Jan 16 2024
Why you should use a focus keyphrase only once

Your focus keyphrase is the keyword(s) you want your post or page to rank for. If you’re particularly eager to rank for a specific keyword, you’ll probably be tempted to optimize many articles for that keyphrase. But, that’s not what a focus keyphrase is for! You should only use it once. But why? And what if you desperately want to rank for that particular keyphrase? Don’t despair: we’ll tell you all about it in this post.

Table of contents

Having an orange or red light for the previously used keyphrase check in Yoast SEO? Here’s what this check does and how to turn that light green.

Don’t compete with your own articles

Why shouldn’t you use your focus keyphrase more than once? Because you don’t want to compete with yourself for a position in Google. This phenomenon is also called keyword cannibalization. By optimizing two different articles for the same focus keyphrase, you’re telling Google two things: that both are suitable for people searching for that keyphrase, and both should appear in the search results.

While having two articles rank for the same keyphrase isn’t necessarily impossible, you’ll find that it’s still very hard. Your site needs to have a lot of authority, especially if you want your two articles to appear in the top ten search results for the same query.

What if you already rank with one article?

If one of your articles already ranks, you may have enough authority to try and rank with a second one. However, if you’re not already ranking for a focus keyword, never use it twice! Instead, update and improve your original article. Then write another post that covers a slight variation of the keyword.

Do you think you might be cannibalizing your own content? Here’s how to fix keyword cannibalization.

Ranking for your desired keyphrase

What do you do if you want to rank for a particular keyphrase? Imagine you’re starting an online store for horse feed. You probably want to rank for [horse feed]. Seeing as you’re just starting, that’ll be pretty hard. You might think you need to optimize all your posts for [horse feed], but as we’ve just seen, that’s definitely not the case.

So what should you do? Your keyword research will give you some ideas about which other terms to target.

Content for your blog

If you have a blog – which we advise you have! – you could write an awesome, long cornerstone article about all the different aspects of feeding your horse well. Next, you should optimize this article for the term [feeding your horse] using our Yoast SEO plugin, and mark it as cornerstone content in our plugin.

In the Yoast SEO sidebar you can mark your content as cornerstone content

You’ll need to write a lot of posts, each covering a different aspect of your ‘head’ term. For instance, you could write and optimize articles for focus keyphrases like [best type of hay for your horse], [pasture management], [feeding thin horses], [feeding sport horses] and so on. These are called long-tail keywords.

If you link from these long tail articles to your ‘head term’ article about [horse feed], you’ll be telling Google which of your articles is the most important. This will help you with ranking your most valuable article. At the same time, you’ll also be attracting traffic for those long-tail articles.

Content for your store

So, what if you have lots of product pages for a type of horse feed? Let’s say you have a big assortment: feeds for thin horses, fat horses, feeds for sport horses etc. Should you optimize all your product pages with feeds for thin horses for [feeds for thin horses]? Nope. In this case, it makes more sense to optimize your category page for this term instead of all your individual product pages.

Can you use a focus keyphrase more than once?

Of course you can, but in most cases it’s not a good strategy to achieve great rankings for a keyphrase. If you want to rank for a keyphrase, dive a bit deeper into a topic. See what questions people have. Could you write long-tail articles about those questions?

Also, look at the other search results. Who is your competition, and what do they show? How can you distinguish yourself from them? When you’ve written your content, embed your articles in a kickass site structure to increase your chance of ranking!

What does the previously used keyphrase check in Yoast SEO do?

One of the assessments of the SEO analysis in the Yoast SEO plugin is the previously used focus keyphrase check. This assessment checks if words from your keyphrase were previously used in another keyphrase for other posts or pages on your site. If you’ve used it for another post or page, you’ll get a red light. Why? Because you should optimize only one page for a specific keyphrase!

What to do if you already used your keyphrase more than once?

If you click on the link next to the red bullet, it will guide you to the other article you’ve written about it. Take a good look at the articles. Check which one performs best in the search engines, or gets the most traffic. Keep that article, or merge the best aspects of both articles in the one that ranks highest. The free Yoast Duplicate post rewrite and republish feature can help you with that!

If you just found out you’re aiming for the same keyword or keyphrase with multiple articles, it might pay off to audit your content to find possible cannibalization issues. Fortunately, Joost has written a step-by-step guide on how to find and fix keyword cannibalism on your website!

Want to learn how to choose your focus keyphrase well?

A solid keyword strategy is indispensable if you’re aiming for your website to rank high. You should investigate which keywords you’d like to rank for, research what the competition is doing, then write excellent copy about your focus keyword. If you want to learn how to thoroughly perform keyword research for your website, read our ultimate guide to keyword research, or try our keyword research training; it’s one of the many courses you’ll get access to with Yoast SEO Premium!

Read more: Why and how to export your focus keyphrases with Yoast SEO Premium »

Marieke van de Rakt

Marieke was Head of Strategy and former CEO at Yoast. She is no longer part of Yoast, but during her time at our company she wrote a lot. Topics that she loves writing about include SEO copywriting, site structure and readability.

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Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
Jan 10 2024
Why you only need one H1 heading per post or page

The title of your post or page usually gets the H1 heading tag. It’s only logical to give your post one title, right? Having more than one H1 is like saying: “Hey, this text is about two topics of equal importance.” Yoast SEO warns you with a red traffic light if you use more than one H1 heading. Here, we’ll explain why your post or page only needs one H1 heading.

Table of contents

Did you get a red traffic light in Yoast SEO for using more than one H1 heading? Read more about what the single title check does and how you can fix the red or orange light.

Heading structure and SEO

In many CMSs like WordPress or Shopify, headings are ordered in ranks (or levels). The highest rank is H1, the title of your post or page. In the rest of the text, you use H2 – H6 headings. With them, you indicate the importance of each section and how it relates to the rest of the text. So, when a reader lands on your page, the headings help them make sense of the content. It helps readers to scan the text and learn how it fits together.

Search engines also “read” headings and try to understand the structure of your text. Instead of the regular text you and I read, they go to the HTML version of your site and read the HTML heading tags. The headings help them comprehend the relative importance of your text’s (sub)topic.

One or multiple H1s?

As mentioned above, the H1 is the title of your post (not to be confused with the SEO title). We would suggest using the H1 heading only once. We believe that’s the best choice because:

  • Headings help readers and Google understand your text. If there are multiple H1 headings, your readers and Google might get confused. People might get confused, distracted, or even frustrated when there’s no clear distinction between main and subtopics. As a result, they may leave your site.
  • Proper use of headings makes your text more accessible. Think of visually impaired people who use screen readers. These devices can use headings to navigate through your text. More than one H1 in one article complicates this, and without visual cues, it might confuse people even more.

