〉Wix SEO: A Guide to Optimizing SEO (2024)

1. What is Wix?

Wix is a popular website builder that offers an easy drag-and-drop interface for designing visually appealing websites.

It is a cost-effective solution for small business owners who want to develop their website themselves.

The advantage of Wix is that no prior experience with coding or website design is required to create a website. Anyone can easily create a website using the 500 customizable templates and easy-to-use features offered by the platform.

2. Is Wix the right platform for your business?

If you're a small business on a tight budget, you probably don't want to spend your resources hiring web designers and developers to work on your business website.

In this case, using a platform like Wix can help you get your website up and running in a few simple settings.

So, if you're a small business owner and don't have any coding experience, Wix may be the right platform for your business.

If you want to create a sophisticated website with advanced design and unique capabilities, Wix might not be the right platform for your business website.

3. Are Wix websites suitable for SEO?

Yes, Wix offers a variety of basic and advanced SEO features that make it easier for its users to implement SEO on their Wix site. Free tools, like Wix SEO Wiz, guide you step-by-step in implementing basic SEO functions on your website.

While Wix has a lot of built-in features and capabilities that are good for SEO, sticking to them isn't necessarily the best idea. In this guide, you'll learn about all sorts of SEO strategies you should implement on your Wix website to ensure that your website starts ranking on the first page of Google soon.

4. Do you need a paid plugin to improve Wix SEO?

No, you don't need to use a paid plugin to optimize Wix's SEO. The platform comes with numerous built-in SEO-friendly functions and capabilities, thanks to which you can implement On-Page SEO for your website.

However, the Wix App Market offers various paid SEO applications, such as Rabbit SEO and Site Booster, which can help you improve Wix SEO. Some of these apps are offered in a free plan. So you should definitely check out these apps.

5. Setting up Wix SEO

Before we get to the question “how do you do SEO on Wix” and the strategies you can implement to get your Wix site ranked highly on Google, let's take a look at the initial setup that will help you get started with SEO for Wix sites.

Make sure that search engines can index your site

Before you start SEO for your website, you need to know the visibility and indexing of search engines.

Search engines like Google and Bing have crawlers that scan the various websites on the Internet and rank them when a user makes a search.

For these crawlers to be able to index your website, you need to ensure that your site is visible to these search engines. You can do this by simply configuring it from the Wix dashboard.

Go in SEO Tools > General SEO Settings. Here, make sure the Let search engines index your site option is activated.

Set up Wix SEO Wiz for your website

Before you start working on the SEO of your Wix site, you should start by setting up Wix SEO Wiz. Wiz SEO Wiz is a free tool offered by the platform that provides you with a step-by-step plan for implementing the basics of SEO for Wix.

If you're a total beginner in the world of Wix website design and SEO, Wix SEO Wiz can be a great tool to guide you through the initial stages of SEO for your website.

You can set up Wix SEO Wiz by going to the Wix dashboard and selecting the Marketing Home option in the left sidebar. There, you can click on Start Now under the Get Found on Google option.

Now all you need to do is enter your preferred site name, physical addresses (if applicable), and a list of up to five keywords that describe your business. Then click Create an SEO plan, and you can now start using the Wix SEO Wizard tool.

The tool will show you a checklist full of tasks that need to be completed to implement your website's basic SEO. The checklist also comes with descriptions that guide you through each step.

Simply go through the checklist and complete each task listed by the tool.

For example, to add the meta description to your site's home page, you can go to the site editor, click on Main Pages, go to the home page, and choose the SEO (Google) option.

Here you'll find a place to add a description of your site's home page. For now, you can simply follow the tool and add a keyword-rich title, URL, and description for the home page. In the next section, we'll discuss in detail how to find the right keywords and optimize all of the pages on your site based on them.

Make sure you have a valid SSL certificate installed

Security is one of the top priorities for search engines like Google. That's why it's essential to have a valid SSL certificate for your website if you want to be ranked in Google.

A valid SSL certificate turns your HTTP connection into a more secure HTTPS connection. This means that all communications between your website and users' browsers are encrypted and therefore more immune to cyber attacks.

All Wix websites come with a valid SSL certificate. So you don't need to worry about getting one explicitly.

Set up Google Search Console

Google Search Console is a free tool offered by Google that allows you to track the performance of your website in Google search results.

With this tool, you can track the keywords you're ranking for, the number of clicks, the number of impressions, and more. Google Search Console also helps you find crawl errors or other issues with your website.

Verify your site on Google

To set up Google Search Console For your Wix site, you need to check your site first. Log in to Google Search Console using the URL Prefix option, click Continue, and copy the meta tag code.

Then, leave this window open and go to your Wix dashboard. Go in SEO Tools > Site Check > Search Engines > Google Search Console, and then enter the site verification code that you copied earlier.

Then go back to your Google Search Console window and click Verify. Your site review has been completed.

Submit your sitemap to Google

A sitemap is an XML file that contains the list of URLs for your site.

