Will using Wordpress to make my website hurt my SEO webpage ranking?

Question

I am thinking about using Wordpress to make my whole website. Does anyone know if that will hurt my web page rankings or if it is okay?

Answer 1

It will hurt unless you put together your Wordpress installation properly.  here are some steps... and links.

It pays to spend time learning this process before jumping in.

1. get together a list of all of your current web pages, and put all of your current website in a folder so you can refer to it.

2. learn how to use .htaccess and 301 redirects.

3. Install Wordpress' latest version.

4. Install the All-in-one SEO pack plug-in.

5. Choose a theme and begin to move your comment into the Wordpress format.  Free themes are free for a reason.  I recommend you purchase a quality theme like Revolution.

6. After you're done, go back to your list of old-site URLs and do a 301 redirect from THEM into your new WORDPRESS permalink structure.  You want to have a 1:1 correspondence.

7. IF, and only IF you seem to have a drop in ratings, you may want to install a Wordpress XML sitemap plug-in to help Google crawl your site.  this is unlikely.

8. make sure your posts inter-link to relevant parts of your site using good anchor text.  One post/page links to another post/page using good text.

9. If you drop in rank, don't panic.  It may be temporary.

10. zip up your old files and get them off the server.

11. Using google webmaster tools, make sure all of your indexed pages still work and that there are no 404 pages. For every 404 page you find, you'll need to add a 301 redirect to your .htaccess file.  YOU DO NOT want 404s on pages that were previously indexed!

Scott Clark

Web Business Strategist

http://www.websiteadvice.com

unavailable for hire