Of course, using the other headings as much as you need is perfectly acceptable. Still, you should keep in mind that headings are hierarchical. For example, you should use H2 before you use H3 within a particular topic. Check out this extensive guide on headings and SEO if you want to use them optimally.

What does the single H1 heading check in Yoast SEO do?

The single H1 assessment of Yoast SEO (both in our WordPress SEO plugin and Shopify SEO app) checks whether the body of your text contains an H1 heading at any position other than the very beginning. If Yoast SEO detects an H1 heading in the body of your text, it gives you a red bullet in the feedback. Luckily, solving this issue is straightforward.

Yoast SEO lets you know when you’ve used multiple H1s in your text

Finding and changing your H1 headings

To ensure your post doesn’t have double titles, you’ll need to find all H1s in your text and change them to a lower heading level.

Changing an H1 heading in the classic editor in WordPress

If you click one of your headings in the classic editor, the clickable drop-down menu in the upper left corner will show the heading level you’ve selected. You can change it to another level by opening the drop-down menu and selecting another level. If the Yoast SEO feedback indicates that your text contains more than one H1 heading, check all your headings by clicking them. Then, select another level to change your H1 into H2 or another appropriate heading.

Turning selected text into a heading in WordPress classic editor

Changing an H1 heading in the block editor in WordPress

In the block editor, Yoast SEO helps you find the H1s quickly. Click the eye icon next to the assessment and see the H1 titles highlighted in the editor. If you want to change the level of your headings, click them. The menu bar above the block shows you the level of the heading. Then, select another level to change your H1 into H2 or another appropriate heading.

Change the header format by clicking on it

Changing an H1 heading in Shopify

When you go to one of your products or blog posts in the backend of Shopify, you’ll notice the ‘Title’ field at the top. This is where you fill in your title (which is automatically your H1 on that page).

In the description field below, you can write your product description or blog post and add headings by clicking the ‘Paragraph’ button above the content field. This dropdown allows you to add headings of different levels. If you get a red traffic light for your H1 assessment in Yoast SEO, find the wrong headings by clicking the eye icon. When you’ve found the H1 in your content, change it into H2 or another appropriate heading.

Click the eye icon to find the redundant H1s

Conclusion

Using headings in the right way helps your SEO. What you learned from this post is quite simple. An H1 heading is the title of your post. You don’t want double or triple titles, so use the H1 heading only once. If you need to remember, Yoast is here to help you!

If you’re on Shopify, the Yoast SEO app can help keep an eye on your headings and other important SEO elements. In addition, it gives you access to all of our SEO courses to master the art of SEO! When you’re on WordPress and ready to take your SEO to the next level, go Premium to get access to all the features in Yoast SEO and all of our SEO courses. This will help you further optimize your site for visitors and search engines.

Go Premium and get free access to our SEO courses!

Learn how to write great content for SEO and unlock lots of features with Yoast SEO Premium:

Read more: Complete beginner’s guide to SEO »



Edwin Toonen

Edwin is a strategic content specialist. Before joining Yoast, he spent years honing his skill at The Netherlands’ leading web design magazine.

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Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
Jan 4 2024
6 essential tips to save time in SEO

Whether you have a company website, a blog, or an (online) store, chances are you’ve got a lot to do. You’re probably busy leading your company, blogging, or making your customers happy with the necessary goods. SEO might not be top of mind at all times. Yet, you also know that higher rankings would most likely benefit your business. So, how do you do SEO efficiently? Here, we will give you some tips on how to save time in SEO!

Disclaimer: it’s a known fact that SEO also stands for Seriously Effortful Optimization, so you will only get to the top by putting in the work. You should focus on stuff that matters (creating excellent content, making your site fast, and providing the best user experience, i.e., doing holistic SEO). The biggest time saver is choosing the right SEO tools to help you perform these tasks.

Table of contents

1. Unlock time-saving optimization with AI

Embrace the cutting-edge AI capabilities of Yoast SEO Premium to streamline your content optimization process. This powerful feature effortlessly generates titles and meta descriptions for your content. It even extends its benefits to your product meta descriptions when using WooCommerce SEO.

By leveraging AI, you can say goodbye to hours spent brainstorming catchy titles and compelling meta descriptions. Let the AI-powered tool handle the heavy lifting, ensuring your content is search-engine friendly while freeing up valuable time. You can focus on delivering high-quality content to your audience while our generative AI feature handles the optimization.

Yoast SEO Premium uses generative AI to help you work faster

2. Improve existing content

Are you considering writing yet another post on topic X? Think twice. Before you write something new, please check which posts you already have on this topic. Do you find something similar that you’ve written two or three years ago? You can refresh the existing post instead of writing a brand new post. Add new insights, add a hook to current news, improve the quality, and merge it with another post on the same topic on your site. Update it, and you can even share it again in your newsletter or on social media.

This is beneficial in more than one way:

  • It will prevent keyword cannibalization: if you have multiple similar posts on the same topic, your rankings for that query can deteriorate.
  • You’ve eliminated that old article and shown users the best and most updated content. This serves both your users and Google!
  • And, of course, you’ll save time by reusing content. In most cases, rewriting and updating content takes less time than writing something from scratch.

If you want to refresh your content smartly to benefit your SEO, check out our blog post on updating your content in 10 steps. A tool that saves time in the updating process is Yoast Duplicate Post. This free plugin allows you to duplicate and rewrite an existing post as a draft. When it’s ready, you can just hit ‘republish’ (or schedule) it. No more copying and pasting or inconveniently working in docs!

The duplicate post menu item with the rewrite and republish feature
Creating a new draft or clone with Yoast Duplicate Post

One of the first things many SEOs do when auditing a site for the first time is to check the internal linking profile of a website. You could write a thousand articles, but if they don’t get links (external and internal), not many people will find them, making all the writing you’ve done a waste of time. A good site structure can boost your rankings, especially if you structure your site according to the cornerstone content principle.

In a nutshell, the cornerstone content principle means linking related posts. And most importantly, link these posts to the best, most complete article you’ve written on that topic. This is the article that touches on all aspects of the topic. It’s the article that you surely want to rank with! Because this post (or page) gets the most internal links, it sends signals to Google that this is the most important post on that topic.

