8.WP Smush
Best WordPress SEO Plugins and Tools for 2015
Optimizing images for SEO means not only filling in all the information correctly, but also making sure they load as quickly as possible. After all, page load time is also taken into account by search engines.
In addition to choosing the right image size in the WordPress editor, you should also use this plugin developed by the WPMU DEV team.
It removes unnecessary information from your images. This means that the file size is reduced, but without loss of quality. Sounds good, right?
The main highlight is that the plugin will perform its operations automatically when you upload an image to the site. Existing files can also be optimized in volume. Pro version is also available.
9. EWWW Image Optimizer
Best WordPress SEO Plugins and Tools for 2015
This plugin works just like WP Smush. It automatically optimizes images uploaded to your WordPress site and can reduce the size of files that already exist.
The difference between the two plugins is that EWWW uses different tools for this process. WP Smush is based on the (now defunct) Smush.it algorithm created by Yahoo, while EWWW uses a bunch of other utilities.
Unlike its competitor, EWWW Image Optimizer offers additional optimization with possible errors. This means that some of the image data will be discarded in order to reduce the file size in the future. However, this may result in poor image quality. Which of these plugins is better is up to you.
Analytics and reports
By not tracking feedback, you control your site by feel. Knowing if your efforts are paying off is half the battle in SEO. The following tools will help you understand if you are on the right track.
10. Google Analytics by Yoast
Best WordPress SEO Plugins and Tools for 2015
Yes, this is the second plugin from the Yoast team on this list. It allows you to connect your website to Google Analytics quickly and easily with just a few clicks.
Very handy, it also adds an analytics dashboard right into the WordPress interface. No need to go to Google every time: you can see the most important traffic metrics right on your site.
In addition, the plugin can ignore users of a certain level (so as not to mess with your data), as well as track downloads, page search results and 404 error pages. We strongly recommend that you take a closer look at this plugin! Those who would like to find an alternative can also take a look at the Google Analytics Dashboard for WP.
11. Social Metrics Tracker
Best WordPress SEO Plugins and Tools for 2015
Want to know how your content is doing on social media? The plugin will tell you this with information about what posts your users have shared on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, StumbleUpon, Pinterest and Google+.
Check how your social media site looks right from your control panel. It’s a great tool to get a quick overview of your current performance without the need for external utilities.
11. Social Metrics Tracker
Best WordPress SEO Plugins and Tools for 2015
Want to know how your content is doing on social media? The plugin will tell you this with information about what posts your users have shared on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, StumbleUpon, Pinterest and Google+.
Check how your social media site looks right from your control panel. It’s a great tool to get a quick overview of your current performance without the need for external utilities.
In addition, Social Metrics Tracker allows you to export the results to a spreadsheet for further analysis.
Other SEO plugins for WordPress
While we have already covered most of the basic features, the following plugins will help you optimize your WordPress site even more.
12. W3 Total Cache
Best WordPress SEO Plugins and Tools for 2015
As mentioned earlier, page load time is one of the search engine ranking factors. Hence, you should do your best to make your site load as quickly as possible.
Plugin caching creates static HTML pages for all pages on your site. Therefore, visitors will not be able to access the database or execute PHP code on your site, resulting in faster loading times.
W3 Total Cache is one of the users’ favorites. It offers minification and compression for CSS, JavaScript, posts, pages and news, as well as browser caching, plus works with content delivery networks.
Over 900,000 people have already entrusted their sites to this plugin. As an alternative, you can check out WP Super Cache.
13. Google XML Sitemaps
Best WordPress SEO Plugins and Tools for 2015
In case you are not using one of the feature rich SEO solutions mentioned earlier, you should make sure you have a sitemap for your WordPress site.
A sitemap is a quick and easy way for crawlers to get all the information they need about your content and how it should be indexed. This plugin will allow you to create a complete XML sitemap and automatically add new content to it as your site grows.
