Want your website to appear on the first page of Google search? If so, your SEO efforts should be on point. One way is to use the Yoast SEO plugin. So, how do you set up the latest Yoast SEO?
You are on the right page here! In this article, you will learn Yoast SEO and the ins and outs of the plugin. Starting from what Yoast SEO is, how to install it, how to set the best Yoast SEO, to how to use Yoast SEO in posts.
Come on, just look at the full article!
What is Yoast SEO?
Yoast SEO is one of the best WordPress plugins used as a way to improve website SEO. Since its presence in 2008, Yoast SEO has helped many websites to rank higher in search engines.
With Yoast SEO, you can create SEO-friendly content thanks to using the right keywords. In fact, you will also know whether the keywords are evenly distributed in the article.
Not only that, you can also see the results of SEO analysis with various parameters. For example, the meta title and meta description that will appear in search results are in accordance with Google’s provisions.
There are still more Readability Analysis features that can help you create content that can be read comfortably by many people. There will be information on the use of connecting sentences, to passive sentences which can make the explanation too long.
If you are interested in using it, this WordPress SEO plugin has 2 versions, namely: free and premium. For basic use, their free version already offers the main features that are useful, really.
Not only are the features complete, how to use Yoast SEO is also easy. So, before going into how to set the best and newest Yoast SEO, let’s start with the installation process first!
How to Install the Yoast SEO Plugin
1. The first step in Yoast SEO settings is to install and activate the Yoast SEO plugin on the WordPress admin dashboard.
2. On the WordPress admin page, click the Plugins menu > Add New to add a new plugin.
3. Then, type yoast in the search field. If the Yoast SEO plugin appears, click the Install Now button.
4. Wait a few moments until the installation process is complete. If so, click Activate.
5. Now, if the plugin has been successfully activated, the SEO menu will appear on the WordPress menu sidebar. Enter the menu, then you will be directed to the General Settings page.
6. On that page, you can make Yoast SEO settings.
To make it easier for Yoast SEO settings for beginners, Yoast provides a quick way to configure the best Yoast SEO settings, namely through the Configuration Workout feature.
You can access this feature directly on the Workout submenu or via General Settings by clicking the Yoast SEO Configuration workout link.
You will be redirected to the SEO Workouts page and then click the Start workout button! You will see several Yoast SEO configuration steps on one page.
1. Optimize SEO data
The first step in how to set Yoast SEO for beginners is to do SEO optimization.
At this stage, SEO optimization will be carried out on your website. Yoast will provide SEO tips to improve its technical SEO performance.
The length of this optimization process depends on the amount of data to optimize. Even so, you can still proceed directly to the next step, even though the optimization process has not been completed.
2. Site Representation
You can choose 2 website type options, namely Organization or Person.
Choose Organization if your website is a business website or organizational institution. Select Person if the website is a personal blog.
Then, fill in the name of the organization/website owner, select the website logo and enter the website tagline. If all the data has been completed, click the Save and continue button.
3. Social Profiles
At this stage, you can include your social media links. If so, click the Save and continue button to proceed to step four.
4. Help Us Improve Yoast SEO
In this step, Yoast SEO asks for permission to use your website data.
If you allow, select Yes, you can track my site data. But if you don’t allow it, select No, I don’t want to allow you to track my site data.
5. Sign Up for Our Newsletter
The final step for setting up the latest Yoast SEO is to enter an email address to subscribe to the Yoast newsletter. You can skip it if you don’t want it.
Now, if all the steps have been taken and the SEO data optimization process is complete, click the Finish this workout button.
If the Configuration Workout feature cannot be used, you can do the latest Yoast SEO settings manually.
How to Yoast SEO Settings Manually
With the manual method, you can do more detailed general settings, appearance, tools to social media.
If you want to know how to set the best Yoast SEO manually, here are the steps:
1. SEO Data Transfer
The first step in how to manually set Yoast SEO is to transfer SEO data. If this is your first time installing an SEO plugin, you can skip this step.
However, if you have used SEO plugins other than Yoast SEO, such as All in One SEO Pack or Rank Math, you will need to transfer SEO data from the previous plugin. That way, Yoast can use its metadata and you don’t have to start over.
You can transfer SEO settings data via the Tools menu > Import and Export > Import from other SEO plugins on Yoast SEO.
Oh yes, if you have transferred SEO data, you can deactivate the previous plugin so that Yoast can work optimally.
2. How to set the latest Yoast SEO on the General Menu
On the Yoast SEO General menu, there are four tabs for configuration, namely: the Dashboard, Features, Integrations and Webmaster Tools tabs.