Internal linking with Yoast SEO Premium

Without any help, implementing this is a lot of work: finding out which posts are related, making sure they’re linked, and manually checking whether they all link to a cornerstone article. Fortunately, Yoast SEO Premium has an excellent feature to help you save time: the internal linking suggestions tool. It will find and show suggestions for related articles to link to next to the post editor in the Yoast SEO sidebar. Pick the ones that you think fit best in the context of your post.

internal linking suggestions in Yoast SEO sidebar
Easily add contextual links with Yoast SEO Premium

Moreover, you can mark your posts as cornerstone content in the backend with Yoast SEO. If you’ve done this and you’re writing a related post, this cornerstone article will show up on top in the suggestions. So you won’t forget to link to those!

Of course, you need more than just internal links for SEO. Nothing beats getting an external link from a high-authority website to build your authoritativeness (part of E-E-A-T). So, building backlinks remains key to achieving good results in SEO. Unfortunately, there’s not a shortcut here. You’ll need outstanding and genuinely original content to earn backlinks nowadays. Plus, you must put effort into the necessary outreach to get the word out about the fantastic things you do, create, or write.

SEO can be overwhelming. You’re never done with SEO, and the tasks you want or need to do can pile up. As a result, you can lose track of everything on your plate, which can even lead to overwhelmed paralysis. It is stressful and not helpful if you want to save time. It’s good to get an overview of the SEO improvements you want to work on to prevent feeling overwhelmed or regain control. Productivity tools like Trello or Todoist can help you attain and keep this overview.

When you’ve organized your board, you’ll need to prioritize. But you might wonder: which tasks on your board come first? Well, as always in SEO, the answer is: it depends. Are significant technical flaws preventing Google from correctly crawling and indexing your site? The obvious answer is to start with that. Do you use huge images on your site, causing pages to load for ages? That might be a good starting point, too.

As for content improvements, it’s impossible to give one-fits-all advice. One principal recommendation, and maybe stating the obvious: make sure your priorities are aligned with your business goals. Are you focusing on getting more sales right now? Optimizing your product pages probably makes sense. Do you want to establish sustainable growth? Focus on the long-term with sustainable SEO.

Are you still feeling overwhelmed? Then, starting with more minor, easy-to-accomplish tasks might be a good idea. Getting into a flow of achieving things and moving cards to done can give that positive energy needed to take up the more significant tasks.

5. Optimize your post for synonyms and related keyphrases

What if you want to rank for multiple queries with one post? That would be a huge time-saver, right? The good news is that you can and might even already do. Of course, there’s one significant constraint: the queries must be very similar. For instance, if you write about sustainable hen houses, it might be worth optimizing for a synonym such as eco-friendly poultry houses too. Using synonyms is a best practice not only for SEO but also for readability. Generally, people don’t like repeatedly reading the same word in a text.

Using synonyms will also help Google to understand the topic better. You’re giving them more context on the topic, making it easier to identify which entity you’re writing about. The same goes for related keyphrases; it will provide Google with the context to show your post or page for the correct query. If you want to optimize your post for related keywords, our Semrush integration can save time finding these. It will show related queries to your focus keyphrase with search volume.

Semrush integration Yoast SEO
Related keyphrase suggestions by Semrush in Yoast SEO

In Yoast SEO Premium, you can set keyphrase synonyms and related keyphrases. The SEO analysis will consider these phrases when analyzing your text and give you feedback so you can also optimize for these phrases. As explained, this will result in more natural writing and a better understanding of the post’s topic by Google. And it can save you time because you won’t write essentially identical posts. As a bonus, you’re not creating duplicate content or causing keyword cannibalization.

6. Preview your social post in the admin

We think sharing your content on social should be part of your SEO efforts. When you’ve written a blog post and plan to share it on social media, you want to ensure it looks good on your timeline. But if you need to do that on the social media platform itself, it does take some time. You must go back and forth between platforms, adapt and upload improved images, etc.

A small but easy time-saving feature in Yoast SEO Premium is our social media preview functionality. It will show you what your post looks like when shared on Facebook or X. Does the image fit, and does the title look good? If you use it, you’re no longer in the dark about the appearance of your post on your timeline. And it saves you time switching between platforms and copy-pasting URLs.

Moreover, you can even set default templates for specific post types. For instance, at Yoast, we set those for help articles. We don’t share these frequently on social media, so we won’t create individual images for all these articles. But setting a good fall-back image prevents these posts from looking misfitted when shared by someone else. Read more about our default social templates.

Save time in SEO

So that’s it. These are our tips on saving time in SEO. It mostly comes down to focusing on what matters and using the right tools. Over to you! Do you have any tremendous time-saving tips? Please share them in the comments!

Read more: Save time in SEO with these tips »



Edwin Toonen

Edwin is a strategic content specialist. Before joining Yoast, he spent years honing his skill at The Netherlands’ leading web design magazine.

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Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
Jan 3 2024
How to use the readability analysis in Yoast SEO

If you’re a user of Yoast SEO for WordPress or Shopify, then you’re probably familiar with the traffic lights in our plugin. Three parts of Yoast SEO use this system: the content analysis, the readability analysis, and the inclusive language analysis. The first checks whether your post or product pages are SEO-proof, while the latter checks if they’re readable for a general audience. The third checks if your content has language that might exclude people. Of course, these are interconnected, as readable content is crucial if you want your site to do well in the search results. Here, we’ll show you how to use the readability analysis.

What does the readability analysis in Yoast SEO do?

The readability analysis in Yoast SEO uses an algorithm to determine how readable your text is. We’ve crafted this algorithm to make it as accurate as possible without being too strict. It features several checks that will give you advice when you write your page. In other words, following this advice makes your text easier to read and understand.

It has been said that Yoast SEO suggests dumbing down your writing. Of course, that’s not the case. We merely want to help people write content that’s easy to understand. Just consider the following quote by content design hero Sarah Richards about making your content as readable for humans as possible:

“You’re not dumbing down, you’re opening up.”

By simplifying content, you’re automatically growing your audience as more people grasp the message of your content. Also, you’re not writing your content just for people anymore. Because virtual assistants like Alexa and Siri must also be able to work with it. Even Google increasingly uses well-written content for rich results like featured snippets, not to mention all the AI tools that love good content.

That being said, while the advice in the readability section is not the be-all and end-all advice, it does give you important clues to the perceived difficulty of your text. Writing with readability in mind is crucial, as readability ranks!

