Why Yoast? The benefits!
Before we begin...I am not dismissing All In One SEO as a plugin. It is probably effective and it was the plugin I used when I joined WA.
However I truly believe that YOAST is far superior, does more for you, ensures your onpage SEO is perfect and makes an easy job of site verification, webmaster tools, social linking and shares and has a much user friendly interface.
Please read this tutorial and decide for yourself if YOAST makes All In One TOAST!
Your Previous SEO will be maintained
If you decide to go ahead and install Yoast DO NOT WORRY about all the work you've put in to All in One SEO ...
Simply search for Yoast SEO in the Wordpress "Add Plugin" section (and obviously go for the free one!!!)..install it...once activated you will get a message on screen from Yoast saying it has detected All In One SEO Plug in. It will ask you if you wish to transfer your SEO settings from All In One to Yoast....click YES!
All your current posts and pages and their SEO will be moved into Yoast...in one click...and then Yoast will help you make the SEO even better....
So your hours of SEOptimization hasn't been wasted as it's all transferred into Yoast!
The BIG Benefit...ON PAGE SEO
Yoast is brilliant. Once set up you can check your SEO scores as you are writing your content. Yoast will almost tell you what you need to do to get a perfect SEO score.
Below is an image of one of my posts SEO values and how Yoast reflects this...
You can see the green and orange indicators...(thankfully no red...)
I know I need to add alt tags to my images and make the reading easier if I am to improve my SEO
But the green lights show that my SEO is now great for...
- amount of text in the post
- focus keyword in the URL
- keyword density is 0.7% appearing 13 times
- keyword is in the meta description
- measures my outbound links
- page title contains the focus keyword
- page title is between 40-70 characters
- focus keyword is in the first paragraph of my content
- focus keyword appears in 7 out of 13 subheadings
- I've never used this focus keyword before
- meta description contains the keyword
All of the above are measured as you write your post so very quickly you can see the success of your SEO and what you need to do to improve...
Join the Discussion
pamdemonium
Premium
Hey Jason, I found your Yoast training via paulgoodwin. Since this is coming from one of the top 50 WA members, I now have the confidence to switch over from AIO SEO. I've had some exposure to Yoast firsthand, and felt it really was very to the point (all them green "lights"!) and user-friendly but was uncertain if I should switch over since I wanted to stick to Kyle's training.
On the same note, I've seen a few other WA members espouse the positive experience with Yoast (which seems to have a tremendous impact on site rankings), which makes me wonder why we are taught to use AIO SEO here at WA instead.
In any case, I see you're now based in KL! All the best there... Let me know if you ever decide to pop by Singapore. I think it's a great idea to meet fellow WA'ers from around the world :)
- Pam (*waves* from right across the Causeway)
On the same note, I've seen a few other WA members espouse the positive experience with Yoast (which seems to have a tremendous impact on site rankings), which makes me wonder why we are taught to use AIO SEO here at WA instead.
In any case, I see you're now based in KL! All the best there... Let me know if you ever decide to pop by Singapore. I think it's a great idea to meet fellow WA'ers from around the world :)
- Pam (*waves* from right across the Causeway)
Reply
Polycount
Premium
I tried switching to Yoast, and I don't recommend it. After about 4 days, I switched right back to AIO SEO. Yoast seems to have an emphasis on keyword stuffing (Which is a big no no), and just overusing keywords in general.
That's just my opinion, but I too took the word of some of the "Top" members on here and got burned because of it.
That's just my opinion, but I too took the word of some of the "Top" members on here and got burned because of it.
pamdemonium
Premium
Hey Cohen, thanks for your comment. Are you saying you somehow got penalised for "keyword stuffing"? Just wondering and trying to understand...
Polycount
Premium
No, I have not been penalized myself, but countless others have. It just makes me wary of using a plugin that's so focused on profits. The on-page SEO wants you to use the primary keyword at least 4 or 5 times throughout the article, and the more the merrier to them (Though there is an upper limit of course).
Anyway, this is just my opinion. I say stick to what you know. Kyle, Carson, and many others on here have used AIO SEO exclusively and recommend it over anything else - I'd rather follow their guidance.
Anyway, this is just my opinion. I say stick to what you know. Kyle, Carson, and many others on here have used AIO SEO exclusively and recommend it over anything else - I'd rather follow their guidance.
DCrumb32
Premium
This may be a dumb question but it won't be my first. And I'm interested because I switched to Yoast a week ago, but haven't produced any content under it yet.
My question, if you don't want to use the main keyword that many times, what is the downside in Yoast to just using your keyword the way you want to and big deal if Yoast gives you a red light on it?
