
In this lesson, we’ll explain what search engines like Google do and how they work. How does Google crawl websites to show in their search results?
The search results consist of different elements, which we discuss in this lesson.
We’ll discuss what Search Engine Optimization (SEO) actually entails, and what it means to work on your SEO. Also: what you shouldn’t do!
At Yoast we believe in holistic SEO. In this lesson, we’ll explain what that means to us and why we think it’ll help you.
Keyword research is in indispensable part of your SEO strategy. But what are keywords? And why are they important?
In this lesson, we’ll explain what keyword research entails and how you can do it yourself.
Having high-quality content on your website is very important. Here’s why!
To create high-quality content, you need to know what the essential elements of great content are. We’ll discuss that in this lesson.
It’s great to get some help while you’re writing, so you know you’re writing readable content. Here’s how!
Having a defined website structure is very important, for a lot of reasons. We’ll explain why, and how to improve yours, in this lesson.
We use the term “cornerstone content” a lot. In this lesson, we explain what that is. Figure out what your cornerstone content is!
What is crawlability and why is it important for you to understand?
Do you know what rich search results are? We’ll show you in this video. There are various kinds! We’ll also tell you why it’s worth working to get rich results for your website.
You need to add structured data to your website to be eligible for rich search results. We’ll explain, in this lesson.
The block editor in WordPress offers blocks that will help you add structured data easily. This video shows you how that works.
In this fragment from his masterclass on site speed optimization, Jono Alderson offers some great insights into some quick site speed wins.
Did you enjoy this training? We offer an extended version of this training for free through Yoast Academy. And we have a lot more online SEO training to offer! Find out more in this bonus lesson.
Yoast has been involved with SEO on a daily basis for over 10 years! Our plugin is the front-runner in SEO plugins for WordPress. Following our mission "SEO for Everyone", we help experienced and beginners in the field of SEO. With our Yoast Academy, we teach thousands of students the arts and crafts of SEO. Focusing on practical guidance, we created this free SEO for beginners training, to help you understand search engines and improve and further optimize your website.
This Yoast Academy course introduces you to all aspects of search engine optimization (SEO). This ranges from how Google decides what search result to show first, to optimizing your website's structure and content. In this easy-to-understand course, we'll pave the way for better SEO and website optimization from now on.
After this training, you will know:
- How search engines work, how they read websites, and what you can do to rank higher in their search results. With this understanding, it will be easier to focus on the right elements of search engine optimization for your specific website and target audience.
- How people find you: what do they type into Google? If you know that, you can make sure you're offering the information they're looking for! A hammer's main purpose isn't to drive nails into a wall, its purpose is to hang a painting (for instance). Make sure you're not caught up in your own perception of your product or services.
- What kind of content ranks high in Google, and how you should optimize your text for that. Using our actionable tips and recommendations, you'll be able to write compelling content that ranks better. Better rankings for the right content equals better quality visitors!
- Find out why the structure of your site is important, and how to optimize yours. Make it as easy as possible for search engines and Google to visit any and all pages on your site. And put focus on the most important ones in the process, of course!
- Learn how to check if you're blocking Google from indexing your site, and how to fix that. It just happens way too often that certain pages are blocked from Google somehow, leaving you wondering why you are not getting visitors. Learn how to check and prevent that.
- Understand how to get those fancy search results that include pictures, or even ratings. Using so-called rich snippets, you might help Google to show your search result in a more prominent way, tailored to their visitors. This will obviously help you gain traffic!
There is so much more! This really is the first step in understanding what you need to do so your website actually gets found. It's full of hands-on tips so you can get right to work!