Current readability checks in Yoast SEO

The current readability checks are available in Yoast SEO:

  • Transition words: Do you use transition words like ‘most importantly’, ‘because’, ‘therefore’, or ‘besides that’ to tie your text together? Using these words improves the flow of your article as they provide hints to the reader about what is coming next.
  • Sentence beginnings: Do any of your consecutive sentences start with the same word? This might feel repetitive to your reader, and that can be annoying. Always keep your sentences varied, so your article is readable and free of obstacles. Unless you want to prove something or use it as a writing style, of course.
  • Word complexity: It would be a shame if you write something and your readers can’t fully grasp it, right? The more uncommon and complicated words you use, the harder it might be for your visitors to understand your writing.  Thanks to the feedback from this assessment, you can easily identify complex words and change them accordingly. We’ll highlight them for you so you don’t have to spend time looking.
  • Paragraph length: Some people tend to use extremely long paragraphs. Doing so makes your text look daunting as it becomes just one big blob of text. Break it up, use shorter paragraphs and don’t forget to give your core sentences some thought.
  • Subheading distribution: Similarly to long paragraphs, texts without subheadings are difficult to scan, which makes them rather daunting. So, we check if you use enough subheadings to guide your readers through the text and help them find what they’re looking for.
  • Sentence length: Sentence length is one of the core aspects that can make a text hard to read. If most of your sentences are too long – over 20 words – people lose track of your point. Readers often have to jump back a few words to find out what you mean. This is very tiring and inefficient. Try to keep the number of words in a sentence in check. Shorten your sentences. Aim for easy understanding, not a complex literary masterpiece.
  • Passive voice: Using a lot of passive voice in your text makes it appear distant, and your message will be less clear. Your sentences become wordy and difficult because the sentence structure is harder to understand. Whenever you use the passive voice, always consider whether a better, active alternative is available.
  • Transition words: Do you use transition words like ‘most importantly’, ‘because’, ‘therefore’, or ‘besides that’ to tie your text together? Using these words improves the flow of your article as they provide hints to the reader about what is coming next.
  • Sentence beginnings (doesn’t apply for Product pages): Do any of your consecutive sentences start with the same word? This might feel repetitive to your reader, and that can be annoying. Always keep your sentences varied, so your article is readable and free of obstacles. Unless you want to prove something or use it as a writing style, of course.
  • Paragraph length: Some people tend to use extremely long paragraphs. Doing so makes your text look daunting as it becomes just one big blob of text. Break it up, use shorter paragraphs and don’t forget to give your core sentences some thought.
  • Subheading distribution: Similarly to long paragraphs, texts without subheadings are difficult to scan, which makes them rather daunting. So, we check if you use enough subheadings to guide your readers through the text and help them find what they’re looking for.
  • Sentence length: Sentence length is one of the core aspects that can make a text hard to read. If most of your sentences are too long – over 20 words – people lose track of your point. Readers often have to jump back a few words to find out what you mean. This is very tiring and inefficient. Try to keep the number of words in a sentence in check. Shorten your sentences. Aim for easy understanding, not a complex literary masterpiece.
  • Passive voice: Using a lot of passive voice in your text makes it appear distant, and your message will be less clear. Your sentences become wordy and difficult because the sentence structure is harder to understand. Whenever you use the passive voice, always consider whether a better, active alternative is available.
  • Lists (Product pages only): Using lists in your product pages enable your customers to scan the content on the page, and help highlight the benefits and features of your product. Try to include at least one list (ordered or unordered) in your product description.

Supported languages

The readability analysis is available in many languages. Check out the languages Yoast SEO supports for an overview. We’re continually working on adding new languages.

How to use the readability analysis in Yoast SEO

The readability analysis

You can find the readability analysis in your Yoast sidebar in WordPress and Shopify. In WordPress, you can also find the readability checks in the Yoast SEO meta box underneath the post or page you edit.

It’s very easy to use the analysis to improve your content. You can start writing the article you want to write. The readability score is calculated in real-time, so you can look at it while you write. However, if you want to stay focused, you can also choose not to look at the score while writing your first draft. That way, you can write without being distracted and make the final tweaks afterward.

The readability score helps you by giving you a green, orange, or red traffic light per check. If you get orange or red traffic lights, click on the eye icon to determine where improvements can be made. Easy peasy!

Everyone has their own writing and editing process, and this way isn’t necessarily how you should use it. You have to find out what works for you gradually. Practice makes perfect!

It’s good to note that the word complexity assessment is a Premium feature. If you’re using the free version of Yoast SEO, you’ll see this feature being greyed out. Upgrade to Yoast SEO Premium now to unlock this feature!

The readability analysis in the Yoast SEO for WordPress metabox

Should all traffic lights be green?

We often get this question: no, not every traffic light has to be green. What you should aim for, though, is a green, happy traffic light overall — the one in the tab that reads “Readability”. An orange traffic light for one of the checks, like in the screenshot above, is fine. Your article will still be able to rank even if it doesn’t pass all of the tests. This is merely an indication, not a necessity.

We want everyone to be able to read and understand content, but we also know that there are industries where the language used is different from what most people would use. That’s perfectly fine. Find out what works for you. Need help? Please read our ultimate guide to SEO copywriting.

Try it out!

The readability analysis and content analysis of Yoast SEO help you write excellent, SEO-proof articles and product pages that are easy for anyone to grasp. In doing so, you ensure that every piece of content you write is ready to start ranking in search engines while staying enjoyable for readers. Don’t have Yoast SEO yet? Do you want to use our Premium plugins’ excellent additional features? Find out about all the benefits of Yoast SEO for WordPress and Yoast SEO for Shopify!

Read more: How to use Yoast SEO’s content analysis tool »



Edwin Toonen

Edwin is a strategic content specialist. Before joining Yoast, he spent years honing his skill at The Netherlands’ leading web design magazine.

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Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
Dec 28 2023
What is a keyword strategy?

To get traffic, you need people willing to visit your site. To get them to visit your site, you need to know what they are looking for, which words they use, and what type of content would fit their intent best. In short, you need a keyword strategy. In this SEO Basics article, we’ll take a brief look at what keyword strategy is and how it goes hand in hand with keyword research.

What is keyword strategy?

You’ve probably gotten the advice to conduct a keyword research to find out what terms you should use. Which is good advice, but it isn’t a keyword strategy. That comes after your research.

A keyword strategy is about how you want to target those keywords, now and in the future. It contains every decision you take based upon your findings in your keyword research project, whether it’s about the content you’re planning to write or how you’re going to track the results in Analytics.

Read our ultimate guide to keyword research for SEO for an all-encompassing overview of all things keyword research. In addition, we have online training on keyword research as well.

A keyword strategy forms when looking at yourself and your environment

You need to have plenty of insights if you want to make informed decisions about your keyword strategy. Start by thoroughly investigating yourself, your product, and your competitors.

Look at yourself

A good keyword strategy starts with asking yourself the following questions:

  • What is your business doing, and why?
  • What are your goals?
  • What’s your uniqueness in this world?
  • What is the message you want to send?
  • How’s your branding?
  • Why would anyone want to visit your site?

