I’ve been using Scribe SEO for WordPress for the past 3 weeks. Scribe is a plug-in that will help you write blog posts that are more Search Engine Optimization (SEO) friendly. I started blogging to write about my adventures in personal finance and debt repayment. As things progressed, I realized that I was actually starting to provide help and inspiration for people (quite shocking to me). I’ve made the decision to continue blogging for as long as I can. One way to get more people to read a blog is to apply SEO techniques to get more visitors from the search engines. If people can’t find you, they can’t read you.
I do make much time to read SEO books, but I do read a ton of blogs. I came across a few blogs talking about Scribe, I read the reviews and decided to take the plunge. Scribe is a program that claims to help you talior posts to meet common SEO guidelines. Meaning that once a post is written, Scribe will analyze it and provide suggestions to implement SEO into the post. If you choose to follow the suggestions, the post will have a much better chance of bring more traffic to the site. The suggestions are usually extremely easy to implement and once you use the program a few times, you will learn SEO by performing the changes. Think of it as OJT (On-the Job Training), many people learn much quicker by doing the work instead of reading about doing the work.
I’ve used Scribe on 10 posts and 8 pages so far. I estimate that each post that required changes took less than 5 minutes per post. Following the suggestions on my pre-Scribe posts has brought in some great traffic. That’s traffic on older posts, not just new ones. Are you ready to take a test drive of Scribe yet?? Ok, let’s go.
When Scribe analyzes a post, the program will return a new window containing 6 tabs. The tabs are; SEO Score, Keyword Analysis, Change Keywords, Tags, SERP, and SEO Best Practices. In the example below I’ve used a previous post titled How to Adjust Tax Withholdings.
Scribe In The Editor
Scribe Analysis
After running the analysis on this post, it scored 66%. Not too bad considering I knew NOTHING about SEO.
SEO Score Tab
The SEO Score tab breaks down each category of SEO into actionable sections for you to review and update. My score for this post was 66%. Here are the two reasons for the low score.
1) The Title does not contain any Primary Keywords at the Beginning
The original title was “How To Adjust Tax Withholdings”. After reading the suggestions I decided to change the title to “Tax Withholding | How To Adjust Tax Withholdings”. This made the plug-in very happy since my primary keyword is Withholding. The snap shot below shows the fields for the All-One-SEO-plug-in I use for the title, description, and tags.
2) Contains 0 hyperlinks towards the beginning, below the recommendation of 1 link at the beginning
I didn’t have any hyperlinks until the second paragraph in the original post. I’ve since added a link to the definition of “Tax Withholding” to provide extra information for someone who doesn’t quite know what a withholding is. Like the change in the title, adding the hyperlink helped the SEO score.
Keyword Analysis
Scribe will provide you with the current primary keyword(s) after the analysis is completed. This screen will show you which keywords the program has picked and the number of times they are used in the post. Other keywords are also shown if you decide you want to change them. The next section will cover the changing of your keywords.
Change Keywords
If you don’t like the current primary keywords that Scribe has picked for you, this screen will give you other suggestions. After each suggestion, Scribe informs you how to position the new keywords in the post so search engines and Scribe will recognize them as the primary keywords of the post.
Tags
Tags are part of the post that most people have a hard time with. They are related words in the post that can help to cast a wider net in the search engines to bring in more fish (visitors). Scribe will offer many tags that you can choose to include in the post tagging section. Most experts believe up to 10 tags will work best, scribe offers you about 20 different ideas.
SERP
Scribe will also show you how the search engines will display your post information. If you don’t like the look of the result you can adjust the title and describtion to get the look you need.
{ 17 comments }
Great Post about Scribe. I have been eyeing it. Supposed to be a discount for third tribe members soon, so I will wait till then and pick it up.
I have just joined Yakezie, and love your new plug in. Please email me more info-I am html ignorant, but have someone who helps me with plug ins.
Love what you have done to Thesis as well.
.-= Dr Dean´s last blog ..Online Checking:Is it for You? =-.
Welcome to the crew Dr. Dean. I’ve added you to the list on right side of this blog. The plug in was created by two other members of the Yakezie; Forest and Beating Broke. You can find it in the Google groups under the thred “Yakezie RSS Widget – WORDPRESS PLUGIN…. finally ;)”. Good luck with the challenge, we are glad to have you.
