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wordpress or regular html page, does it matter?

by gnojham
23 replies
  • SEO
    • |
hi all
currently i use wordpress for all my websites, but now that i am going to start focusing on SEO, i was wondering if wordpress hurts or helps ranking.
my domains are setup as www.whatever.com

are there any known problems related to SEO with wordpress that i should fix from the start?
should i even use wordpress?

are there pros and cons to both, or is one just clearly superior to the other?

thanks in advance for any input on this
#html #matter #page #regular #wordpress
  • Profile picture of the author mrhmamun
    From my personal strategy, if you use premium seo optimized WordPress theme for your site or use all in one seo pack plugin if it's free theme, for proper seo. you will be benefited.
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  • Profile picture of the author webdevpro
    If you are novice in SEO then WordPress can be a good way to starts as you can find and install many seo related plugins to fine-tune your site without even having a comprehensive knowledge in this field.
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    • Profile picture of the author davis1990
      Originally Posted by webdevpro View Post

      If you are novice in SEO then WordPress can be a good way to starts as you can find and install many seo related plugins to fine-tune your site without even having a comprehensive knowledge in this field.
      What other SEO plugins you reccomend above AIOS pack?
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      • Profile picture of the author trevord92
        Originally Posted by davis1990 View Post

        What other SEO plugins you reccomend above AIOS pack?
        Pick one SEO plugin and learn how to best use it. Whether it's the all-in-one pack, Yoast or whatever else.

        They all do roughly the same job - there's no point in having several close to identical plugins on your site.
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        • Profile picture of the author davis1990
          Originally Posted by trevord92 View Post

          Pick one SEO plugin and learn how to best use it. Whether it's the all-in-one pack, Yoast or whatever else.

          They all do roughly the same job - there's no point in having several close to identical plugins on your site.
          Ok.Thank you very much.I am using AIOS and I am satisfied with it.
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          • Profile picture of the author savidge4
            Again WOW...

            html is html sure I get it.. but that's not the point. wordpress vs a coded page, a coded page should win every time. Its not about the code specifically, its about "Where" the code is.

            I can hear you already... that's old school.. there is little to no benefit yada yada.. the truth is there IS benefit. it may not be a large gain, but a gain non the less.

            There was another post today about hosting and page load speed.. again dismissed as not of value... not a major element for change.

            Https... again not a major element of change

            These elements of plausible gain start to add up 2% here 3% there 1% over this way... on a one on one basis any one of these has little to no value, but I will assume there are those here that "Do" SEO professionally, and would understand and communicate that each and every slight gain is just that... a piece of the puzzle that will assist in better rankings, if looked at as a whole.

            SEO CRO it really doesn't matter... long term gains are measured in minute increments. The application of even the smallest of results spread across 10 15 30 elements to a site / page is no longer peanuts, but in reality a big deal. In the game of SEO... every inch counts.

            So to answer the question at hand.. yes there is a difference.. in some cases a HUGE difference. There ARE ways to get around most of it in wordpress, Using a "Premium Theme" is simply a load of crap... but using plugins like the SEO stuff, that actually place the tags of value into your code... it helps... like using a CSS over ride plugin to reduce the line usage of custom CSS is of use. like I said before Https is of use. better servers of use. paying attention to H1 tags, and removing them as necessary is of use. in WooCommerce looking at the "Single Product Page" and dumping out all of the useless h3 tags.. again of use.

            All of these things would probably not be in a better CMS, or if they were hand coded. Like I said all of these things can be corrected, but really not to the level of someone that knows what they are doing on the code development end.

            Getting a wordpress site to the level needed to play in major keyword markets its a lot of work... that's why we see on this forum in general long tail, longer tail... how long can you go tail.. that's where you will get traffic and results. Anybody that does SEO for a living knows that there is an amount of truth there... but how many of us here are shooting for an getting mid length and short length keyword placement in the SERP's. can this be done with wordpress.. sure if there is little competition. can it be done with a term with heavy competition? sure if you juice the day lights out of it.

            The point is in moderate to low competition, you can compete. Itwithout question helps fixing all of the issues the OP mentions through out the thread
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  • Profile picture of the author trevord92
    Google doesn't care about whether a site is built in HTML, WordPress or whatever.

    It just sees the pages as HTML (which is what they are)

    Check that your WordPress theme isn't slowing you down by using a tool such as Pingdom or Google's own Page Speed tool.

    Use a decent SEO plugin such as Yoast to make it easier to keep your site SEO'd - the Yoast plugin has lots of useful help built in.
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    • Profile picture of the author gnojham
      Originally Posted by trevord92 View Post

      Google doesn't care about whether a site is built in HTML, WordPress or whatever.

      It just sees the pages as HTML (which is what they are)

      Check that your WordPress theme isn't slowing you down by using a tool such as Pingdom or Google's own Page Speed tool.