Better insights lead to a better understanding of what you want to achieve. You’ll safe yourself time, and make sure you’re not focusing on the wrong things.

Look at search intent

After you’ve fleshed out your uniqueness, it’s time to look at search intent. Search intent is the why behind people’s search and click to your site.

So, ask yourself: Do you know your audience? Are people only looking for information on your site, or are they willing to buy stuff as well? And are there ways for you to target specific search intents with focused content, so you can influence this?

Look at the words your audience uses

By doing keyword research, you should get great insight into the words people use to find what they are looking for. Next, make sure the content you write (and that your audience is interested in) fits with your users’ search intent and the language they use.

Look at the competition

Don’t forget to take a good look at your competitors! What are they doing? How well are they ranking for terms you’d like to target? What kind of content do they have? Are there ways for you to improve on that? Have you thought about looking at the long tail?

Look at the search engines

Of course, while looking at your competitors, you’ll often use search engines to see how they are doing. Doing these types of searches can give you great insights into the strategy of your competitors. It also gives you a very good feel of what happens when you type in your main focus keyphrase. What’s the on-screen real estate like? Are there featured snippets you could target? Are there other types of rich results? Is there a local pack?

In some markets, if you track developments over time, you might see that search engines are increasingly giving answers that lead to no-click searches. Always keep an eye on search engines, but don’t go obsessing about every little algorithm update.

Look at data

Of course, analyzing data plays a big role in the success of your keyword strategy. Both before and after, Google Analytics provides invaluable insights into the performance of your site. Even Google Search Console can give you a lot of stuff to think about and opportunities to pursue!

How are you targeting your keywords?

Checking your analytics regularly to keep track of your SEO performance is incredibly important. But you can’t have performance without content that’s specifically tailored to the needs and goals of your strategy.

If you’ve ran through all the steps and did a thorough keyword research, you should have an idea of what you should target and how you should do that. You can use these insights to create the content you need to make a success of your strategy. There’s a lot you can do:

  • Make landing pages
  • Create specific types of content for different search intents
  • Maybe make specific content to get featured snippets
  • Perhaps voice search is something that might fit your strategy?
  • Or apps?
  • Video?
  • Something else entirely?

Many roads lead to Rome, but some roads are more difficult than others. You could say that the highway is the fastest way to Rome, but you might run into a traffic jam because everyone wants to take that route. Sometimes, it’s better to take the rarely traveled mountain pass — the results might wow you!

Update your keyword strategy

Through the years (sometimes even months!), there’s a lot that can happen and change in the online world. It might be that your users’ language changed, or that a new competitor is gobbling up market share. Your keyword strategy should take that into account. So, regularly re-evaluate your keyword strategy, and adjust where necessary!



Edwin Toonen

Edwin is a strategic content specialist. Before joining Yoast, he spent years honing his skill at The Netherlands’ leading web design magazine.

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Dec 28 2023
Make a great website menu for your users and SEO

Website menus are one of those things you take for granted — until you encounter a really bad one. In the ideal scenario, users get an instant overview of what a site has to offer, and they can reach all the important stuff with just one or two clicks. In the worst case, users end up frustrated and unable to find what they’re looking for. This post will walk you through the basics of menu design and help you understand which options will work best for your site.

Your website’s menu is important because it helps users navigate your site. Sure, sometimes a user will arrive on the page they were looking for straight from Google. But usually, your visitors will want to look at various pages on your site. Or they land on your homepage and will need to navigate to the right page from there. That’s why your menu should be available on every page, and ideally, you would even have a sticky menu. Meaning that it scrolls down with the content to make sure it’s always in view. That way it doesn’t matter where your users are: they’ll always be able to find what they need.

Besides the essential navigation function of a menu, it’s also a neat way of letting users know what your site has to offer. You can think of it like a banner on each page, saying “This is what we do”. Make the most of that opportunity!

A great site menu should include links to the most important parts of your website. So it’s up to you to figure out what to put in it. But whatever content you decide to include, it’s essential to keep your menu usable.

One of the worst things you can do is overload your menu with too many links. This will make it look cluttered, and users will need to work hard to find what they need. Depending on your choice of menu design, some of the links could end up inaccessible if you have too many. For instance, if you’re using a drop-down menu, users might struggle to access links that appear off-screen.

Do: be selective or use alternative navigation options

The best option is to be selective about what you include in your menu, but for larger or more complex sites this won’t be possible. Luckily, there are lots of other solutions to a crowded menu. One solution is to create hub pages or categories, and add these to your menu instead. Then users can navigate to the relevant category or hub, and find their way to more specific content from there.

A second solution is to add sub-menus; these are additional menu options which only appear when the user hovers or clicks on a particular menu area. Sub-menus can be handy, but they can also become cluttered and difficult to use. So if you do use sub-menus, do so in moderation.

The third option is to include a search bar as part of your navigation menu. That way, if a user can’t see what they’re looking for in your menu, they can search your site for what they need. A search bar is a great feature to include, whether your menu is too cluttered or not. But do take some time to configure your search function well, because otherwise it won’t really help.

Tip: Yoast SEO Premium includes an Algolia integration you can use to improve your site search results. Using it will help push your most important content to the top of the results. Give it a go!

It’s easy to forget about mobile users when you’re using a desktop computer to build your website. But that’s the last thing you want to do, especially when it comes to your site menu design. A menu that looks good and works well on desktop might be completely unusable on a phone or tablet. Now that more and more people are using mobile devices to go online, it’s really important to consider menu design for both desktop and mobile.

There are two options for creating a menu that works on both desktop and mobile. You could add a responsive menu with a layout that adapts to the screen size being used. Alternatively, you can create a specific menu for the mobile version of your site. Whichever solution you choose, test it out on a few different screen sizes to make sure the end result is user-friendly.

There are loads of different menu styles to choose from. Hamburger menus, drop-down menus, and sidebar menus are a few well-known examples. There are also some very abstract and creative menus out there. However, the way that you implement these styles has a big impact on the overall impression and usability.

Here are some of the more standard options:

If you have a simple website and only one or two online goals, it makes sense to opt for a minimalist menu design. For example, Behance is a ‘network for showcasing and discovering creative work’, so it doesn’t need a complicated menu. They only include 3 menu options: ‘Discover’, ‘Livestreams’, and ‘Jobs’. This lets the user focus on the search field and the creative works being displayed instead.