Google uses the sitemap to crawl and index your site. Once your site review is complete, you can submit your sitemap to Google.

You can access the site map of your Wix site by simply adding /sitemap.xml to your website URL. To submit it to Google, go to your Google Search Console dashboard and open Sitemaps in the sidebar.

Add sitemap.xml to theURL and click Submit.

Google will start indexing your website after a while.

Set up Google Analytics

Understanding your website visitors, their behavior, and other details about them plays a very important role in SEO. Google Analytics, another free tool from Google, can be a useful tool for offering such information about visitors to your website.

You can learn more about the demographics of your site visitors, the most viewed pages, acquisition sources, and many other key details that can help you optimize your site and rank higher for keywords.

You can connect your Wix site to Google Analytics using a tracking code. Start by connecting to your Google Analytics account. In your Google Analytics dashboard, go to Admin > Property > Tracking Info > Tracking Code. Here you can copy the code that is displayed.

Then, go to your Wix dashboard. Go in Marketing > Marketing Integrations > Google Analytics > Connect. In the top right corner, click the Connect Google Analytics button. Here, paste the copied code, check the IP Anonymization box, and click Save.

Optimize the structure of your site

Optimizing your company's site structure is a very important part of your SEO strategy with Wix. First of all, what do we mean by site structure? Site structure is how pages and information are arranged on your website.

Site structure is important because it determines how easy it is to use your website. Users who come to your site should be able to navigate easily to the various pages and sections of your site. Any difficulty in use impairs the user experience, which leads to a drop in your rankings.

In general, the structure of a site starts with its main pages - home page, “about” page, “contact us” page. Depending on the type of your business, there may be other pages such as the services page, the “Meet the Team” page, etc.

For an e-commerce site, the structure will be different. There will be a home page, followed by category pages, and then product pages.

Depending on the type of your business, you can start planning the structure of your site. You can also take a look at your competitors' websites to get an idea of what's working well.

Ensure the compatibility of your website with mobile phones

Once you've completed the initial few pages of your Wix site, but before publishing your site, it's important to make sure your site is mobile-friendly. Mobile friendliness is an important part of SEO.

In fact, over 60% of Google searches are done from mobile devices. You should therefore ensure that your website is adapted to all device sizes and that its design is also pleasant on the mobile version.

By default, all templates offered by Wix are mobile-friendly. But, to check it out, you can check the mobile preview option before pressing the publish button on a page. You can also open your site on various devices to see if your website is indeed mobile-friendly.

You can also use the tool Free Mobile-Friendly Google Test, which reviews your site and tells you if it's mobile-friendly and responsive.

Robots.txt file

A robots.txt file tells the Google crawler which pages on your site can and cannot be crawled.

You don't need to worry about the robots.txt file because it's automatically generated by Wix. But if you want to replace it by editing the file, Wix allows you to do that.

You can edit the robots.txt file on Wix by going to the Wix dashboard.

Go to Marketing and SEO > SEO Tools > robots.txt Editor > View File. You can make changes here and click Save Changes.

6. Wix On-Page SEO Strategies

Now that you're done with the initial SEO setup for your Wix site, we can move on to the question: how do you do SEO on Wix? It starts with on-page optimization strategies. But first of all, what do we mean by on-page SEO?

On-page SEO refers to optimization strategies that can be implemented on each page of your website. With On-Page SEO techniques, you can implement certain strategies on your web pages, content, and settings to improve search engine rankings.

Off-page SEO refers to strategies that need to be implemented outside of your web pages. We're going to look at off-page SEO in the next section.

Perform a keyword search

The first step in On-Page SEO is the keyword research process. Keywords are nothing but the search phrases that we use when we search for something in search engines.

For example, if you're looking for inspiration for your workouts, you can search for the phrase “20-minute home exercises.” So it's a key word. When a website optimizes its web page for this keyword, it's likely that the page will rank in search engines like Google.

In order to attract the right people to your website, you need to do keyword research and find the right set of keywords for your website.

Keywords can be short- or long-tail. Short keywords are generally very competitive and difficult to rank for. Short keywords get a higher search volume. To get the best possible results, you should use a combination of short and long keywords.

Another way to categorize keywords is to classify them according to their informational or commercial nature. Let's say you own a photography business. In this case, keywords like “wedding photography tips” and “best selfie poses” will fall under the category of informational keywords. Indeed, users who search for these keywords only want to know more about photography.

Keywords such as “best wedding photographer in Sydney” are those that have a commercial intent. Users who search for this term are looking to hire a photographer.

In order to get the best results, you need to optimize your website for informational and commercial intent keywords. You can add commercial intent keywords to the main pages of your site, such as the home page, landing pages, the “contact us” page, the “about” page, the “services” page, etc. You can optimize your blog pages for informational intent keywords.

Market-oriented keywords will help you attract customers in a short period of time. Informative keywords allow your site to rank higher over time, and people will eventually become familiar with your brand. Ultimately, this will mean more customers for your business.

