

multiple menu-items

So: avoid multiple menu-items for the same article

Use Menu Item Alias (under System links) for the Menu-Item Type

Not doing so will definitely create duplicate content issues

Also avoid having both a www and a non-www version of your site Fix this in .htaccess or use an extension


404 (PAGE NOT FOUND) ERRORS (1) Can be caused by typos of users, but also because you changed your site

Examples: removed .html extension, renamed an article or menu-item WITH the alias,installed a SEF extension without preparationEtc

Prevent these changes, or correct them using the Redirect Component:


404 (PAGE NOT FOUND) ERRORS (2) Default 404 page is quite ugly.

Totally different from your design

Solutions:

Use a template with a custom page

Use an extension

Create your own 404 page:Create an article with correct tekst and create your own error.php file using a copyof the system error.php


MICRODATA Joomla 3 has Microdata support built in: Markup especially for search

engines

Special code marked for specific purposes:Article properties like heading, body-tekst, ratings, etc.

With plugins you can achieve even more:Breadcrumbs, product prices, video thumbnails, event information, etc


ROBOTS (1)Robots.txt

Joomla ships with a default robots.txt file: blocks system folders from Google

Older sites may still block /images: remove that line

May not fully block pages from Google index

Robots meta

Robots meta tag can be set in Joomla (Globally or per article / menu-item)

Used to keep pages out of the Google index

Use it for non-relevant pages or pages without unique content

Examples: Terms and conditions, or overview pages like search pages


ROBOTS (2)Robots.txt Robots meta tag options


SITEMAPS Always create a sitemap

Not a core Joomla feature

Small static sites: create manually online at www.xml-sitemaps.com (or other)

Other: use an extension (make sure all URLs are included, also for 3rd party extensions)

Once generated: submit to Google Webmaster Tools (again after changes)

http://www.xml-sitemaps.com/


SEO EXTENSIONS (1)Managing metadata:

Easy Front-end SEO

SEO generator (automatic generation: but manual is always better)

OSMeta

Header tags (setting H1, H2, etc.)

SEOBoss

Sitemaps

Xmap

Jsitemap


SEO EXTENSIONS (2)Redirection:

Redj

Non-SEF to SEF

Canonical (no redirect, but setting correct canonical tags)

Microdata

Microdata Google Breadcrumbs

Rich Snippets Vote

Often built in for larger extensions (webshops, event managers)


SEO EXTENSIONS (3)Full SEF extensions:

Possibly complicated, but very powerfull

Carefull: changes URLs after activation

Canonical (no redirect, but setting correct canonical tags)

All-in one solution:Metadata management, Canonicals, Headers, SEF URLs, Redirection to SEF, 404 errors management, Custom URLs

Best known: SH404SEF

Alternatives: JoomSEF, MijoSEF


AUDIT YOUR SITE (1) Google Webmaster Tools is a free tool

Submit sitemap and set basic settings

Also allows auditing of HTML issues and performance in search pages


AUDIT YOUR SITE (2) SEMrush: free version offers nice functionality for limited sites

Keyword research, keyword difficulty, rank tracking, but especially Site Audit


MORE INFORMATION? This presentation’s slides:

Slideshare: www.slideshare.net/joomlaseo

Joomla SEO: www.joomla-seo.net

SEO /SEA: http://www.semrush.com

To try out SEMrush full functionality for 2 weeks:www.joomla-seo.net/Blog

http://www.slideshare.net/joomlaseo

http://www.joomla-seo.net/

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