Some sites use a more minimalist menu style to cater to their mobile users. A hamburger menu (which looks like this: ☰) is a popular minimalist choice for mobile sites as it takes up a very small amount of screen space. For instance, on the mobile version of Joolz.com there are three simple icons to help users navigate: search, shopping cart, and a hamburger menu. Clicking on the hamburger menu expands it to show a list of their product categories. Solutions like this work really well on mobile devices.

An image of a minimalist style site menu on Joolz.com

Classic menus are probably the simplest to work with. These focus on selecting the main categories or areas of the site and use buttons with text labels to guide users to the right place. A horizontal navigation bar is the most common type of classic menu. Sometimes menus like this have a few drop-down options below the main menu items, too. WordPress.org uses a classic menu design on its desktop site. Two of the menu items have a drop-down button to show more options: ‘Support’ and ‘Get Involved’.

An image of a classic style menu on wordpress.org

Another classic menu style is the sidebar. You can see this kind of menu in action on Google Maps. Usually, these kinds of menus can be opened using a hamburger menu button and closed again using the ×-button. This is a great way to offer full-screen content, as the menu is hidden most of the time.

An image showing the expanded sidebar menu in Google Maps

Mega menus are a kind of drop-down menu, but instead of having a single column of links under each main menu item, there is space for multiple columns. These menus are popular with larger and more complex sites, as they offer space for many more links than other menu styles. So in theory, you can be less picky about which links to include. Right?

Well actually, this supposed benefit can be the downfall of mega menus. Even though all the links can fit in there, including too much content in your menu can be overwhelming for users. That being said, if you limit yourself to a moderate amount of menu links, a mega menu can be a great option for your site.

On asana.com you can see they’re using a mega menu with a manageable number of links below each main menu item:

An image of the mega menu on asana.com

An example of a very full mega menu can be found on the World Food Program desktop site. In this case, the drop-down menu shows a list of countries, so users will still be able to navigate this menu quite easily. But just imagine if all these links were about different topics. Then users would struggle to find what they need, as if they were rummaging around in a messy drawer.

An image showing a very full mega menu on the World Food Program website

Other navigation options

You can do a lot with your site menu, but it’s not the only navigation option. Many sites add extra navigation links to their site header or footer. You’ll often see options to log in or change the site language in these spaces. However, if you do choose to add footer links you must disable infinite scrolling, or your users will never be able to reach the footer.

Another possibility is to create a sitemap page that users can access. This shows a structured list of all your site’s pages. These are becoming less popular than they once were, but they can still be a powerful tool for site navigation.

Does your site menu influence SEO? Sure it does! You’re unlikely to get a lot of internal linking benefit from adding items to your menu. But there are other ways your menu can benefit your SEO, and that benefit has to do with how users experience your site.

If users can’t find what they’re looking for, they’re likely to leave more quickly and not come back to your site again. Google can pick up on those kinds of signals. So a great menu can help your SEO, albeit in an indirect way.

As a general rule, it’s a good idea to keep your menu as simple as possible. Especially for smaller sites and those just starting up, a classic or minimalist-style menu should work great for you. If you have an enormous site you’ll need to think harder about what your users need to see, and how best to display that content.

Once you have a design you’re happy with, it won’t hurt to ask a few people to try it out and give you their feedback. If you’re really serious about making your site menu usable, you could carry out task-based user testing. Either way, make sure your website menu works for your users and provides them with a great experience!

Read more: Holistic SEO: Improve every aspect of your website »



Camille Cunningham

Camille is a content specialist at Yoast. As part of the Search team, she enjoys creating content that helps you master SEO.

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Dec 14 2023
Copywriting for mobile

We’re in the smartphone era, which means a large part of your audience will use your site via mobile. So, what does this mean? Do you need to write differently if you’re copywriting for a ‘mobile’ audience? In this post, we’ll share some useful tips on how to write awesome texts that are great for both desktops and mobile devices.

Why is copywriting for mobile different?

Even with responsive website designs, reading on a mobile device is still different from reading on a desktop. Since phone screens are smaller, text will appear longer because it takes up more space, and people have to scroll to read everything (which will make it feel longer to read).

What’s more, lots of people use their mobile device ‘on the go’, while also doing other things. This means their attention span and concentration are limited. They’re easily distracted, so you want to grab their attention with short and concise content when you’re copywriting for mobile.

Tip 1: Always focus on your audience

While it’s good to focus on the question ‘how can I write good texts for smartphone users’, you shouldn’t lose track of the most important question: ‘what does my audience like?’ Because phones won’t read your content. But your audience will! That’s why it’s good to keep an eye on your audience’s interests, and write about those topics.

Tip 2: Make your fonts large enough

Font size is important for your mobile UX. You want your texts to be readable without folks having to squint or pinch and zoom; especially your base font – your paragraph font – should be readable. So don’t use your desktop font size on your mobile site. At least, not without checking how it looks on mobile first. And while you’re at it, check it for tablets too.

How many font sizes should you use?

Be aware that your mobile site will look messy when you use more than three font sizes. The size differences will be much more visible. That’s why we advise limiting the number to two, maybe three, sizes.

Read more: 10 ways to improve mobile UX »

Tip 3: Write short sentences

Don’t use too many long sentences. As we’ve said before, people who search on their phone want fast and short answers. To illustrate, a sentence of 25 words takes up two lines on an average desktop screen. But on a phone screen, those 25 words will be four lines. That’s twice as long!

Not to mention, long sentences make reading your text much more difficult. This is true for desktop as well, but it’s even more important when you write for a mobile audience. So, try to address your audience’s specific pain points with your copy and quickly offer a solution.

Tip 4: Add subheadings

Mobile users often skim texts. So, if you want your content to be easy to read, break it up with informative subheadings. These subheadings will guide your readers through your text, making your message much easier to digest. They’re almost like road signs, guiding your users to the good stuff.

Tip 5: Check your white space

Don’t be afraid to let your words breathe. Since phones have smaller screens, you don’t want your text to look cramped. By giving your content some room, it will be easier to read. Plus, if you have sufficient white space between sentences, people will be able to easily tap on clickable elements with their finger.

If you’re unsure how much white space is enough, you should check on multiple devices how it looks. And feel free to ask other people what they think!

Tip 6: Keep an eye on text-structure

If your text is well structured, people will more easily understand the main message of your post. If it’s not, people might get lost and tune out. So the structure of your text should be flawless.

A well-structured text has two things:

  1. Paragraphs that follow each other in a logical order.
  2. Sentences that are connected to each other, usually by transition words. These words will help people understand the meaning of your text.

Remember, copywriting for mobile is all about writing texts that are easy to read. So, pay attention to your text structure and make sure it makes sense.