Find targeted keywords with informational and commercial intent

There are a number of ways to find the right informative and commercial keywords for your business website. Here are some of the easiest methods:

Google search results page:
The easiest way to find keywords is using the Google search results page. Start by creating a list of main topics and sub-themes that best describe your business. Then search for these keywords on Google.
When you start typing the search term into the search bar, you'll see that Google will offer you a list of automatic suggestions. All of these are the keywords that users are looking for and that you should use for your website.

In the middle of the page, you'll find another section called “People Are Also Asking.” This section consists of keywords based on queries that users are looking for. You can also use these keywords to optimize your site. THE
using a tool like KeywordInsights.ai will help you with this process.

Keywords Everywhere Chrome Extension:
THEKeywords Everywhere free Chrome extension Offer a list of related and long-tail keywords every time you do a Google search.

Keyword research tools:
If you want to dig deeper into your keyword research, using a keyword research tool is a great idea. You can use tools like SEMrush, ahrefs, AnswerThePublic, Also Asked, and more to find the right keywords for your website pages and blog content.
All of these tools work similarly. Simply search for the main keywords or topics related to your business. The tool will give you a list of keywords that you should optimize your content for.
Most of these tools also have indicators for search volume and SEO difficulty for each keyword. Consider choosing keywords that have a relatively low SEO difficulty. These keywords will be easier to rank for when you start your business.

Research your competitors

Studying your competitors is also a great way to come up with the right list of keywords that you need to optimize your site for. Most keyword research tools allow you to conduct competitive analysis.

Simply type in the URLs of your top competitors into the keyword research tools mentioned above to get a list of keywords that these websites are ranking for. Tackling these keywords is a great way to bring more potential customers to your business website.

You can use tools like SEMrush, Ahrefs, and more to find competitors' keywords.

Optimize your website pages for targeted keywords

Once you've finished your keyword research, your next step should be to start optimizing your web pages for the right keywords. You can start with the home page and then the other important pages.

You may have already done this as part of the SEO plan provided by the Wix SEO Wiz. Now you can go back and make changes with the new set of keywords that you found.

For this step, simply go to your Wix site editor and start editing the text on the home page. Start adding the main target keywords and associated keywords to different parts of your home page.

Be careful not to stuff the keywords on your home page to the point that the text seems unnatural. Make sure the text is legible and meaningful to any site visitor.

Likewise, you can edit other pages on your website, such as the “About Us” page, the “Contact” page, the “Services” page, etc., to include the right keywords.

Optimize title tags, meta descriptions, and URL slugs.

In addition to the text on your website pages, you should also include target keywords in the title tags, meta tags, and URLs on those pages. Optimizing these parameters for the target keywords will also help you rank higher in Google.

To change these Wix SEO settings, go to theWix editor > Main pages. Select any page and click SEO (Google). You You can add the page title, meta description, and URL slug, all optimized for the right target keywords.

Create high quality blog content

Search engines like Google like to rank websites that offer valuable information to users. Therefore, keeping a blog up to date can be an added benefit for the SEO of your website.

With the right SEO from the Wix blog, your site will start ranking for informational keywords. Eventually, your Wix site will get more visitors. And all of that will help you generate more leads and get more customers.

So start creating blog content that is unique and useful for your target audience from the day you launch your website. Be sure to create content around topics that your target audience will be interested in.

To find topics for your blog, you can use the keyword research methods mentioned in the previous section. You can also research your competitors and look at the type of content they're posting.

To create blog content for your site, go to the Wix dashboard > Blog > Create a new post. This will open a text editor where you can add your content, as well as images, videos, GIFs, etc. Once you're done, you can click “Publish,” and your blog post will be live.

Make sure you find the right keywords for every blog post you publish. Use these target and related keywords in article titles, subtitles, image alt tags, blog content (introduction, body, and conclusion), meta description, and URL slug.

Ensuring an appropriate page structure

Like site structure, having a hierarchical structure for each page on your site is also very important in determining your search engine rankings. Without a proper page structure, search engine crawlers will have trouble navigating your pages and understanding their content. Inadequate page structure also affects the accessibility of your site.

Therefore, whether they are main web pages or blog pages, be sure to follow an appropriate page structure. Follow a hierarchical structure starting with the title, followed by H1, H2, H3, etc. and then move on to paragraphs. Be sure to structure your content in numbered or bullet lists whenever possible.

Add structured data

Structured data or schema markup is a format used to tag information about a website. Structured data helps search engine crawlers understand the content and context of your website.

Adding structured data can help your website appear in the rich results at the top of search engine results pages (SERPs). By default, Wix adds structured data for blog posts, product pages (for e-commerce stores), event pages, booking pages, and forum posts.

But if you want to add any other type of structured data, like a recipe, breadcrumbs, event, FAQ, etc. to your Wix site, you can do that too. You can use tools like FAQSchema Generator, Schema.dev And this one from Technical SEO to generate the schema code.

