How to Check Google Indexing of a WordPress Website

SEO

Ensuring that search engines can access your website and that the information appears correctly in their search results is a crucial aspect of search engine optimization.

Following are the steps to perform Google SEO of a WordPress website

1. Improve Google Indexing

Follow the previous post How to Improve Google Indexing of a WordPress Website.

2. Add image descriptions in WordPress

To help improve SEO for your WordPress site, follow these steps to add or edit image descriptions.

  1. Visit your website, right-click on your home page, and click View Page Source.
  2. Search for an image tag (<img>).
  3. Within the <img> tag, look for the “alt” attribute and confirm that it describes the image. For example, an image tag for a picture of a sunset might be alt=”sunset”, and the tag would look like this: <img src=”sunset.jpg” alt=”sunset”>
  4. If there are any images that do not have values in the alt attribute:
    1. In your admin menu choose Media.
    2. Click on the image that needs a description to edit it.
    3. Add the description to the alt field.
    4. Repeat steps for any additional images that need descriptions.

3. Allow search engine indexing in WordPress

To help improve SEO ranking, follow these steps to make sure your WordPress site allows search engine indexing.

  1. Log into WordPress.
  2. Click Settings > Reading.
  3. Make sure Discourage search engines from indexing this site is not selected.

4. Allow indexing of all pages in WordPress

Canonicalization refers to the way your URL is utilized. A single page may be accessible through varying URLs (for example, https://example.com and https://www.example.com), which may display identical content but lead to different web addresses. This inconsistency can result in search engines incorrectly indexing your website.

To ensure that all pages of your WordPress site can be indexed correctly to enhance SEO rankings, you can follow these steps. Numerous third-party tools exist to conduct this assessment. This guide will detail how to use the URL Canonicalization test offered by SeoSiteCheckup.com. if you opt for an alternative tool, make sure to consult its documentation.

  1. Navigate to the URL Canonicalization Test tool.
  2. Enter your domain into the Website URL field.
  3. Click Checkup!
  4. Review the results.
    • If your URLs resolve to the same URL, no further steps are required.
    • If there is a conflict, you may need to perform a Find and Replace in your database to correct the problem.

5. Check the length of WordPress site title

To enhance your website’s SEO, adhere to these guidelines to ensure your site title has an ideal length. Google search results usually display the initial 50-60 characters of your title tag (approximately 600 pixels wide). Additionally, your title should feature keywords that users are likely to search for.

  1. Visit your website, right-click on your home page, and click View Page Source.
  2. Copy the text between the Title tags (<title>).
  3. Visit this page at Moz.com.
  4. Paste the text you copied into the Title tag preview tool and click Check
  5. Make sure text does not get cut off in the preview. If text is cut off in the preview, shorten the title as needed.

6. Create a Sitemap in WordPress

Follow the video article How to Create a Sitemap in WordPress.

7. Create page descriptions in WordPress

You can follow these steps to ensure your WordPress site includes page descriptions to enhance SEO performance.

Various plugins are available for this purpose; we will discuss how to install the Yoast SEO plugin. If you opt for a different plugin, make sure you select one that is regularly updated.

  1. Log into WordPress.
  2. Install & Activate a plugin in WordPress.
  3. Edit each page you want to have a description and use the Yoast SEO panel on those pages to add a description.
  4. It is advisable to at least complete this step for your home page.

8. Check if Google is blocking my website

You can follow these steps to ensure that your website remains off Google’s blacklist. Being on the blacklist will impact your SEO ranking. For additional details, visit safebrowsing.google.com.

  1. Visit the Google Transparency Report.
  2. Enter your website URL into the Check site status search field.
  3. Submit your search to view the report.

If it indicates that there is no harmful content, Google is allowing access to your website, and no additional steps need to be taken.

Here are several methods to optimize the SEO of a WordPress site.

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