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Using WordPress

– A Small Business Guide

Special Report From: Tools for Social Media.com

If you’re an entrepreneur or business owner who wants to leverage

the power of the Internet, then it’s worth your time to learn about

WordPress. Many business owners have started using WordPress,

a web publishing platform, because it offers simple ways to boost

your site’s visibility to search engines—and that, in turn, drives

more customers to your website.

Here are just a few of the advantages of WordPress that will help

you create a professional and profitable web presence:

Permalinks: Short for permanent link, this is the name for the

specific web address, or URL, that appears in the address bar

of each particular page. There are two kinds of permalinks.

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A default permalink, which typically contains a random

number, is generated when you create a page or post. The

challenge with these numbers is that they don’t tell the search

engines anything about the content on the page, so it takes

them longer to list that page in their search results.

A custom permalink is a URL that contains specific

information, such as a blog post title, describing the content.

One of the keys to WordPress search engine optimization is to

turn on the feature that creates these search-engine friendly

custom URLs.

One of the advantages of WordPress for small business is that one

of the custom permalink options will automatically insert the title

of the page or post and the date as part of the URL.

Tags: Web crawlers, the computer programs that search

engines use to find web content, use tags, or special keywords,

to search your site. Look for special plug-ins that help you add

tags to your WordPress content management system. (A plug-

in is a specialized program that allows you to customize your

WordPress site).

Page & Post Titles: When it comes to SEO tips, one area

that’s overlooked is the value of a compelling headline that

includes at least one targeted keyword. And, if you’re using

WordPress permalink options to make page titles part of the

URL, web crawlers will pick up those additional keywords. Be

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careful though—don’t pack page and post titles with so many

keywords that they read like gibberish to your customer.

Relevant Posts: Take advantage of WordPress search engine

optimization features by using the option to add a list of

related posts underneath each new post. This will help web

crawlers identify your site’s pages more easily.

Google Sitemaps: If you’re using WordPress, be sure to

incorporate the Google Sitemaps tool, which is a way to notify

the giant search engine about all the pages on your site,

including those that might be missed by their web crawlers.

Categories: This is a way to organize the site’s content. One

feature of WordPress search engine optimization is the ability

to boost SEO by using keywords to name sub-categories and

sub-sub-categories.

Ping: Post an update? Edit a blog page? This WordPress

search engine optimization feature notifies sites, like blog site

Technorati, that you’ve updated your small business website.

Autolinks: If you’re interested in more SEO tips for using

WordPress, consider adding an autolink plug-in. This will

automatically link keywords and phrases in your post with

other content on the site, such as posts, pages, or categories.

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There are so many resources available to learn Wordpress quickly

and easily. Whether you use a free resources or take a Wordpress

tutorial, take the time to learn the basics of Wordpress and how it

can be used to your advantage in terms of driving traffic to your

website.

The WordPress content management system offers the SEO tools

individuals and small businesses need to drive traffic to a website.

Whether you want to launch a new website or re-envision your

current site, using WordPress is a smart place to start down the

path to online marketing success.