Then, copy that structured data code and go to your Wix editor. Under Pages > Main Pages/Blog Pages > Advanced SEO > Structured Data, you'll find a place to paste the copied structured data.

Ensuring readability

Search engines like Google consider user experience to be an important factor in ranking different websites in the SERPs. Google uses a set of UX signals to measure the UX of any web page it crawls and uses this information to rank the pages.

To guarantee a good user experience on your site, good readability is essential. So, for every page you post on your Wix site, make sure it's easy for visitors who come to the page to read and understand.

Follow an appropriate hierarchical page structure. Add descriptive titles and subheadings for each section of the page.
Keep sentences and paragraphs short.
Avoid huge walls of plain text. Instead, leave empty spaces that allow readers to navigate through the content of the page.
Support your content and break up plain text with lots of media in the form of images, screenshots, videos, GIFs, tables, charts, infographics, and more.

Optimize content for on-page UX signals

As we've seen before, search engines like Google consider user experience to be an important ranking factor. Google uses UX signals to measure the user experience offered by your site. Therefore, optimizing these UX signals can help you rank higher in the SERPs.

Here are some of the UX signals to optimize:

Bounce rate

Users are said to bounce back when they leave your site without taking any action, like clicking a link or making a purchase. For any website, there will always be users who bounce back.

But you can reduce the bounce rate by making sure you're giving the visitor what they're looking for. Poor site design and poor navigation are other factors that can cause an increase in the bounce rate.

Waiting time

Stay time is the amount of time a user spends on your page. You can increase attendance time by creating in-depth, useful content. Adding engaging elements like images and videos to your web pages can also help.

Organic click rate (CTR)

Organic CTR is the percentage of users who see your site link on the SERP compared to those who click on the link and land on your page. Optimizing your title, meta description, and URL can help increase a page's organic CTR. Make sure the title and meta tag are descriptive and engaging enough to get users to click.

User search intent

Search intent is the user's main objective when looking for a query in a search engine. The search intent can be informational, navigational, transactional, and commercial. It's important that you optimize your content for the right search intent.

For example, when a user intends to search for information about a topic, your page should be optimized for informational, non-commercial intent. If not, the user will leave your site.

Optimize for speed

Speed is also a key ranking factor taken into account by Google. Did you know that users will leave your site if it takes longer than 3 seconds to load? Therefore, optimizing your site for fast page load speed is a crucial part of SEO.

Wix offers some default features that ensure high performance of your site and a significant reduction in page load time:

Wix uses a global system of cache services and proxy servers called the Content Delivery Network (CDN) that dramatically reduces the load time of your site.
Wix offers automatic or manual page caching that reduces page load time. You can control this by going to the Wix dashboard > Pages > Main Pages/Blog Pages > Settings > Advanced Settings.
Wix also offers automatic image optimization. Large image files are the main factor that contributes to slower page speed. Wix automatically compresses the images you add, resulting in better performance.
Wix also offers lazy image loading, which helps increase page load speed.

You can use Google's free PageSpeed Insights tool to check the speed of the desktop and mobile versions of your site. The tool also offers suggestions for improving the speed of your site.

Avoid duplicate content

Having duplicate content on your Wix site can cause your search engine rankings to drop significantly. Duplicate content means that pages on your site are competing against each other when ranking for a search term on Google. This is not an ideal scenario and should be avoided at all costs.

Optimize images

As we saw in the section above on optimizing speed, images are generally the ones that contribute the most to the slowness of a web page. Optimizing images can therefore be an important factor in improving the speed and performance of your site.

By default, Wix offers image compression and lazy loading, so you don't need to explicitly worry about these steps. Additionally, you should also be careful to add descriptive, keyword-rich titles and alt texts to any images you add to your site. Google also takes these factors into account when ranking your site.

Set up internal links for SEO

Internal link building is the process of adding relevant links to your site pages from other pages on your site. Internal links are also a crucial part of SEO, so it's important to implement them as part of your On-Page SEO page.

Here's how you can set up internal links for your Wix site:

Add links to related articles and pages from every page on your site.
Be sure to add keyword-rich anchor texts to your internal links.
Internal links help the equitable flow of links from the linking page to the linked page. So try to create links to important pages, like the home page or the services page, from the other pages.
Don't overuse internal links, as this could hurt your SEO.

7. off-site SEO strategies from Wix

Off-page SEO refers to techniques that can be implemented outside of your website pages in order to improve the ranking of your web pages in search engines.

On-Page Page Optimization is largely under your control and easy to implement. On the other hand, off-page optimization may be more difficult to implement, but can have a significant impact on your website's rankings. Your SEO strategy should therefore include both off-page and on-page tactics. If you simply stick to one or the other, you won't get the best results.

In this section, we'll look at some of the top off-page SEO strategies that will help your Wix site rank higher in search engines.

