The document discusses the features and setup of the Yoast SEO plugin for WordPress, including its new version released recently. It outlines essential tools like Google Search Console and Analytics, emphasizes optimizing title tags and meta descriptions, and suggests best practices for social media integration and XML sitemaps. Additionally, it highlights the functionality of the Yoast SEO meta box for page-specific optimization.

1. YOAST SEO FOR
WORDPRESSVictoriaWordPress Events Meetup
November 19th, 2015
Speaker: Marcus Clayton

2. Hey, great timing!
Yoast SEOVersion 3.0
released yesterday
(November 18th)
“Since the ‘creation’ ofYoast
SEO as a plugin, we’ve not
done a release as big as this” –
Joost deValk

3. Yoast SEO
One of the most popular
SEO plugins forWordPress
It’s completely free!
I install it on every website I
work on, whether SEO is a
part of their project or not

4. What else should you have?
Google Search Console (previouslyWebmasterTools)
https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools
Google Analytics
https://www.google.com/analytics
Keyword Planner
https://adwords.google.com/KeywordPlanner

5. General
• Introduction tour to show you the basics
• Specify your website name if it is different from the default
• Verify webmaster tools – meta tag fields
• 90% of the time you will only need to set up Google Search Console
• Block the advanced features of theYoast SEO meta box from
authors and editors

6. Titles & Metas
• You can allowYoast to rewrite title tags for you. I never
turn this feature on.
• Set templates for the title tags and meta descriptions for different
post types, taxonomies and archives.
• You rarely need to change the templates for title tags as they follow best
practices
• Meta descriptions don’t need templates.You only need to write custom
meta descriptions for important pages.
• You can hide theYoast SEO Meta Box from post types that don’t need it
to keep your backend clean
• Other
• The only box that should be checked here is “Noindex subpages of
archives”.This will allow Google to prioritize the first page of the archive.

7. Social
Yoast helps with more than just SEO!
• Add in URL’s to all relevant social media profiles
• Adds Open Graph meta data andTwitter meta data to help
Facebook (and other social networks) better understand content
when pages are shared
• Verify your Pinterest business profile easily with a meta tag field
• Google+ is arguably dead, so it is not necessary to complete those
settings. Other than linking to your Google+ page if you have one.

8. XML Sitemaps
• A sitemap wont directly improve your rankings, but it will
make your site more crawlable so search engines can find
your content
• You should add your sitemap index to Google Search Console
• Exclude unnecessary post types (ask yourself – do I want this
content to rank, and will it realistically rank)

9. Advanced
• Breadcrumbs are great to use on sites to make navigation
easier for the user
Ie – Home »WordPress Plugins »Yoast SEO forWordPress
• This also takes care of a bunch of internal linking for you –
important for SEO
Permalink settings
• Fix common problem of /category/ appearing in category URL’s
• Remove stop words from slugs (checked off by default)
• Other settings are unnecessary to edit unless you’re doing
advanced SEO

10. Tools
Bulk editor
• This allows you to see and edit all your title tags and meta
descriptions in one place
File editor
• Allows you to edit your robots.txt and .htaccess files
Import and Export
• Could be used when rebuilding a website to easily transfer over the
settings of the old site
Recalculate SEO scores (new)

11. Search Console
• You can authenticate your Google Search Console/
webmaster tools account
• Brings in 404 errors and server errors
• Shows errors detected by Google’s desktop crawler/ smartphone
crawler
• You can easily fix the errors with 301 redirects if you purchase
Yoast SEO Premium
Or you can use one of the many great free redirect plugins.We
recommend:
• Simple 301 Redirects - wordpress.org/plugins/simple-301-redirects
• ADD ON – Bulk uploader - wordpress.org/plugins/simple-301-
redirects-addon-bulk-uploader

12. Yoast SEO Meta Box
Once you have set up the general settings forYoast, you
are able to optimize your site on a page by page basis with
theYoast SEO meta box
• Customize title tags, meta descriptions, and the URL
• Analyze the optimization of your content
• noindex pages that you do not want in search engine results
• Indicate if you want to nofollow all outbound links from the page
• Advanced robots tags areVERY RARELY needed
• Indicate a canonical URL
• Customize your social meta data to improve how page looks when
shared on social media

13. Yoast SEO Meta Box
Once you have set up the general settings forYoast, you
are able to optimize your site on a page by page basis with
theYoast SEO meta box
• Customize title tags, meta descriptions, and the URL
• Analyze the optimization of your content
• noindex pages that you do not want in search engine results
• Indicate if you want to nofollow all outbound links from the page
• Advanced robots tags areVERY RARELY needed
• Indicate a canonical URL
• Customize your social meta data to improve how page looks when
shared on social media

14. Yoast SEO Extensions