Keep reading: 10 copywriting tips – from experts to experts »

Tip 7: Don’t be afraid to use images or videos

With shorts and reels and all types of short-form video trending right now, you’d be a fool not to use some type of multimedia on your mobile site. So, use high-quality visuals that underline or amplify the main message of your text. And mind the file size! Nobody likes a slow-loading website.

And remember: using images or videos isn’t just about making your site look good. You want them to enhance your user’s experience.

Short and sweet

If you want to use videos on your pages or posts, keep in mind that they need to be short! Mobile users are like speed daters, they want to know who and what and why fast. A short video will keep them hooked and on your site.

And of course, don’t forget to add captions. People who search on their phone are usually outside or on public transport, so they can’t turn on their volume. By using captions, you’ll ensure that people will be able to watch your video.

Conclusion: readability is of the utmost importance on mobile

Copywriting for mobile is not that different from writing for a desktop. In both cases, you need to write for a real audience. However, ‘mobile’ texts demand an even better readability than ‘desktop’ texts, because reading from a mobile screen is more challenging than from a desktop. But if you make sure your readability is top-notch, your texts will have loads of readers, both on mobile devices and desktops.

Read on: Mobile SEO: the ultimate guide »



Cindy Paul

Cindy is a content manager at Yoast. She writes and optimizes blog posts, and enjoys writing content that will help people create better content for their site and users.

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Nov 22 2023
Integrating your video strategy with your blog strategy 

While we live in a video world, blogs aren’t going anywhere. As Cindy points out in her post about the future of blogging in a video-obsessed world, there’s still space for blogs and written content in a world dominated by short-form videos. As TV hasn’t precipitated the demise of books or newspapers, there is room for written and video content in web marketing. Let’s find out how to integrate your video and blog strategies.

A different experience

The core distinction between video and online writing is consumer experience. Written content requires active participation from the reader. They must determine which sections to focus on and at what pace to take the information.

Video is a more passive form of consumption, where the creator determines the running time and controls the experience. You can’t skim-read a video. It also plays across conceptual, visual, and aural faculties, whereas text only connects with us on a conceptual level.

In today’s mixed-media world, the best use of blogs and videos is an integrated strategy. In such a strategy, each form influences the other and works together.

There are a few ways you can think about getting started.

Turn your blog posts into videos

Certain posts are ideal to convert into videos, giving them extra life beyond your blog. You can post these on YouTube and social media. In addition, you can use these to augment and improve the quality of your blog posts.

The blog posts that tend to work best as videos are those with a strong individual editorial perspective. We know these as “op-ed” type content in traditional journalistic language.

When the post is written with the voice and expertise of an individual, hearing from that individual on camera helps to add authenticity and credibility to the post itself. It ensures the core message can be distributed across social media more effectively.

The simplest way to do this is to plan for a talking head video after writing the post – either as a monologue or an interview.

Firstly, reverse engineer your article to determine the theme (core message). Find the points that help explore and explain the theme.

Write these down, and then sit in front of a camera. Talk your way through them, or structure a more formal interview where an interviewer asks questions about each point to get you (or the writer) going.

These videos can then be edited to include branded visual elements, text overlays, and cropped for the optimized formatting of different platforms.

Generally, it’s better to shoot 16×9 horizontally, with the talent’s face in the center of the frame. From there, crop these to create vertical videos for TikTok and Instagram.

Turn your videos into blog posts

Do you have a YouTube channel that’s driving a lot of views? Do you seem to get a lot of engagement with your video posts on LinkedIn? Think about how those videos might be able to be adapted to a written form.

Sometimes, you might be creating a quick video based on an idea, and lo and behold, it seems to resonate with your audience or pick up a lot of views from a YouTube search.

Perhaps it’s then worth thinking about whether there’s a blog-style execution of this idea that would work. Examples of this might be a list of step-by-step instructions for a tutorial idea or several slides and images with supporting text explaining what they show.

A simple way to get going here is to pull out the transcription of the video. Once you have that, reformat it into plain text, and then use this as a basis to edit. Tools like Descript are great for pulling the transcription from any video, and you can then export it to Word or Google Docs.

If your video is rambling or unstructured, you can use ChatGPT or another LLM AI to summarise the core points in more of an article form.

Remember that the nature of media types on the web is much more fluid than ever. Blog posts can encompass video embeds, images, audio, interactive elements, and more.

Consider instances where a mixed-media approach may be preferable to just pure text. Find out where the different media types can support one another. Recipes, for example, are often great when they include lists of ingredients, a summary of the method, some supporting copy, an image of how the final product is supposed to look, and a video demo.

So, as you plan out a content calendar, consider before drafting the possibility of video as part of any posts you’re writing, and bake that into the creative process. Even if you don’t have production resources to do more than a simple talking head video, it can help with EEAT factors. You can demonstrate authenticity and use the personal connection offered by video to build trust.

Don’t forget to implement Video SEO

One of the great benefits of adding video to your blog posts is that these pages can rank in video search and Google organic search. 

By implementing Video SEO — which Yoast Video SEO for WordPress automates — your blog posts can appear in the “videos” tab in Google and sometimes as video results with a rich snippet in universal web search.

This means you can use video to improve user experience and drive more traffic to your blog!

Phil Nottingham

Phil Nottingham is a marketing strategist who specialises in video SEO and brand strategy and search engine optimization.

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Nov 21 2023
What is Google’s Knowledge Graph?

If you search for a specific company, you’ll likely see a big block of information on the right (sometimes the top) of your screen. That’s Google’s Knowledge Graph. This block – also known as the Knowledge Graph Card or Panel – contains relevant, context-specific information regarding your search, powered by the Knowledge Graph.

If you search for a specific company, the Knowledge Graph will show an almost complete profile, depending on how well they did their SEO work. Searching for a recently released movie will show posters, reviews and screening times for your local cinema. As you see, the graph is a powerful and fascinating tool. But what can you do to get your information in the Knowledge Graph?

It’s Google’s way of connecting information

Google’s core business is providing people with a correct answer to all their questions. To do that, it doesn’t just present the result that closest matches a search term, but it also makes broader connections between data. Google, therefore, collects and analyzes massive amounts of data on people, places, things and facts, and develops ways to present the findings in an accessible way. These are often rich results, like featured snippets, images carrousels or the famous Knowledge Panel mentioned in the intro of this text.

The Knowledge Graph and its panel

This is where it might get confusing: many people mix up the Knowledge Graph and the panel you see on the right-hand side of your screen. The Knowledge Graph is the engine that powers the panel that’s officially called the Knowledge Graph Card or Panel. In this card, you’ll find the most visible result of the work that the graph does. When there’s enough data about a subject, the card will be filled with all kinds of relevant facts, images, and related searches.