      Use a decent SEO plugin such as Yoast to make it easier to keep your site SEO'd - the Yoast plugin has lots of useful help built in.
      hi, thanks.(im aware that wordpress is HTML, but i cant think of a better way to differentiate the two. perhaps 'custom html' and 'wordpress'??)

      this is kinda what i wanted to know. but more specifically, i was just curious if wordpress structures things in a way that would hurt SEO.

      for example, i did a check of one of my sites and got a report back that there were pages found with multiple H1 tags. I actually dont know if that is a bad thing or how bad it is, but i know i didnt use multiple H1 tags, so i assume wordpress did it somehow. So if multiple H1 tags are bad, then that would be a strike against wordpress and perhaps a reason to consider custom HTML.
      the report also said there were a large number of css descriptions which apparently hurt performance. and again, that would be a wordpress thing that a custom html page wouldnt necessarily have.

      thanks in advance for any input on this!
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      • Profile picture of the author savidge4
        Originally Posted by gnojham View Post

        for example, i did a check of one of my sites and got a report back that there were pages found with multiple H1 tags. I actually dont know if that is a bad thing or how bad it is, but i know i didnt use multiple H1 tags, so i assume wordpress did it somehow. So if multiple H1 tags are bad, then that would be a strike against wordpress and perhaps a reason to consider custom HTML.
        the report also said there were a large number of css descriptions which apparently hurt performance. and again, that would be a wordpress thing that a custom html page wouldnt necessarily have.

        Here is a very simple test that you can do. you want to load up your page in a separate tab. This will become the static variable in this little test. Next you want to open up your your wordpress dashboard and where ever it is you prefer to do this, insert a quick little line of CSS

        Code:
        H1 {
       display: none;
}
        Now you want to load the altered page into a separate tab from the static variable. simply compare the 2 pages. what exactly is missing. is there just one line of text, or are there multiple? - multiples would be the lines that you need to go in and adjust. be it by changing to bold and adjusting the text size, or replacing with graphics or what ever other method you can think of.

        In regards to CSS. what happens when you start "customizing" CSS is you are placing the customized code outside of a style sheet. basically the code has to go somewhere so it gets loaded to each and every page of html that is viewed. regardless if it is page specific or universal. if it is intended for "wordpress" pages, or "woocommerce" pages. each and every one of these lines becomes what is called a "Call"

        To many of these is a bad thing. you are causing the server to basically go out implement, and back, out and back, out and back etc. this can easily be fixed with a "Css Plugin" these plugins place all of the "customized" code into one neat little file that is "Called" once, and not repeatedly. Just like a "style sheet"

        The above then brings us to the issue of speed. I will be honest and say that in general Wordpress is not the fastest turtle in the box. if there are races to be won, the turtle with the big fancy blue "W" spray painted on its back would not be one I would choose. That being said... when you do run a speed test the MOST important number you should be looking at is "Response Time" THIS is the amount of time that is needed for the "Internet" to reach your host, and parse out your site.

        KEEP IN MIND, your overall "Speed" does NOT factor the "response time" but is simply a test of how fast YOUR page is loading, and not a representation of how fast it will load for a viewer.

        For the purpose of development 2 seconds is tolerable. For the purpose of actually making money... that is equal to driving a Yugo in a Formula 1 race. There is a statistic that states that 8% of your traffic drops off for every second your page does not load. If you have a 2 second response time, and a 1 second load on your page.... you are potentially loosing 25% ( +/- ) of your traffic before the page even loads.

        Think about that. a 25% bounce rate before even a glimmer of your page hits the screen. Throw at it the above mentioned CSS time monster, and your hosts lack of decent response time, and you are behind before you even get started.

        In my book... the $25+ a month I spend for hosting that is in the 300ms response rate range.. is worth every penny. a 300 to 600% increase in load speed.. yeah.. and that's not even considering the actual "page load"
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  • Profile picture of the author trevord92
    Things like multiple H1 tags are either down to the theme or you marking them as such in the WordPress editor. Much like a newspaper article, best practice is to only have one main headline (which is what H1 usually indicates)

    CSS will be down to the theme and possibly the plugins you're using.

    Neither problem is down to WordPress - you could get the same issues on a regular HTML site.
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    • Profile picture of the author gnojham
      Originally Posted by trevord92 View Post

      Things like multiple H1 tags are either down to the theme or you marking them as such in the WordPress editor. Much like a newspaper article, best practice is to only have one main headline (which is what H1 usually indicates)

      CSS will be down to the theme and possibly the plugins you're using.

      Neither problem is down to WordPress - you could get the same issues on a regular HTML site.
      Thanks
      i agree that i could get get multiple H1 tags on a custom html page, but that would only be if i used more than one, right? Somehow wordpress is creating this situation because i am not using extra H1 tags now and im getting this notice in the report.

      how could i get multiple css descriptions on a custom html page? wouldnt i have just one css file?


      thanks again for any input on this!
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  • Profile picture of the author trevord92
    WordPress itself isn't creating the additional H1 tags.

    If you're not adding them then the theme you're using is the most likely culprit.

    CSS depends - lots of things like calendar controls, social media "likes" and other goodies on a page have their own CSS.

    Some designers keep separate files for screen, mobile and printer.

    The forum software on this site has a number of CSS files.
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    • Profile picture of the author gnojham
      Originally Posted by trevord92 View Post

      WordPress itself isn't creating the additional H1 tags.

