23 May 5 Main Reasons Why Your WordPress Website Isn’t Ranking in Google

Have you read a lot of articles about search engine optimization (SEO) before starting your own WordPress website? Now that you’ve done your research it’s time to wait for Google to index and rank it. However, you may also find out that your website isn’t still ranking on Google. – No worries. The good thing is that your low ranking is possibly due to some issue which can be easily fixed.

Below in this article you can find the most common reasons why your WP website isn’t ranking in Google, and how to fix them:

1. Your WordPress Website has Weak Content

Content is one of the two key ranking factors for Google. Therefore, if your content isn’t good enough, your WordPress Website won’t have a chance to rank well. So, how to create a good and strong content? In fact, there are several elements you should ensure your content follows. Just, look at this checklist and its points for making strong content:

• The content you create must teach readers something. It should provide the sense that they’ve learned some new information and that their time wasn’t wasted.
• Stick to correct grammar and proper English. Be aware of some language issues like fragment sentences, punctuation, typos, etc.
• Make sure your content contains the minimum of 400 words. Yet, as most well-performing content, aim for 1,000 words or even more.
• Upload new content on a regular basis, preferably once a week. If you can’t manage that, try at least once a month.

2. You Changed Your Permalinks

The permanent link to a page or blog is also known as the permalink and it is the second key ranking factor for Google. For best results, your permalink should be descriptive and, whenever possible, feature the keyword targeted in the post or page.

Furthermore, make sure that your permalinks can be read by human and machine so that Google can keep track of your pages and keep your rank. Your permalinks shouldn’t be too long or include bits like “?p=3282949” or stop words like “and,” “by,” or “do”.

However, if you ever need to change them, try not to sacrifice your ranking. In fact, you can safely change your permalinks by using certain tools or plugins.

3. Your Website Isn’t Mobile Responsive

You must be aware of the fact that more than half of website traffic is done through mobile devices. Therefore, your site must be fully responsive and work well with multiple browsers on various devices. This was once a challenging task for web designers, but now it’s easily feasible.

A fully responsive website means that it adapts to a format which is user-friendly and suitable for a specific device. Otherwise, if a website isn’t responsive during mobile search queries, it will be rejected and excluded by Google.

In addition, if you are unsure whether your website is fully responsive, use Mobile Friendly Test tool by Google and check your website. This tool will warn you if your site isn’t mobile friendly or if it has other issues. Alternatively, if your WordPress design isn’t most favorable for mobile users, switch your theme so that your site becomes fully responsive.

4. Your Website Isn’t Visible to Search Engines

If you’re a newbie starting a WordPress website, or if your site isn’t ranking in Google, you may need some information about the options you have to customize website settings. Also, it’s very likely that you’ve unintentionally changed something that affects your search engine optimization.

For that reason, go to Settings > Reading Settings in your WordPress dashboard and scroll down to Site Visibility where you should select “Allow search engines to index this site”. Then, give Google some time to index your site and check whether your page has improved its ranking.

5. You Use Keywords Incorrectly

Keywords are also one of the key things that affect Google ranking. Plus, they are crucial for search engine optimization. But, if you use them incorrectly, they will only harm your ranking. So, let’s see which practices you should follow for correct use of keywords:

• Avoid keyword stuffing – use keywords in a natural-to-read way instead of filling and stuffing paragraphs with the targeted keywords because the content will read poorly.
• Use long tail keywords (three or four words long) – such keywords are more descriptive and specific to what the user searches for and easier to rank for.
• Avoid keywords with high competition rate – by doing so you are probably losing out to other websites. Instead, begin to rank for keywords with low or medium competition rate.

As a bonus tip, use the Yoast SEO plugin if you need more help regarding keyword usage. Just set the wanted keyword and the plugin will enable you to analyze the density, usage in headings, etc. and to check if the targeted keyword is also included in your URL.

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Thank you for reading this article. We hope you found it helpful. If you need additional assistance, or have any questions regarding this article, please feel free to contact us below in comments, and we will do our best to help you in any way we can. Take care.