Use content marketing

Produce high quality and consistent content

As we've seen before, producing quality content is one of the most effective ways to rank higher on Google. Most businesses make the mistake of just publishing the basic web pages and not prioritizing content marketing.

Google ranks websites that have high-quality, up-to-date content that are valuable to users. Furthermore, it is unlikely that users will simply land on your web page and make a purchase. Users prefer to get acquainted with your offer, obtain information, and then proceed to the act of buying.

So start creating unique and original content for your website as soon as you put it online. Optimize your content for the right keywords. Your articles will end up ranking better on Google and you will get more traffic to your site as a result.

Conduct original research studies and statistics

Backlinks are hypertext links from other websites to your site. They play an essential role in SEO. In fact, Google considers backlinks to be one of the top three ranking factors.

While there are numerous ways to create backlinks to your site (discussed in the next section), creating quality content will allow you to automatically get lots of backlinks without you having to do anything.

Conducting original research and creating statistics can be a great way to get high-quality backlinks to your website. Indeed, websites are always looking for original studies and statistics that can support their claims. And so, these types of content help you generate lots of good quality external links.

Use content groups

Content clusters offer in-depth information about a specific topic. Content or topic groups generally consist of a pillar and a group of groups. The pillar consists of content around the main topic. And the groups cover sub-themes around the main topic.

Source:

The pillar post consists of internal links to all posts in the cluster, and the posts in the cluster can also be linked together when relevant. Content groups tend to improve your site's rankings because they cover the subject at hand in depth. Any visitor landing on a content group should ideally find all the information they need in one place.

Promote your content on all social channels

SEO is a process that requires a lot of time and effort. You can't publish a blog post and expect it to start ranking in the next few days or even in the next few weeks if you're a relatively new website. It may take a few months and a considerable amount of content before Google starts ranking your site, especially if you are in a competitive niche.

Therefore, strengthening your content marketing efforts by promoting them on social media can be a great way to attract the first few visitors to your website.

Start by creating accounts for your brand on as many social media channels as possible. Build a loyal audience and share your content on these channels. You can also use email marketing to boost your content.

Create backlinks to your Wix website

As mentioned above, backlinks are one of the most important factors in determining how your website ranks on Google. In this section, we're going to talk about the various tactics you can use to create backlinks high quality to your website.

Email awareness to retrieve links from competitors

Sending emails is one of the easiest ways to create backlinks to your website. Start by using keyword research tools like SEMrush, Ubersuggest, or ahrefs to generate a list of websites that link to your competitors' sites.

Then, create content that is 10x better than that of your competitors' sites. Make sure your content is more thorough and more useful to readers. Then, send emails to the list of websites. You can present your content and explain how linking to your content can be much more valuable to their leaders.

Email prospecting is a time-consuming process, and many may not respond to your emails. But, even if you generate a few high-quality links this way, the result will be worth your efforts.

Guest blogging

Publishing posts on relevant, high-quality websites can also be a great way to build backlinks to your Wix site. Indeed, websites that allow you to publish invited articles (or”Guest blogging“) on their site allow you to add a backlink to your site, either in the main content or in the author's biography section.

To find sites that are relevant for publishing articles, simply search on Google with the terms “guest article +<votre_niche>” or “write for us +<votre_niche>”. You will find a list of websites that offer guest positions. Simply contact them with your content suggestions and add back links to important pages on your site from these guest articles.

Building broken links

Broken links are hyperlinks that no longer work. When users open these links, they usually get a “404 not found” error. This significantly affects the user experience. This is why the presence of broken links on a website is not good for its SEO.

You can use this fact to your advantage and build a few backlinks to your site through it. Go to the most popular websites in your niche and use Chrome plugins like Check My Links and Link Miner to find broken links on those sites.

Then, contact these websites and offer them an alternative to these broken links — a working link to your site. This is an effective way to create lots of good quality links because no website wants to have broken links in their link profile.

Creating links to resource pages

Many leading websites in each niche feature a “Resources” page that is nothing more than a selection of links to resources that their audience will find useful. These pages usually contain a lot of external links and are therefore a great opportunity to create links.

You can reach out to these websites with valuable content or tools that will be useful to their readers. If your content has value, you are sure to generate tons of backlinks this way.

Create assets that can be linked

Linked resources are unique, high-quality pieces of content that automatically generate backlinks to your site without requiring you to go to any website. Linked resources are typically infographics, videos, data visualization charts, or anything else that is unique and valuable.

Therefore, in addition to creating blog content, you should also consider creating linkable assets that will be extremely useful to users in your niche.

Mentions of unrelated brands

Often, websites use your brand, images, quotes, statistics, etc. on their website without creating a link to your site. You can contact these sites and ask for a link.

You can set up Google alerts for your brand name or any other keyword specific to your site. Google will send you email alerts when another website mentions these keywords. You can then contact them by email and ask for a link.