Check out Albert Einstein’s card in the screenshot below, and you’ll see how much information it provides.

This Knowledge Graph at the top and right side gives you all the facts about Albert Einstein

Read more: Elements of the Google search results page »

Anatomy of the Knowledge Graph

When Google released the Knowledge Graph in 2012, they made an excellent introductory video. This explains in easy-to-understand language how the graph works, and how it influences the results you get when you search for a specific term. Check out the video! It’s still as relevant today as it was then:

Examples of search results

In recent years, content presented by the Knowledge Graph has become much more interactive. Google likes to experiment with the graph, what it shows and how it’s presented. At first, it featured only static content, like images, social media profiles, and general information about the search. Today, it is continually expanding in possibilities. If you search for a movie, you can directly book tickets to see it at your local cinema. Search for a local store, and you know exactly when the busiest times are. And on mobile, the rich results are even richer!

Let’s look at some examples of Knowledge Graph listings.

Nutritional information:

Movies:

Places:

List sliders:

How do you get your content into the Knowledge Graph?

First, you need to become an authority on your subject. Find out what people search for by doing keyword research, write excellent content and make sure your site is fully optimized and mobile-friendly.

Next, you should use structured data to mark up important elements of your site to make it easier for Google to understand what it’s all about. After all, structured data in the form of Schema.org is becoming increasingly important! And finally, you should register your site with Google Search Console and My Business.

If you are a well-known person or if you own a particular company, you can claim your Knowledge Panel. After verifying, you can edit the contents of the panel to a certain extent.

Yoast SEO and the Knowledge Graph

Do you need help getting your (business) information in the Knowledge Graph? Fear no more, because Yoast SEO can help! Our Yoast SEO plugin for WordPress and Yoast SEO app for Shopify both output a complete Schema graph for your site, ready for search engines to use.

Just by setting up Yoast SEO — optionally supported by Local SEO in WordPress — and filling out the information on your site, you automatically enable the data that Google needs to fill the Knowledge Graph. After that, you can use regular SEO tactics and structured data to fill in the missing pieces. Keep in mind, though, that it’s Google that determines what it adds to its Knowledge Graph.

Conclusion

The Knowledge Graph is an important part of the search experience in Google. It powers many of the innovative new ways data shows up in the search engine. Getting your information in there is of the essence, especially if you have a business. And don’t forget to make sure that your business details are correct, you sign up for Google My Business and add everything you possibly can. Many other parts of the Knowledge Graph are generated from structured data, like reviews, movie information, events, so be sure to mark up your data in any which way you can.

Keep reading: Structured data: the ultimate guide »



Edwin Toonen

Edwin is a strategic content specialist. Before joining Yoast, he spent years honing his skill at The Netherlands’ leading web design magazine.

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Nov 15 2023
Content planning for a (growing) blog: 6 easy-to-use tips

Maintaining a blog is about more than just writing a bunch of blog posts. You should develop a strategy and plan your content – especially if you’re writing with multiple authors. You should also interact with your audience and respond to their comments. In this post, I’ll explain the importance of content planning and give some practical tips on how to plan your blog posts – effortlessly!

A blog post planning that works

If your blog and audience are growing and you’re getting more serious about blogging, you should make a plan for your content. This might seem unnecessary at first, but it will make your life so much easier! Especially if you work with guest bloggers or multiple authors who write about different topics.

But how do you create a proper plan? Well, we’ve got six important pointers for you:

Want to read more about the technical side of a growing blog? Then read our article on how to manage the technical SEO of a growing blog. Or struggling with your blogs structure? Read how to keep the structure of your growing blog under control!

1. Create an editorial calendar

An editorial calendar is essential if you’re working with multiple authors and you’re posting frequently. So, what is an editorial calendar? It’s a calendar in which you plot all the posts that you’re going to write the upcoming weeks, months, or even year!

This could just be an Excel sheet, but it’s easier to use an editorial plugin or a service with a drag-and-drop calendar. Think Trello, MeisterTask or Monday. In this calendar, you can easily assign posts to authors and editors, and (if you like) use labels for categorization.

2. Sit down and brainstorm

If you want to fill your editorial calendar, you could start with a brainstorm session. Invite all your blog authors, and sit together. Ask everyone what their ideas are and which posts they would like to write in the near future. Of course, you should use your keyword research as a basis.

While you’re brainstorming, make a list of everyone’s ideas and wishes, then plot them out on the editorial calendar. Make sure your authors finish their blog posts a few days before the publish date so you can proofread and edit if needed. Plus, you can use that time to find or create accompanying illustrations or photos.

3. Decide on frequency

You should blog regularly. Still, it’s hard to give exact numbers. For most company blogs, one daily post is fine and doable. For a personal blog, however, this probably isn’t be feasible. Try to establish some kind of frequency and stick to it. Your readers will appreciate a reliable schedule.

Once you know you can commit to your chosen schedule, make sure to communicate it to your audience, so they know what they can expect!

4. Add variation

If you often write about similar topics – beware of keyword cannibalization though – make sure to vary a little. Don’t post articles about nearly identical topics one after another. Of course, you can still write blog series, but try to vary between subjects as much as possible.

You could also make variations in the form of your content. A video post, for example, spices things up!

5. Use news and current events

When planning your content, you should take a look at your calendar as well! Are there any major events coming up that are worth mentioning in your blog post? Or should you write a few seasonal posts? Make sure to mix these ‘current-events posts’ with other posts you have lined up.

6. Use a style guide

Creating a style guide for your blog is a great way to make sure everyone writes and spells in the same way. Of course, we should all write in a grammatically correct way, but the use of capitals and brand names could differ. As all authors write for the same blog, it will create more unity if everyone spells the important words in the same way.

In the style guide, you could also agree on the length of your posts, the use of paragraphs and headings, and the use of images. It should be a document in which you write down all the things that have to be consistent in your posts. And don’t forget to add some pointers for SEO copywriting as well!

If you work with an occasional guest blogger, a style guide could be a great document to help them write a post that fits the style of your blog as well.

Content planning will help you grow!

A growing blog will ask for more content planning, especially if you’re working with multiple authors. It’s important to agree on style, the topics you want to write about, and the number of blog posts you want to publish. And don’t forget to evaluate your content strategy from time to time. As long as authors keep on working and talking together, a blog with multiple authors can be a great success and make your site grow even further!

Read more: Blogging: the ultimate guide »



Cindy Paul

Cindy is a content manager at Yoast. She writes and optimizes blog posts, and enjoys writing content that will help people create better content for their site and users.

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