By describing the strategic use of Wordpress blogs for search marketing for a customer, I defined a process I am calling SEO-Aware Wordpress Publishing.

You start with Wordpress, configured according to SEO best practices, and then … you don’t start publishing, but rather you get a little SEO training. Training in SEO copywriting, yes, but also beyond just SEO copywriting. I could have called it SEO copywriting on Wordpress, because we make strategic use of page slugs/permalinks, H tags, outlinks, and excerpts, and the various SEO plugins for Wordpress as they support our publishing mission (where at least one outcome metric is search marketing).

Since I know that YOU know what I am talking about, I am inviting you to continue this conversation on your own SEO blog. Below I will present three SEO tips for Wordpress Publishing that I would include in that initial SEO training session for an in-house copywriter/author responsible for publishing on the platform. The goal is to help them become SEO Aware, to reduce the amount of SEO involvement needed on the blog. If you have other tips you would recommend, why not publish them on your blog as a follow on? If I see the potential, I’ll collate the best tips into a larger article with credit given back, of course.

When publishing with the SEO’d Wordpress blog, consider these tips for SEO-aware blogging:

• write the excerpt first, from a perspective of “here I am telling the desk editor what this blog post is about and why it is important from her desk’s perspective“. You can always go back and edit it again later, but writing it first makes sure it gets something in it. Drafting the excerpt will also probably help you forumulate your post (especially the attitude of your post, and the closure it needs).

• The post slug or permalink defaults to the standard “null permalink” provided. This ensures your drafts are saved in a safe location until they are ready for publication. But since we craft permalinks like we craft headlines and titles (after the post is written), consider making the first line of your post “Permalink: ” so it remains painfully obvious that we need to create a permalink before approving the post for publication.

• Consider hiding buried treasure messages in the “title” field of embedded links. When your reader hovers over the anchor text, they will appreciate the way the hover tip gives them additional, off line communication about the link. The message can also can help them to store a concept in short-term memory, giving them confidence to not click away just yet, but rather stay and finish reading your prose. For example, Michael Gray made a video about SEO for Wordpress

• If you didn’t just hover of that link to Michael’s blog and see the buried treasure message, do it now.

Good job! I hope you SEO consultants recognize the potential value in continuing this conversation with 3 of your own tips published on your own SEO blog.

From SEOHumor.com, translation courtesy of Google:

Yesterday in Pervoprestolnoy on art. Domodedovskaya metro after drinking for a couple of FlyAway juice, the body clearly alluded to the need to go in the toilet. Upon noticing the corresponding index on the wall in the form of tablets, brain machine has issued the full phrase is “a direct reference to the text toilet.” Then, laughing long, discussing with Andre, looked like in the real world redirecting similar link.

Another great domain name idea that didn’t turn out quite as splendid as imagined?

It’s still a “Google Dance” if you watch the datacenters, and confirm the update process with additional evidence such as new sites not getting included for a few to several days prior, despite indexing, as if the queue was backing up so the update could propagate. Also watch the international traffic referrals. They provide early clues.

After all these years it seems Matt has accomplished his coup d’état of the update naming process. This one’s Dewey, whether Matt intended to name it or not. It’s still underway… and might be the result of infrastructure changes or software changes, but things they are a shiftin’.

If you’re waiting on a new site to appear and rank, or have been enjoying the spoils of a questionably-deserved #1 ranking for a long time, best of luck to you.

Addendum: I’ve seen some reference to the Dewey / Truman race in the webmaster forums. Please, if you’re going to read into Matt’s choice of name for this “Google Wierdness”, remember Matt studied Library Science. John Dewey comes to mind… Dewey Decimal system, Instrumentalism, etc.