2.1 Dashboard Tabs
The dashboard page displays links for configuring SEO workouts, SEO-related problems and notifications containing suggestions for improving SEO. Make settings that you have not optimized.
2.2 Features tab
Yoast SEO has 10 main features that you can easily activate/deactivate on this page, namely:
– SEO analysis : Displays scores and performs SEO analysis of your content.
– Readability analysis : Displays scores and performs readability analysis of your content.
– Cornerstone content : Helps manage the main content (content pillars) of your website.
– Text link counter: Displays the number of internal links in the article.
– XML sitemaps : Create XML sitemaps for your website.
– Admin bar menu : Displays the Yoast SEO menu on the WordPress admin toolbar.
– Security: no advanced settings for authors : Hide advanced SEO settings for authors.
– Usage tacking : Allows the author plugin to track data usage.
– REST API: Head endpoint : Allows you or a WordPress developer to retrieve SEO data specifically for a post or page.
– Enhanced Slack sharing : Added an author by line and estimated reading time to article snippets when shared via Slack.
If you have decided which features will be active or inactive, don’t forget to click the Save changes button.
2.3 Integrations tab
To optimize the content on your website, Yoast SEO offers integration with products from third parties, namely SEMRush and Ryte.
SEMRush allows you to search for related keywords that match the focus keywords you are using. Meanwhile, Ryte is a tool that helps you analyze sites for search engine indexing.
Both SEMRush and Ryte are tools that can improve the SEO of your website content. Therefore, we recommend enabling both. Then, click the Save changes button to save changes.
2.4 Webmaster Tools tab
To make your website easier to find on search engines, you can verify your website by entering codes from various webmaster search engine tools such as: Baidu, Bing, Google or Yandex.
3. How to set the latest Yoast SEO on the Search Appearance Menu
In this menu, you can change the appearance of the website on the search results page. There are seven configuration tabs in the Search Appearance menu, namely: General, Content Types, Media, Taxonomies, Archives, Breadcrumbs and RSS.
3.1 General tab
On the General tab, you can choose a symbol to use as a separator in your title. Usually, this separator symbol is placed between the content title and the website name.
Next, you will enter the Homepage settings. Here, you can create an SEO title and meta description that will be visible to your audience on search engines.
Next, you can set the preview display on social media if the homepage link is shared. You can add images, titles that will be used on social media and website descriptions.
If Homepage settings are complete, scroll down, then you will see Knowledge Graph & Schema.org settings. In this section, you must choose the type of your website: a website that represents an organization or a personal blog.
Then, enter the organization name/website owner name and add your website logo.
If all configurations are set correctly, click the Save changes button to save changes.
3.2 Content Types tab
In this tab, you can choose or create an SEO title and meta description that can be used as the default or template for each of your website content.
In this tutorial, we recommend that you only customize the SEO title part. As for the meta description section, it is better to leave it blank so that later Yoast SEO can generate its own meta description from the first paragraph of your article.
3.3 Media tab
On this tab, you don’t need to change anything. Just leave it as the default setting, namely Yes.
3.4 The Taxonomies tab
In the taxonomies tab, you can configure title and meta for categories, tags and formats. In this tutorial, we recommend that you activate only the categories section.
Then, set the SEO title and meta description columns according to your wishes. Then, click Save changes.
3.5 Tab Archives
The Archives tab is the place to set the appearance of archive pages on your website. In WordPress itself there are three types of archive pages, namely: Author archives, Date archives and Special pages.
By default, Yoast SEO enables Author archives and Date archives.
However, this configuration is not recommended for websites that have a single author. The reason is, the author archives page will be exactly the same as the date archives. As a result, content will be duplicated and have a negative effect on your SEO ranking.
Therefore, for websites with a single author, we recommend deactivating one of them.
As for Special Pages, you can modify it or leave it with the default settings from Yoast SEO.
3.6 The Breadcrumbs tab
A website that uses breadcrumbs is considered a quality website and has a good effect on SEO. Therefore, the Yoast SEO plugin has a breadcrumbs feature to add to your website.
However, there are already several website themes that feature built-in breadcrumbs. So, you are free to choose whether you want to use the default theme breadcrumbs or from the Yoast plugin.
You can change the breadcrumbs configuration in Yoast or leave it with the default settings.
Make sure you enable breadcrumbs for your website theme by moving the toggle to Enabled.