Focus on the quality of backlinks

It's important to understand that not all backlinks are the same in Google's eyes. Some backlinks carry more weight than others. So what determines the quality of a backlink? There are many factors that come into play.

Try to focus on the following types of backlinks:

Backlinks from a website with higher domain authority
Backlinks from a web page with higher page authority
Backlinks with keyword-rich anchor text
Backlinks that are placed higher on the web page
Do-follow links instead of no-follow links
Backlinks from a site that is relevant to your link

By prioritizing these links, you'll get better SEO results, even with fewer links.

8. Wix Advanced SEO Strategies

Now that we've covered basic On-Page and Off-Page SEO strategies, let's take a look at some advanced SEO strategies you can implement to further improve your Wix site rankings.

Set up 301 redirections

Sometimes it may be necessary to redirect visitors to your site from one URL to another. This could be because you updated the content or the old page is no longer valid. In this case, it is important to set up 301 redirects to ensure that visitors are redirected from the old URL to the new one without problems.

To set up 301 redirects for your Wix site, go to your Wix dashboard. Go in SEO Tools > URL Redirect Manager > Create a new redirect. Here, you can easily set up single or grouped 301 redirects.

To test 301 redirects, simply type the old URL into the address bar, and your browser should automatically redirect you to the new URL you set up.

Add Canonical tags

Having multiple URLs with the same or duplicate content can cause Wix SEO issues when Google attempts to index your site. To avoid this, you can add canonical tags.

These tags tell Google which URL should be considered as the main copy of the page. So Google will only index this specific URL and the problem of duplicate content will not arise.

You can add canonical tags to pages on your Wix site by going to the site editor. Then go to Pages > Main Pages/Blog Pages > select a page > Advanced SEO > Meta Tags > Canonical > Edit > Tag Settings > Tag Value and add the canonical tag here.

Set up AMP

Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) helps speed up your mobile pages, and Google uses it to rank rich results and carousels on mobile devices. AMP speeds up the loading of your pages and thus offers a good user experience.

To enable AMP for your blog posts, go to your Wix dashboard and navigate to SEO Tools > SEO Templates > View Templates > Edit Template under Blog Posts > Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) > Edit > Enable AMP on your blog posts.

Optimize Open Graph (OG) tags

OG tags help you control how pages on your website appear when shared on social media. This can help you define images, names, and descriptions that seem more appealing for social media.

You can set OG tags for pages on your site by going to the Wix editor, Pages > Main pages/Blog pages > select a page > Advanced SEO > Meta Tags. Here, you can edit and define the OG tags you want to add.

Set up Google My Business for local SEO

If you are a local business with a physical location, you should definitely consider optimizing your site for local SEO.

Studies show that 4 out of 5 consumers use engines of researching to find local information. So when users in your area search for keywords with local search intent, your site is likely to appear in Google SERPs.

The first step in implementing local SEO is to create a free Google My Business account. This detailed guide on creating a GMB account can help. Creating a profile on GMB allows you to attract local traffic to your website from Google. Google can also rank your site in the Google Knowledge Panel, Google Local Pack, and Google Maps when consumers are looking for local businesses.

You can connect your Google My Business to your Wix site by going to the Wix dashboard and going to Marketing Tools > Google My Business > Get Started Now.

With the Wix-GMB integration, you can monitor performance, track consultations, and explore other useful local SEO information. Wix also allows you to manage and respond to GMB reviews from its dashboard.

Wix International SEO

As part of the implementation of international SEO, you want to create multilingual sites, which is possible with the help of Wix. Wix allows you to manually translate pages into other languages. There is also an option to automatically translate your pages.

You can access and edit all multi-lingual versions of your site from within the Wix editor. Each language version of your Wix site will have its own subdomain with the language code (en, fr, etc.).

Wix also allows you to set different SEO settings for different languages, which can help you tailor your SEO strategy to suit the location you're targeting.

Use Wix Analytics and reports to track performance indicators

Gaining key information about your Wix site can help you make smart business decisions and increase profits over time. Wix offers analytics and reports on a variety of categories such as sales, traffic, people, and behavior. This information can be very useful in helping you grow your business.

You can use this feature to track important metrics and improve your business traffic and conversions. You can access these reports from the Wix dashboard. Go to the main menu > Analytics and reports. Here you can see a visual overview of your website traffic, sales, and user behavior over a given period of time.

You can also generate reports by going to the main menu > Analytics and reports > Reports. Here, you can generate reports in the form of tables, graphs, heat maps, and more.

9. Wix SEO Tips Bonus

Set up Wix SEO templates

SEO templates are a free feature offered by Wix that allows you to set up the same SEO logic for multiple pages at once. So instead of changing the settings for each page every time, you can define SEO models for multiple pages at once.

By default, Wix creates SEO templates for all pages on your website, such as site pages, product pages, blog posts, blog categories, etc. You can edit and customize these templates to suit your needs.

