WordPress is the most popular CMS on the internet. WordPress is used by millions of people around the world. According to the latest figures, WordPress is used by over 30% of all websites on the internet. It’s popularity can be credited to its SEO friendliness. Out of all the CMSs out there, WordPress is the most SEO friendly. This is because WordPress was created with SEO in mind. WordPress is written in clean code and it follows all the latest SEO trends.
There are many factors that contribute to WordPress’ SEO friendliness. One of those factors is the availability of SEO plugins. There are many WordPress SEO plugins available. Some of them are paid and some of them are free. In this blog post, we will be discussing the best free WordPress SEO plugins.
1. SEO by Yoast is one of the most popular WordPress SEO plugins. It was created by Joost de Valk, who is a well-known SEO expert. Yoast SEO is a plugin that will help you with all aspects of your on-page SEO. Yoast SEO will help you to choose the right keywords, optimize your title and meta tags, and create XML sitemaps. Its advanced features include the ability to control what your social media snippets will look like and the ability to set canonical URLs. Yoast SEO is available in both a free and premium version. The premium version includes some more advanced features, such as a redirect manager and an internal linking optimization tool.
2. All in One SEO Pack, popularly known as AIOSEO, is another popular WordPress SEO plugin. It was created by Michael Torbert. It has currently over 3 mission active installations. All in One SEO Pack is a plugin that will help you with all aspects of your SEO. The free version of All in One SEO Pack will help you to optimize your title and meta tags, create XML sitemaps, and generate social media meta tags. Apart from this, some of the key features of AIOSEO are Seamless integration with Google Analytics, Support for WooCommerce, AMP pages, Local SEO, Redirection and 404 monitoring. There are plenty of other features available in the premium version of All in One SEO Pack.
3. W3 Total Cache is a WordPress caching plugin. It was created by Frederick Townes. Caching is a process of storing frequently accessed data in a temporary storage so that it can be retrieved quickly. W3 Total Cache will improve the performance of your WordPress website by caching static files and eliminating the need to send requests to the server for each page load. In addition to this, W3 Total Cache will also compress HTML, CSS, and JavaScript files to reduce the size of your pages. The premium version of W3 Total Cache includes features such as CDN integration and fragment caching.
4. Redirection by John Godley is a WordPress plugin that allows you to manage 301 redirections and keep track of 404 errors. Redirection is a process of forwarding one URL to another. This is often done when a page has been moved or deleted. Redirection will help you to redirect visitors from the old URL to the new URL. It will also help you to keep track of 404 errors so that you can fix them. Redirection is available in both a free and premium version. The premium version includes features such as the ability to redirect based on referrer and user agent, and the ability to track 404 errors in Google Analytics.
5. WP Smush is a WordPress plugin that allows you to optimize your images. It was created by WPMU DEV. WP Smush will help you to reduce the file size of your images without losing quality. This will help you to improve the performance of your WordPress website. WP Smush is available in both a free and premium version. The premium version includes features such as the ability to optimize images in other directories, and the ability to optimize images that are larger than 1MB.
6. List Category Posts By Fernando Briano is a WordPress plugin that allows you to display a list of posts from a specific category. This is useful if you want to create a blogroll or a list of your most recent posts. List category posts is available in both a free and premium version. The premium version includes features such as the ability to display the list of posts in a widget, and the ability to exclude specific categories.
7. Simple Sitemap by David Gwyer is a WordPress plugin that allows you to create an HTML sitemap. An HTML sitemap is a page on your website that contains a list of all the pages on your website. This is useful for visitors as it helps them to find the information they are looking for. Simple Sitemap is available in both a free and premium version. The premium version includes features such as the ability to exclude specific pages, and the ability to display the sitemap in a widget.
8. Internal Link Juicer is another very useful WordPress plugin. This plugin allows you to automatically link to other pages on your website when they are relevant. This is useful for two reasons. Firstly, it helps to improve the user experience as it makes it easier for visitors to find related information. Secondly, it helps to improve your website’s SEO as it creates links between your pages. Internal Link Juicer is available in both a free and premium version. The premium version includes features such as the ability to automatically link to external websites, and the ability to nofollow links.
9. External Links by Denis de Bernardy & Mike Koepke is a WordPress plugin that allows you to manage outgoing links. External Links are links your website pointing to other websites. When you link to an external website two things happen. First you are giving away some of your website’s “link juice” and second there is this chances of visitors navigating away from your website. External Links helps you to manage these outgoing links and gives you the option to nofollow them and also the option to open new links in a new tab/window.
10. LiteSpeed Cache By LiteSpeed Technologies, Inc. is a WordPress plugin that allows you to improve the performance of your WordPress website. LiteSpeed Cache will create a static version of your website and serve that to visitors. This is useful as it reduces the amount of work that your server has to do, and therefore improves the performance of your website. LiteSpeed Cache is available in both a free and premium version. The premium version includes features such as the ability to cache WooCommerce pages, and the ability to cache pages that are visited by logged in users.
These are just some of the many WordPress plugins that are available. There are plugins for almost everything. If you can’t find a plugin for what you want to do then chances are that someone has written a tutorial on how to do it. So, don’t be afraid to search for tutorials on how to do things with WordPress. There is a wealth of information out there. And, if you get stuck, there are plenty of people who are willing to help. Just post a question on the WordPress support forums.
