We often get asked whether Drupal is good for search engine ranking. Whether it can optimise web pages that we build via the Drupal platform, and the quick answer is, yes. Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) can be broken down into three elements:
- Good site structure
- Good content
- Quality backlinks
At Website Express we ensure your site structure is developed correctly. We begin by enabling clean URLs within your system settings. Drupal by default gives all of its URLs an ID instead of a readable URL, like “website-express.co.uk/node/99”. Enabling clean URLs takes the page title and turns that into a readable URL. We continue by installing and configuring the following modules:
Path auto Module automatically generates your page URL based on content you define. For example, you can pick a content type such as News article and always have the URL as follows: /news/[title]. This way the user doesn’t have to manually specify a path alias. If you give your content keyword-rich titles, your URLs will also contain those high ranking terms to improve your content’s rank with search engines which reward keyword appearances in page addresses.
Metatag Module allows you to add a custom browser title, description, keywords, and a handful of advanced search options on a per page basis. Having custom browser titles and page titles allows you to inform search engines more details about the content on your page.
Redirect Modules permits you to put in 301 redirects from old URLs to new ones. Drupal by default does not remove the old or original path if you create an alias, which can cause duplicate content in search engines and negatively affect your SEO efforts.
XML Sitemap Module creates an XML sitemap for search engines to easily find and index pages on your site. You also have the option to submit your sitemap to the top search engines. Having a website with a solid SEO foundation will help increase organic traffic and should engage with your audience. Good content is where you, as an expert in your field can showcase your knowledge to the world, we will make it easy for you to create content and publish it to your users, automatically sharing published content to your social media networks. Quality backlinks are about building useful links, from other websites that are related to you or your service sector in some way. If you have an existing or, new Drupal project that requires SEO focus, please contact us on 029 2000 4547.