To customize the SEO templates for your Wix site, go to the Wix dashboard > Marketing and SEO > SEO Tools > SEO templates. Here, you can select any option and click on the Edit Template button. For example, if you change the template for site pages, you will find several options that you can customize.

You can click on Edit and change the default templates for SEO, social media, structured data, and advanced SEO tags.

Ensure the accessibility of your Wix site

Website accessibility ensures that your site is easily accessible for all users who visit it. Even when users with disabilities or reduced mobility try to access your site, they should be able to do so easily.

Practicing website accessibility helps you improve your site's user experience and ultimately rank higher in Google. You will also get more visitors to your site.

Wix has a list of accessible models that you can choose from. So if you are just starting out, you should consider using one of these models. If you've already chosen a different model, you can refer to the detailed accessibility checklist prepared by Wix.

Align your SEO plan with your business goals

When creating and implementing an SEO plan for your business website, it's important to ensure that your plan is in line with your business goals. By having specific business goals in mind, you will be giving precise direction to your SEO efforts.

For example, if one of your main business goals is to generate more local customers, you need to ensure that you prioritize local SEO. Aligning your SEO plan with your business goals will help you reach your goals much more quickly.

Perform SEO tests on your Wix site

SEO, unlike other marketing strategies, does not provide instant results. It may take a few months to test a strategy and measure its effectiveness. To make sure you're on track with your SEO efforts, you can run SEO tests on your Wix site.

You can use tools such as SEO testing, On-Page SEO Checker of SEMrush, etc. to measure the performance of your site in search engines. These tools offer helpful SEO recommendations and suggestions. You can also identify technical SEO issues and fix them using these tools.

Voice search optimization

With the increase in the number of smart speakers, the number of voice searches seems to be on the rise. The future of SEO seems to be oriented towards voice search optimization. You should therefore consider including voice search optimization in your SEO strategy.

Here are some tips to help you implement voice search optimization:

Optimize your content for longer, conversational keywords that are primarily used in voice searches.
Optimize your content for “featured snippets,” as they're more likely to be picked up by Google for voice search queries.
Add the FAQ schema to your content as it also improves your chances of appearing in voice search results.
Improve the speed of your site, as it plays a critical role in optimizing voice search.
If you're a local business, optimize your content for “___ near me” search queries, as these are more common in voice searches.

Integrate social media sharing buttons

Remember to add social media sharing buttons to your web pages and content. This will help users share your website with others and help you create more visibility this way.

To add social media sharing buttons to your Wix site, go to the site editor, then go to Add > Social. You can Y Add social media sharing buttons and social media links of your choice.

Improving social signals

Social signals refer to the visibility on social networks that is perceived by search engines such as Google. These include likes, shares, engagement, mentions of related and unrelated brands, etc. These social signals play an important role in improving your search engine rankings.

You can gain social signals and brand mentions by being active on social media. Choose the ones that are most used by your target audience and create relevant and useful content on these platforms. You can use organic and paid strategies to gain visibility on these social networks.

Strengthen SEO through other marketing channels

SEO, on its own, is a super powerful channel for businesses. But if you combine your SEO efforts with other marketing channels, you'll get much better results. So instead of sticking to SEO, use other marketing channels like the social media marketing, the email marketing, PPC, native advertising, etc. to get better results.

Wix eCommerce SEO Tips

If you want to create your e-commerce site, Wix may be a great choice for you. You can browse a variety of Wix store templates that allow you to set up your online store with absolute ease.

Using Wix store templates, you can set up product pages, online checkout, and other e-commerce store elements.

You can consult Wix's detailed guide to using Wix for more tips from Wix SEO or on creating a Wix site.

10. List of missing SEO features in Wix

Wix had a bad reputation when it came to SEO a few years ago. But in 2019, Wix came in with a few major SEO-friendly updates that changed the opinion of most SEO experts.

Wix has all the basic SEO features and most of the advanced features you can take action on. But, the platform has a few advanced SEO features missing that may be a problem for a few.

Customizing the sitemap

Wix automatically generates a site map for your website. But you can't customize the sitemap—which is one of the main SEO issues with Wix sites.

Customizing the tablet version

Wix offers a mobile editor that allows you to edit the mobile version of your website. However, the tablet version of your website is not customizable, which may limit your access to optimizing the tablet version for SEO.

Cryptic names for image files

When you upload images to the Wix editor, by default, Wix offers cryptic names for your image files, such as - 10b2fh9~mv6.jpg/. Therefore, if you don't update your image file names to be meaningful or SEO-friendly, your images won't be able to appear in Google image search results.

Same URLs for all languages

If you plan to build a multi-lingual website using Wix, you may run into SEO issues. With Wix, you'll have the same URLs for your website in all languages - your-site.com/ post?lang=en. It's not ideal for SEO. You cannot have multilingual URLs in the format - your-site.com/en/post.

Slow site speed

According to some SEO experts, the speed of Wix sites in general can be slow due to the architecture of the website builder. As you may already know, slow websites are not the most SEO friendly. However, the future looks bright as Wix offers new updates to improve website speed.

