You should not allow your CMS to interfere with your SEO strategy. When selecting a CMS, you must take into consideration, instead, how it will help. It does not matter how great your website is, most of your site traffic is going to come from organic searches on search engines. This means that SEO must be the most important thing you consider when it comes to online content management. It needs to also be among the top things to consider when choosing a CMS.
Table of Contents
1. 301 Redirects
So how exactly does your content management system help you when content is moved? In case you move content within the CMS, or if you are moving content into your content management system from elsewhere, you must ensure that visitors to the old URL can easily get to the new one. But just linking or redirecting them to the new page isn’t enough.
You must have a 301 redirect that will keep search engines informed of changes in your content. The user is taken to the correct place by the redirect, which also informs the search engine that this new place is the legit URL for this page henceforth. After that, it will update its index and transfer the score, or weight, to the new URL from the old one. You should not throw away everything you have worked for. Ensure your CMS is able to create 301 redirects.
2. Content
Your content is as essential as everything else on your page. Ensure you have great keyword phrases and keywords representation. An additional way to ensure you hit your keyword objectives is by using keyword synonyms, which besides helping your score, also ensure it is easy to read by not repeating the vocabulary repeatedly to the user.
You can use a question and answer structure whenever useful or logical. Furthermore, always remember that all your images need to have alt text. And finally, you should frequently add fresh and new content. According to Peter Andrew, SEO specialist at Vancouver SEO, the search engines and your visitors will always reward your good content strategy. Ensure your CMS can assist you to create SEO friendly, relevant, fresh and keyword-focused content.
3. Page Keywords
You must have heard already that Google no longer puts weight, negative or positive, in the keywords you have defined in your meta tags. But not all search engines have totally disregarded them, so you must still maintain your keywords. It may also be a technique to help you manage your content as well, so make use of the keyword field to allow you to manage your goals, thoughts, and concepts for a page.
It must be simple to refer to your keywords while writing a page. If you are able to see your keywords while you are editing, you can ensure your content suits the overall objectives of the page. Ensure your content management system makes it convenient to specify, control and manage keywords and provides you with ways to refer to them while you are editing a page.
4. Breadcrumb Navigation
Content management system must support the breadcrumb navigation’s customization. Breadcrumb navigation is essential for user experience and also link connectivity for pages not seen in the Global navigation template.
It can be driven by page titles as a default behavior; however, must permit unique, keyword focused customization where suitable. In addition, breadcrumb navigation functionality must not create unique URL paths.
5. Heading Tags
You should not overlook your heading tags. Not only do these tags symbolize your content structure and assist you to systematize the thoughts on the page, they are used by search engines in the algorithm so ensure you use them appropriately. Each page must have one tag, and the heading used must include essential keyword phrases for the page. Once more, ensure you do not stuff it with keywords. Ensure your CMS lets you use the right heading tags properly in your content.
The above-mentioned tips will provide you with a better perspective in what to search for when assessing the SEO-friendliness of a content management system.
A great CMS can have an impressive impact on the performance of your SEO and on the other hand, a bad one can destroy your SEO program and any hope you could have of achieving success. Make an effort to evaluate the way yours might be affecting your program.
