Search Engine Optimization is one of those illusive things that can really have a huge impact on your sites ability to attain new viewers. A previous post by Ben, The Truth About WordPress SEO, laid out a lot of the pros and cons of WordPress SEO, but the takeaway was this:
Keep writing, keep creating good quality content, but don’t turn a blind eye to SEO and assume it will all happen naturally either.
For those of us that like to focus on writing and not as much on the ins and outs of SEO here is your godsend: Scribe SEO. This little plugin/service sits in WordPress quietly waiting to look over your shoulder and make sure you did a good job combining your content and your necessary SEO. Think of it as a spellchecker for search engine ranking. Let’s jump right in and take a look at the guts of this plugin.
Setup
If you have ever installed a plugin on your WordPress site before, then you’ll be able to install and use Scribe. Once you have an account, watch the installation video and you’ll be up and running in about 5 minutes. One note: you do need a premium WordPress theme like Thesis or Headway, or an SEO plugin like All in One SEO Pack, FV All In One or Platinum SEO Pack.
Use
Now it’s off to the races. To start reaping the rewards, login to your WP Admin page and add a new post. On the right side where your Publish and Categories box are, you should see a box for Scribe Content Optimizer. All you have to do is enter the relevant post information (title, keywords, description) into your theme or SEO plugin of choice, then click “Analyze” and your post gets graded. After it finishes analyzing, you get a nice report. Here is what the report looks like at this point in the review:
And… Holy!!! I didn’t think I was doing that good, but apparently Scribe thinks I’m knocking on the proverbial door of search engine optimization perfection.
This overview gives you quick reference in to what areas you are covering well and what needs some work. Getting more detail is pretty darn easy by clicking on the links across the top.
The Keyword Analysis and SERP tabs are particularly useful as I can quickly see what keywords I need to add into my content and what the search engine results page will look like. This let’s me know that I am not just going to rank well, but that my link is interesting enough to click on.
With Alternate Keyword suggestions and Best Practices right in the results window, going back and updating your content to improve your score is a snap.
After each analysis, the status bar on the right hand side of your post updates with your Content Score and the Primary Keywords. Very handy indeed! It just sits there, unassumingly waiting to be clicked on and do its magic. It really is that simple.
Other Uses?
Now, this is a WordPress specific blog, but, Scribe can actually be used with Joomla, Drupal and you can even log in to your account and upload content directly for review.
Support
On the support side, I am happy to say that I have only had to use support once, and that was for an issue with my web host, but the response was fast and there was even a little Scribe Compatibility Checker that helped us diagnose the issue.
Overall Impression
This obviously isn’t your typical “review” of a plugin. I’ve been using it for a couple of months now, and honestly, I can’t live without it. I’m biased.
I don’t have the time to learn all of the ins and outs of content optimization for search engines. I know what I want to write, and Scribe watches my back to make certain I am going to achieve optimization bliss. I would highly recommend this to anyone that isn’t an SEO expert. Go try it for yourself.
For those wondering, after completion of this article, my Content Score is still at 100% and the Primary Keywords are scribe, seo and plugin. Just what I wanted.
Jason Wietholter is a problem solver, content creator and entrepreneur. Helping people build business through relationships is his focus. You can find him at JasonWietholter.com or on Twitter, @jasonwietholter.
Note: Several links in this review are affiliate links. Buying through our links doesn’t cost you anything extra and allows us to get paid for the quality information and recommendations we provide.
{ 5 comments… read them below or add one }
Yes an unusual review as you don’t mention that it is a service you must pay for or that your links are affiliate links. mentioning both would have added a little more credibility to your post.
Great idea for a plugin for people who are unfamiliar with SEO though.
Thanks for the well-written review! I am in the process of churning out content for a medical school preparation blog I am constructing (no real content publically available yet) , but was frankly gun-shy about releasing the main content due to inexperience with SEO optimization. I will definitely be milking this plug-in for all it is worth!
@Allison, Jason clearly states Scribe is a service and I don’t know of many services you don’t pay for,
I’ve added a note disclosing the fact that the links in the post are affiliate links (Jason was unaware of my typical method of disclosure). However, the existence of affiliate links has no bearing on our credibility. If you think anyone posting on this site would sell out our readers by recommending a bad product just to make a quick buck, you might as well not read our content.
If you don’t trust us, there’s not much of a point is there?
@YourPreMedAdvisor, I love the plugin and it helps tremendously with my writing. There are some other SEO enhancements you should probably make to your site as a whole, but this plugin definitely handles the optimization of your blog very well.
@Allison, I wanted the Scribe site to speak for itself as it goes into far more detail that is specific to users types. I focused on its usability and benefit from the perspective of someone in need of SEO without the time for SEO. You are exactly right, it is an awesome plugin for those unfamiliar with SEO.
I’m a big fan of the WordPress platform. Scribe seo is one of the best plugin in WordPress that works with WordPress to analyze your posts, give you information about them, and make suggestions about improving your post from an SEO Perspective. Once you’ve finished writing your post, the plugin checks to make sure you’ve written an optimized version of your title in the custom title field.
If you have old post in your blog and you expected a little more out of? Use this tool to go back, re-evaluate, and tweak things a bit to improve them.