Why do I have to keep my WordPress plugins up to date?

Off the top of my head I can think of four reasons: Because they often introduce new functionality which sometimes makes your life a whole lot easier Because they nearly always fix known bugs Because WordPress core has been updated and the plugin no longer works properly with the new version of WordPress And finally,…

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Kip McGrath, Gateshead East – Helping a local business to grow online

I’m feeling well chuffed today after Carol Milne of Kip McGrath Gateshead East asked me to check her SEO ranking. Carol’s main targeted keyword phrase is ‘tutoring gateshead’, for which she now proudly holds the number one spot. She has six other keywords she targets (‘maths tuition gateshead’, ‘english tuition gateshead’), and for all of them bar…

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Do broken links on your site affect your SEO?

Yes, they do. They lose you Google points, plus they increase your bounce rate because your visitors get frustrated and click away. To check for broken links, either have a look in your Google Search Console, or use the Broken Link Checker plugin, but only do it once every six months or so, and when…

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What’s the best way to find out if the domain name I want is available?

The best places to check are Nominet, the UK’s biggest domain name registry, and ICANN, who, amongst many other things, perform the same function for global/US domain names.  So if you want a domain name ending in, say, .co.uk, .uk, .org.uk or .london, check its availability first on Nominet’s whois page. If you want a…

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