Many of our clients have been using WordPress for awhile and call us because they want to improve the performance of their site.  Basically, there are only two reasons why a WordPress site would not have high website rankings, blog authority and great search engine placement – either you need a few tips on business blogging (content, formatting, optimization and basic SEO), or your WordPress system is not configured properly for SEO.  Most likely, it’s a combination of both.

When it comes to SEO WordPress configuration, one of the biggest problems we run into is the overzealous use of WordPress SEO plugins.  Unlike Genesis and some of the other more robust SEO WordPress platforms, older and basic versions of WordPress require a few SEO enhancements or plugins to help them perform better in the SERPs.  However, that doesn’t mean that by installing a bunch of SEO plug-ins, you’re making your site better – au contraire!  Getting crazy with too many conflicting SEO plugins can actually bite you in the Arss!

WordPress Plugin Confusion

For example, you don’t want to mix the SEO All-in-One Pack with Head Space or the Total Webmaster SEO plug-in. Having multiple SEO plugins will continuously ping the search engines with the same data, which could easily be construed as spam.  Also, when there is conflicting info given to your data base, the system gets confused and doesn’t know what to follow. 

WP Super Cache is another WordPress plugin we don’t recommend using.  A lot of people use this plug-in to speed up the load time of their site. It’s often installed as a cure for slow loading dynamic headers with flashing images or when a site has a lot of images on the home page, such as a property search.

If your WordPress site is a slow loader, more than likely it’s a problem with your HOSTING COMPANY and not with the system itself.  Every body’s situation is different.  But the bottom line is that if your hosting company can’t serve your site quickly, you need a new host. There should be no need for a plugin that pushes content into a browser.

The reason why we don’t recommend WP Super Cache is that it often shows search engine bots the older version when you make changes or update your site.  It doesn’t change the cache of most spiders, which defeats the purpose of having an XML Sitemap and the XML RPC Update Service. Search engine bots work with cache just like an Internet browser does and are based on the oldest browser platform known as Mozilla, a text only browser – known to humans as FireFox. 

The overuse or misuse of plugins can be detrimental to the performance of your WordPress site.  So, rather than adding one plug-in after another, we recommend that you upgrade to a newer, more robust version of WordPress with built-in SEO that works in harmony.

We also recommend that you be extremely careful about who you let “tinker” with your WordPress site.  Unless they have a high performing WordPress site of their own, which you can easily check out on Website Grader.com (free of charge), hire a SEO WordPress company that actually knows what they are doing.

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Learn more about why SEO business blogging and SEO WordPress is the answer for top, organic search engine placement.  Type in “SEO business blogging” or SEO business blogging on WordPress” and see for yourself!

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If you are interested in coaching for SEO Business BloggingSEO WordPress training , SEO copywriting services, SEO WordPress set up (StudioPress-Genesis), static website conversion to WordPress or a SEO tune-up for your existing WordPress system, please fill out the online contact form or give us a call at 813.782.1619 or 813.4841363.  Let us help you GET FOUND NOW!