SEO is an interesting topic. Thanks for detailing this plug-in. Do you know of a free version for bloggers just starting out who can’t really justify the cost?
@BibleDebt I know Scribe had a free trial version at one time, but I’m not sure if it’s still active or not.
I’m currently using the trial version. I missed the initial firesale otherwise I probably would have signed up for the deal Jeff got. The trial version I’m using give you 10 evaluations per month. It’s definitely an interesting plugin that has changed the way I am writing posts. I’ve actually tried another one from the wordpress plugin directory and I thought it stunk. As far as I can find, scribe is one-of-a-kind.
Jeff, why do you use all-one-seo-plugin with Thesis? I was under the impression that it’s redundant. Is there any added benefit you know of?
.-= Evolution Of Wealth´s last blog ..What Every Life Insurance Policy Shouldn’t Be Without =-.
@Evolution, I could never got the results I was looking for from the Thesis SEO. My SERP would never look right using Thesis, I may have been doing something wrong who knows. Now I only fill in the fields for the All-in-one plug-in and leave the Thesis ones blank. The SERP looks perfect everytime.
I’m just going to reiterate a few of the comments above.
1. I love the Yakezie widget, can I ask where to get that?
2. Great design of the site. I love thesis.
3. why the all-in-one SEO plugin when using thesis?
.-= Derek @ ChristianCommonCents´s last blog ..If You Want To Win With Debt, Do This =-.
ah i was too slow on the plugin. should hit refresh when i finally got a chance to read the page 🙂
.-= Derek @ ChristianCommonCents´s last blog ..If You Want To Win With Debt, Do This =-.
Hi Derek, I see you have a badge for the Yakezie but I don’t see you in the google groups. Email Coach at Eliminate the Muda or Craig at Free From Broke (links on the left side under Yakezie Group) and see they will get you hooked up. The widget is listed there.
Thanks, I love Thesis and I continue to learn more everyday.
Thanks for the quick response, I just sent an email. Hope to join soon 🙂
.-= Derek @ ChristianCommonCents´s last blog ..If You Want To Win With Debt, Do This =-.
Wow looks like an awesome plugin. I was convinced that I was going to go download it until I got the paragraph about how much it costs. Guess I’m stuck with All in One SEO!
Edit>I just installed the trial version. Contains some good advice that I know nothing about. However, a trip to the library could fix that for free.
Ouch on the monthly fee!! I think I might try the trial version though, sounds like a great tool!! Thanks for telling us about it, Jeffrey.
.-= Mrs. Accountability´s last blog ..Paradigm Shifts with Money =-.
@Mrs. Accountability and @MFO The price is sure an issue, but sometime you need to spend money to get a great product. I was on the fence with purchasing Thesis and I’m glad I did, I love it. My wife and I each get $20 a week in blow money. I use mine for blogging activities and she uses her’s for her nails. I love blogging, she likes having nice nails- it’s a win-win for us 🙂
Something like this might help people find my website. I think only 2 people have found my site via google. I have read at least 20 different websites in a failed effort to learn what SEO is and how to use it. No matter, if I can find a free trial version just seeing how it works, in action, with my own words would go a long way in helping me understand what it is and how to use it. It’s good to know these type of programs exist for people who are computer illiterate.
.-= Stay at Home Mom CFO´s last blog ..“Dear Stay at Home Mom CFO,” =-.
A client recently had me trouble shoot his scribe and I didn’t fully understand what it was… strangely I fixed it without still fully understanding :)….. Now I understand though and may jump for the $27 a month next month… Looks intriguing, especially if it’s bringing up traffic.
I’d like to have an SEO discussion with you some day, my blog does very well from Google but I am always interested in seeing what others are doing.
.-= Forest´s last blog ..FREE DOWNLOAD -Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us by Seth Godin =-.
Interesting plugin. I’d like to try it if I’m ever lucky enough to get the same deal you did!
.-= Tom @ Canadian Finance Blog´s last blog ..Lower Your Credit Card Interest Today With A Few Simple Psychology Tricks =-.