6 WordPress SEO Mistakes Beginners Must Fix Now

You have great content, but zero traffic. The problem? You’re blocking Google. Stop wasting time and fix these six common WordPress SEO errors. This is your fast-track, step-by-step guide to getting noticed.

1. Default Meta Titles

Using generic titles like “Home” or “Post Title | My Blog.” This looks weak in search results, kills your click-through rate (CTR), and confuses search engines.

What to do?

1. Install an SEO Plugin (e.g., Yoast or Rank Math).
2. Edit the SEO Title: Place your primary keyword near the start (e.g., “WordPress SEO Mistakes to Avoid”).
3. Keep it Short: Limit titles to 50–60 characters so they don’t get cut off in Google.

2. Default Permalinks

Allowing long, confusing URLs with dates or random numbers, like yoursite.com/?p=452 or yoursite.com/2025/11/post-name.

What to do?

1. Go to Settings: Navigate to Settings > Permalinks.
2. Select ‘Post Name’: Change your structure to Post name.
3. Clean Your Slugs: For every new post, manually edit the URL slug (the last part) to be short and keyword-only.

3. ‘Discourage Search Engines’ Setting

Leaving a specific checkbox marked that tells Google, “Do not index this site.” Your content is completely invisible.

What to do?

1. Go to Settings: Navigate to Settings > Reading.
2. Find the Checkbox: Locate the “Search engine visibility” setting.
3. Uncheck the Box: Ensure the option “Discourage search engines from indexing this site” is completely Unchecked. Save changes. Your site is now open to the public.

4. Ignoring Image Alt Text

Uploading images with no description or a file name like IMG_001.jpg. This hurts accessibility and misses a crucial SEO opportunity.

What to do?

1. When Uploading: In the WordPress Media Library, look for the “Alt Text” field.
2. Be Descriptive: Write a short, accurate description of the image.
3. Weave in Keywords: Include your primary or a related keyword naturally within the description. Example: “Checklist of common WordPress SEO mistakes on a desktop monitor.”

5. Multiple SEO Plugins

Installing more than one full SEO plugin (e.g., running both Yoast SEO and Rank Math). They conflict, break crucial data, and slow down your site.

What to do?

1. Choose ONE: Pick a single, reliable plugin
2. Deactivate and Delete: Go to Plugins > Installed Plugins. Deactivate and delete all other competing SEO tools.
3. Do Not Switch: Stick with your choice to maintain clean site data.

6. Not Hiding Pages from Your Sitemap

Including low-value, non-public pages in your XML sitemap. This makes Google waste the crawl budget on pages that don’t need to rank.

What to do?

1. Edit the Page: Open the editor for the page you want to hide (e.g., a “Thank You” page).
2. Find Advanced Settings: In your SEO plugin’s box, go to the Advanced or Settings tab.
3. Set to ‘Noindex’: Find the option to set the page to “noindex” and/or exclude it from the sitemap. This tells Google to ignore it in search results.

Conclusion

You now know the six most common beginner SEO mistakes. The good news? These aren’t technical nightmares, they are simple settings you can fix in minutes.