When I read this particular tutorial (and some others, including ones that were not from WA) it seemed like one of the overriding positives of the Yoast SEO plugin was that it gave you the red lights / green lights to use as a guidepost on your content. To me, as a real beginner in this, that was highly appealing. I need help with learning SEO. After I completed the 2nd level of training I saw that we were about to get into actually getting affiliate relationships and I realized that I really knew very, very little about SEO. So I went about doing some independent research, including watching some of the tutuorials on WA, as well as a few other sources. I read positives and negatives about Yoast, but in the end I decided to give Yoast a try. Obviously I haven't used it enough to form an opinion, but I felt the regular SEO training in the first two courses was somewhat lacking.
My question, if you don't want to use the main keyword that many times, what is the downside in Yoast to just using your keyword the way you want to and big deal if Yoast gives you a red light on it?
When I read this particular tutorial (and some others, including ones that were not from WA) it seemed like one of the overriding positives of the Yoast SEO plugin was that it gave you the red lights / green lights to use as a guidepost on your content. To me, as a real beginner in this, that was highly appealing. I need help with learning SEO. After I completed the 2nd level of training I saw that we were about to get into actually getting affiliate relationships and I realized that I really knew very, very little about SEO. So I went about doing some independent research, including watching some of the tutuorials on WA, as well as a few other sources. I read positives and negatives about Yoast, but in the end I decided to give Yoast a try. Obviously I haven't used it enough to form an opinion, but I felt the regular SEO training in the first two courses was somewhat lacking.
Evacapri
Premium
I love Yoast, By the way if you switched to yoast you cant just switch back without messing things up from my understanding, what did you not like about yoast
Evacapri
Premium
I like yoast a lot, I am only one month into WA but feel free to check out my website. www.thinkyourselfskinny.com. everything I have so far has been created using YOAST
Evacapri
Premium
I love YOAST, what makes you say they focus on keyword stuffing? They ask you to focus on one focus keyword. I have had great results but would love to hear feedback on why you don't like it?
JamesBB
Premium
Hi Jason, you screen shot one page 1 of the SEO values shows a field for Meta Keywords, under the Focus Keyword field. Mine does not show this and I cant find how to put it in. Do you know how to - or is this screen shot or Yoast Premium ? In AIO SEO you could add in a bunch of keywords .. does this affect the SEO of the article if I only display a focus keyword?
cheers
James
cheers
James
RaeAnnePond
Premium
Hi Jason,
I printed out the instructions on installing Yoast and everything else associated with this training, but I have one question. I have asked this before somewhere else and was told to refer the white question bar above. Either I'm not using the correct wording or my question simply isn't there. So Jason, what the heck are outbound links??? Please help me understand this obviously important step.
Thank you,
Rae Anne
I printed out the instructions on installing Yoast and everything else associated with this training, but I have one question. I have asked this before somewhere else and was told to refer the white question bar above. Either I'm not using the correct wording or my question simply isn't there. So Jason, what the heck are outbound links??? Please help me understand this obviously important step.
Thank you,
Rae Anne
ChrisGooden
Premium
It's encouraging to see that you used the search bar before putting up your question. Excellent.
What you are looking for is "external links", so you'll now be able to find a ton of stuff on that when you search for it.
They are links that go to pages which are external to your own website.
Don't forget that, when you find stuff, you can bookmark it to find again later 3 Ways to Bookmark at WA
What you are looking for is "external links", so you'll now be able to find a ton of stuff on that when you search for it.
They are links that go to pages which are external to your own website.
Don't forget that, when you find stuff, you can bookmark it to find again later 3 Ways to Bookmark at WA
RaeAnnePond
Premium
Thank you Chris for your help. When I am told to search in the search bar with no clues as to how to word my question when there are dozens of combinations, it is frustrating to say the least. I will try again under "external links." Thanks again and also thank you for reminding me how to bookmark the trainings I like!
AHohaia
Premium
Hi Jason, I have installed Yoast and using the Webmaster Tool I have been verifying the Alexa account etc. For some reason, I can't verify my Google search account. I put in my Google Analytics account and tried other things . Any ideas on it? I also can't see the SEO score?
Thanks in advanced Anke
Thanks in advanced Anke
albinchero
Premium
Polycount
Premium
Do you know if (I haven't read all of this training yet, so forgive me if you explain this) if Yoast converts meta tags to keywords? This is a big deal for me in AIO SEO. I don't think, despite how many awesome articles I've written so far (with great keywords), I've ranked on page 1 a single time yet in the 4 months I've been at WA. This could be due to just needing more time, or perhaps I really should make the switch to Yoast.
JasonGB
Premium
Yoast specifically allows tou to add keywords/metatags to each post and page. Research your keywords and add them ro yoast and you will rank
Polycount
Premium
Hi, maybe you can help me with this. When I linked Yoast to Google Analytics, it asked for the verification code, yada yada yada..Well, after entering it and hitting save changes, nothing happens. According to Yoast's guide here: http://kb.yoast.com/article/66-i-cant-get-the-plugin-to-connect-to-authenticate-with-google I should be seeing a drop down menu of some sort. I'm not getting that. Any advice?