3.7 RSS Tabs
RSS feeds are often used by content thieves to copy content from websites and do not provide backlinks to the original content. This will affect SEO rankings because there will be identical content from two different websites.
Well, Yoast SEO has an RSS setting feature that will add a backlink at the beginning or end of each RSS feed post. So, you will get backlinks from content stealing websites, and Google will know that your content is genuine.
There are several options you can add, such as: author link, post link, blog link or blog description link.
4. How to set the latest Yoast SEO on the Social Menu
Yoast SEO has features to integrate your website with social media, such as Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, etc. In the Social menu, you can configure it on four tabs, namely: Account, Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest.
4.1 Accounts tab
On this tab, enter your social media profile URL. If so, click Save changes to save changes.
4.2 Facebook Tabs
On the Facebook tab, make sure you activate the Open Graph meta data so that Facebook can display a preview in the form of an image or text when you share a website link.
Next, select an image in the Default image section, this image will be used if the website content you share on Facebook doesn’t have an image. If so, click the Save changes button.
4.3 Twitter Tabs
Twitter uses Open Graph metadata like Facebook. Therefore, to optimize websites on Twitter, you must make sure the Open Graph meta data in the Facebook tab settings is active.
Then, activate the Twitter card meta data by sliding the toggle towards Enabled. Then, select the default type of card that is used to display previews of website content on Twitter.
In this tutorial, we chose the Summary with large image card type which will display a summary and an image in the displayed preview.
4.4 Pinterest tabs
To configure Pinterest, make sure the Open Graph meta data on the Facebook tab is active. After that, enter the Pinterest verification code in the column provided.
This verification code is in the form of a meta tag that you can get in your Pinterest Business account > Settings > Claim.
5. Using the Tools Menu [Optional]
The tools menu can help you in setting the latest Yoast SEO. Yoast SEO provides sophisticated features to help you do advanced tasks, such as: import and export, file editor, bulk editor and optimize SEO data.
6. Switch to Yoast Premium [Optional]
The free Yoast SEO plugin is good enough to carry out the SEO optimization function. However, to make it more optimal, you can use the paid (premium) version.
In the premium version, you will get additional features such as: Redirect manager, Synonyms & related keyphrases, Social previews and Premium support.
How to Use Yoast SEO on posts
After setting up the latest Yoast SEO, it’s time to use Yoast on each post. To do this, check the analysis panel at the bottom of the editor page, then do the following:
1. Enter keywords
The first way to use Yoast SEO is to enter the appropriate keywords after the article has been written. So, articles can rank high on Google according to topic searches with certain keywords.
Before adding keywords to the Yoast SEO panel in your articles, do keyword research with the help of tools such as Google Trends or Ubersuggest.
Then, enter keywords in the Focus Keyphrase column.
2. Set up Google Preview
At this stage, you can adjust how your article appears on search pages either on mobile or desktop devices. There are three things you can set:
– SEO title: Give an interesting title and insert focus keywords. Don’t use titles that are too short or too long with green SEO indicators.
– Slug : Determine the permalink of your article. Don’t be too long and try not to use numbers in the slug.
– Meta description: Make an interesting meta description with the appropriate word length and enter the keywords. Make the SEO indicator green.
3. Enter keywords in H2/H3
Check your article again and make sure there is at least one keyword in the subtitles of your post.
4. Pay attention to the Keyword Density in the Analysis section
Yoast SEO is a plugin that provides SEO analysis information, such as an analysis of the number of keywords used in articles.
So, check the keyword density in the post, namely the comparison of the number of keywords with the number of words in the article. Make sure keyword density is green.
Apart from keyword density, also try to have other SEO indicators colored green. If something is still red or orange, make improvements according to the suggestions given by Yoast SEO.
5. Add Internal Links
Don’t forget to add an internal link, which is a link to one of your posts on the website. Internal links are important for building explanatory context and blog structure.
6. Add Keyword to Alt Image Tag
The last way to use Yoast SEO is to always add keywords to the Alt image tags, at least in one of the images. To do this, click on the image in your article and add Alternative text in the Image settings section.
Conclusion
Thus the best Yoast SEO setting guide for you. Yoast SEO is a popular SEO plugin with many advantages and advanced features that can help websites rank high on Google.
For beginners, use the best and newest Yoast SEO setting method through the SEO Workout feature. Meanwhile, for those of you who want more detailed configurations, there is a more complete manual method.
Next, you can apply how to use Yoast SEO on each of the menus and features that we have explained.
The optimization step is complete. However, to get maximum results, use web hosting that has good performance to support your SEO optimization.
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