      If you're not adding them then the theme you're using is the most likely culprit.

      CSS depends - lots of things like calendar controls, social media "likes" and other goodies on a page have their own CSS.

      Some designers keep separate files for screen, mobile and printer.

      The forum software on this site has a number of CSS files.
      ok thanks
      so what youre saying is you would not shy away from using wordpress given a choice?
      thanks again!
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  • Profile picture of the author trevord92
    I've been on the web long enough (I started in 1995) to be able to code in HTML - I had to be able to do that, there was nothing else available.

    Unless I'm creating a custom site, I use WordPress. It takes all the hard work out of it and I can concentrate on creating the content for the site and promoting it.

    Which is a long way of saying WordPress is my first choice to create sites.
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  • Profile picture of the author yukon
    Banned
    Originally Posted by gnojham View Post

    hi all
    currently i use wordpress for all my websites, but now that i am going to start focusing on SEO, i was wondering if wordpress hurts or helps ranking.
    my domains are setup as www.whatever.com

    are there any known problems related to SEO with wordpress that i should fix from the start?
    should i even use wordpress?

    are there pros and cons to both, or is one just clearly superior to the other?

    thanks in advance for any input on this
    Your asking If HTML is better than HTML because the end result Google is looking at on a Wordpress site is HTML source code.
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    • Profile picture of the author gnojham
      Originally Posted by yukon View Post

      Your asking If HTML is better than HTML because the end result Google is looking at on a Wordpress site is HTML source code.
      no im not
      i know wordpress is html
      i was asking if wordpress does things that create issues, like the examples given, multiple H1 tags, css descriptions, etc.
      this seems to have been resolved, but thanks anyway
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      • Profile picture of the author yukon
        Banned
        Originally Posted by gnojham View Post

        no im not
        i know wordpress is html
        i was asking if wordpress does things that create issues, like the examples given, multiple H1 tags, css descriptions, etc.
        this seems to have been resolved, but thanks anyway
        Again, HTML source code.

        A CMS is irrelevant for ranking pages because a CMS (theme) only generates the finished HTML that you tell it to generate. Nothing more, nothing less.
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  • Profile picture of the author ronyoung
    Banned
    I personally like wordpress becuase theres lots of other things you can do with it . Search engines dont care really but , you can do a lot more seo wise with wordpress. Like interlinking and other methods.
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  • Profile picture of the author Timmywat
    I use SEOPressor, I would say its one of the best WP seo plugins.
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  • Profile picture of the author KiethJohnson
    I don't think wordpress causes the issue or whatever. Mostly its the person behind the website. It will only do whatever you tell it to do. If you put multiple H1 tags that it will generate multiple H1 tags but that's now wordpress who did it. Same with non-wordpress websites so there's really no issue here.
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    • Profile picture of the author savidge4
      Originally Posted by KiethJohnson View Post

      I don't think wordpress causes the issue or whatever. Mostly its the person behind the website. It will only do whatever you tell it to do. If you put multiple H1 tags that it will generate multiple H1 tags but that's now wordpress who did it. Same with non-wordpress websites so there's really no issue here.
      Kieth,

      I'm really not here to argue... I'm not here to look smarter or more stupid... but load up any theme out of the box and look at the code. right off the bat.. the site title H1 the Page titles H1 ( HOME ) Title sub text h3 footer and side bar titles h3. ITS ALL THERE, and many many many people work with it, and don't know to change it. And believe you me, I am all good with that LOL. Start looking at WooCommerce, and things like "Product Description" an H3 on each and every product page.. that's NOT good you understand that? 300 500 4000 matching h3 tags.. really not good!

      These are the things that separate those that KNOW what they are doing, and those that cant afford those that know what they are doing.

      That is the thing with wordpress it is DESIGNED to be easy. everything is already there all you have to do is change it to fit your needs. its about as plug and play as it gets. I would bet that 99% of each and every wordpress site out there, there is little if any modifications made on any of the topics that have been brought up on this thread alone.

      There are people out there thinking they can do by themselves, they figure out real fast there is one heck of a learning curve. Struggling, and learning and seeking answers for this that and the other.. and they finally get what they are HAPPY with. there vision is right there before them... then the let it loose to make them millions.. and we all know what happens after that... NOTHING..

      and WHY? because the basic structure is flawed... and they think they are doing the right thing and adding those H1 tags they think they need, and adding those h3 tags they think they need. they don't understand that at the same time there are multiple and in the case of WooCommerce HUNDREDS and THOUSANDS of instances that is hurting them.

      All because they think "It will only do whatever you tell it to do" and "there's really no issue here" - I just pointed out the obvious issues... would you like me to keep going?
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  • Profile picture of the author jackluter
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    Wordpress is the better process to use where we can manage the techniques that are user friendly.The plugins in word press are handled in safe manner.
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  • Profile picture of the author JohnTimmins
    Personally, I also recommend WordPress because of its easy to use feature. It is also search engine friendly but if you want to try other CMS that is also search engine friendly, why not try that out?
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