11. FAQ - Wix SEO

Are Wix websites suitable for SEO? Is Wix good for SEO?

Yes, Wix is a website development platform that allows you to easily implement On Page and Off page SEO strategies. Wix also offers a free tool called Wix SEO Wiz that helps users create and implement a step-by-step SEO plan with ease.

What are the disadvantages of Wix?

Here are some of the disadvantages of the Wix platform:

Wix templates are not interchangeable.
The free plan offers limited capabilities.
The drag-and-drop designer can limit the creativity of a few.
Wix does not have advanced website design capabilities, unlike other predominant options like WordPress.
Because Wix is a closed platform (not open source), there are no direct ways to transfer content from this CMS, but you can still do it.

What are the major businesses using Wix?

Businesses like EditorX are known to use the Wix platform for their websites. It is also used by deviantART, one of the largest art galleries and online communities.

Do professionals use Wix?

Yes, Wix is a great platform for professionals who want to showcase their work and use the website as a portfolio. Wix offers a variety of templates for professionals to choose from, making it a great choice for professionals who don't have experience developing websites.

Is Wix good for blogging?

Yes, Wix is an ideal platform for bloggers who want to create visually appealing websites using a simple drag-and-drop solution. Wix also offers exclusive website templates for bloggers, making it easier for newbie bloggers to get started creating their website.

How do you set up SEO on Wix?

You can start by setting up basic SEO on Wix using the free tool offered by the platform, called Wix SEO Wiz. It guides you through a simple, step-by-step plan to get started with SEO for your Wix site. However, these steps are not enough. So you can use this ultimate guide to Wix SEO to set up the SEO of your Wix site.

Wix SEO vs. WordPress

There are a variety of Wix SEO tools and tutorials that can help you set up most SEO features for your website. In comparison, WordPress offers a wide range of SEO plugins that can help you implement much more advanced SEO tasks.

So, in the face-to-face between Wix and WordPress SEO, who wins?

If you're a beginner looking for website creation options that are easy to use and have SEO capabilities, you should definitely opt for Wix. But if you run a business where you can afford to get help and if you rely on a large portion of the traffic on your site, then you should go for WordPress.

Wix vs Squarespace SEO

Wix has more powerful SEO features. Its interactive, responsive, and beginner-friendly SEO Wiz sets you up for success, and its comprehensive resources help you get off to a good start.

While Squarespace has a good set of built-in SEO tools and a useful SEO checklist feature, it's not as user-friendly and feature-rich as Wix for beginners.

Wix vs Weebly SEO

While Weebly has detailed guides, articles, and checklists that offer great SEO support to its users, the story is somewhat similar to that of Wix vs Squarespace when it comes to SEO.

In addition to these resources, the Wix SEO Wiz tool offers a personalized SEO plan. You have useful applications like Site Booster to help you further. So, all things considered, Wix is the winner.

Can I edit the robots.txt file on Wix?

Yes, you can edit the robots.txt file on Wix by going to the Wix dashboard. Go to Marketing and SEO > SEO Tools > Robots.txt File Editor > View File. You can make changes here and click Save Changes.

Does Wix work with Flash?

No, Wix does not work with Flash. Wix is built with HTML elements.

Can I use Wix for multilingual sites?

Yes, you can use Wix for multilingual sites. In fact, Wix offers a multi-language setting through which you can translate your website into various secondary languages.

Do Wix websites come with SSL?

Yes, Wix offers a free SSL certificate for every website.

Do Wix websites appear on Google?

Yes, with the correct implementation of Wix's Google SEO strategies, Wix websites appear in Google search results.

Is Wix good for e-commerce?

Yes, the Wix site is suitable for e-commerce businesses. Wix offers a variety of templates for e-commerce stores. You can use any of these templates to create an online store from scratch.

Can you put ads on Wix?

Yes, you can place ads on your Wix site using the following methods:

Download the ad as an image and link to the corresponding URL.
Add marketing integrations
Use the Google AdSense app to show third-party ads
Use a Lightbox pop-up window to show your ad

Can a Wix blog be monetized?

Yes, you can monetize your Wix blog through advertising, affiliate marketing, or selling your own products or services.

12. Example of highly ranked Wix sites

In this section, we've listed a few Wix sites that rank high organically on Google, with organic search traffic and high inbound links.

EditorX

DeviantArt

Conclusion

Wix is one of the most popular website builders that offers a hosted solution. It is beginner friendly, extremely easy to use, and intuitive. It comes with hundreds of templates and offers a wide variety of SEO-friendly features.

By using the strategies and tips provided in this ultimate guide, you can plan your entire SEO strategy and start positioning yourself on major search engines.

If you want to explore other website builders, you can check out our comprehensive guides on Squarespace SEO And the Webflow SEO.

Wix SEO: A Guide to Optimizing SEO (2024)

Key Takeaways