Recently we had to propose some SEO best practice for on-page SEO. From working with lots of WordPress websites and using the Yoast SEO plugin a lot, this is what our team came up with.
- Focus keyword :
- Choose one focus keyword per page
- Should appear in the first paragraph of the copy
- Having unique focus keywords per page is also good
- Page title : should be at least 40 characters and contain the focus keyword
- Body copy :
- Each page should contain 300 words at minimum
- Have subheading tags (H2) in the body copy if possible containing the focus keyword
- Should score well on the Flesch Reading Ease test. It uses the number of words per sentence and the number of syllables per word in an equation to calculate the reading ease.
- Page URL / link : should contain the focus keyword
- Meta description : minimum 120 characters containing the focus keyword
- Images :
- Good image to text ratio – not just copy without any images but should be balanced
- All alt tags populated for images to include a good description (16 words) of the image including focus keywords if possible
- Backlinks : The pages should have outbound links to other external website or pages / sections inside the website
