Service / 08
Most WordPress SEO retainers we replace had the technical work outsourced to Yoast or Rank Math defaults. The plugin emits schema, the agency calls the technical SEO 'done', and the actual work (plugin pruning, theme-level schema deduplication, Core Web Vitals at theme and hosting level) never happens. We do it properly.
What it unlocks
Built for WordPress sites that have outgrown a generalist SEO retainer and need someone who can write PHP, audit plugins, and read a hosting profile, not just configure Yoast settings.
Capabilities
Engagement rhythm
Free audit
Theme + plugin + host foundations
Continuous publishing and refresh
Quarterly strategic review
What we do
Article, BreadcrumbList, FAQPage, Service, Organization, LocalBusiness, Product schema, implemented in the theme code, deduplicated against Yoast or Rank Math output, and validated. Most sites we audit have schema generated by three sources (theme, SEO plugin, page builder) all conflicting. We consolidate and validate.
Most WordPress sites carry 30+ plugins, often with overlapping responsibilities and silent performance drag. We audit which are paying their way, prune the dead weight, replace the bloated ones with leaner alternatives. Plugin pruning often delivers the biggest single CWV win on a WordPress site before we have touched the theme.
WordPress speed is rarely fixable in a plugin. We work at theme and hosting level: critical CSS, image optimisation pipeline (Imagify, ShortPixel, or theme-side AVIF/WebP), caching strategy (often Redis or Object Cache Pro on managed hosts), server response time tuning, and selective dequeue of plugin assets where they do not earn their load. Cheap WordPress hosting undoes everything; we will be direct if the hosting tier is the bottleneck.
Product schema, faceted nav, /shop/ canonical handling, category page architecture, and the WooCommerce-specific patterns generalist SEO agencies do not know. We have a dedicated WooCommerce SEO page if WooCommerce is your primary revenue driver; this page covers it as part of broader WordPress SEO if it sits alongside your editorial site.
Four or more new pieces a month, briefed against actual Search Console data. Existing posts and pages refreshed monthly based on what has slipped. Category and tag archive page handling (most WordPress sites have at least one archive working against them). Internal linking extended across the cluster.
Monthly report against attributed organic revenue or pipeline, not ranking screenshots. Quarterly strategic review with a real human. We treat Search Console as a control panel, not a quarterly screenshot. If a tactic is plateauing, we will tell you and pivot.
How an engagement runs
Full technical, content, and SERP audit. Plugin load profile. Theme-level performance. Schema duplication status (Yoast or Rank Math vs theme vs page builder). Core Web Vitals at template level. Content depth. Where the site is leaking traffic, where it should rank but does not, where the highest-impact fixes are.
Theme-level schema deployed and validated. Plugin audit completed, dead weight removed, bloated plugins replaced with leaner alternatives where appropriate. CWV improvements at theme and host level. Content calendar launched. GSC baseline established and weekly review cadence started.
Steady content cadence. Refresh queue on slipping posts and pages. Internal linking extended. Schema kept current as content changes. CWV monitored as new plugins or theme updates land. Plugin audit revisited quarterly.
Every 90 days: which content clusters are paying back, where the site's CWV has drifted (plugin updates often regress performance), what next quarter's content investment should look like. Real strategy from a real human.
The lay of the land
WordPress's SEO plugin ecosystem (Yoast, Rank Math, All In One SEO) is excellent at editorial workflow. Meta titles, descriptions, social cards, sitemap generation, focus keyword scoring. What it cannot do is fix the technical foundations: theme-level schema duplication, plugin-driven performance drag, hosting tier bottlenecks, content depth. Most WordPress SEO retainers we replace had Yoast installed, configured to a reasonable default, and called the technical SEO 'done'.
Real WordPress SEO requires writing PHP, auditing plugins for performance impact (every plugin loaded on every page costs something), and reading the hosting profile to identify whether server response time is the actual constraint. The work is not glamorous and it does not show on a ranking dashboard for the first 60 days, but the foundations are where the compound effect comes from. Get theme-level schema right once, and every page benefits forever. Prune ten unnecessary plugins, and CWV improves across the whole site permanently. Move off cheap shared hosting to managed WordPress hosting on Kinsta or Cloudways, and the conversation about CWV becomes about milliseconds, not seconds.
From month four onwards, the work converges with standard SEO: content production, on-page optimisation, internal linking, schema for new page types. But the foundations matter, and they require WordPress-specific eyes.
FAQ
Same fundamentals; WordPress-specific technical work added. Plugin audits, theme-level schema deduplication against Yoast/Rank Math, hosting-level CWV work. If you run a WordPress site (with or without WooCommerce), this is the right page. If your business spans Shopify and a separate WordPress editorial site, the main SEO Services page covers both.
One of them. Yoast is mature and reliable; Rank Math is feature-richer and sometimes faster. We do not have a strong preference; we will work with whichever is installed. We deduplicate schema between the plugin and the theme so Google does not see conflicts.
Work in your existing theme via child theme overrides. We extend templates, add schema, and tune CWV without rewriting the parent theme. If the parent theme is so badly built (often the case with page-builder-heavy themes from ThemeForest) that no amount of optimisation will move CWV out of the red, we will be direct and recommend a rebuild via our WordPress Development or Web Design services.
Not if it is done carefully. We audit in stages: which plugins are loaded on every page, which on specific page types, which are actually used by the editorial team. Pruning runs on staging first with a full diff and rollback plan. Most stores find 5 to 12 plugins that can be removed without anyone noticing, and CWV improves materially as a result.
Managed WordPress hosting (Kinsta, Cloudways, WP Engine) is the right home for any serious WordPress site. We can advise on the right tier based on traffic and complexity. Shared hosting will undo every theme-level optimisation; we will say so directly if the hosting tier is the bottleneck and the work needs to start there.
Yes. The technical work is similar; WooCommerce adds the platform-specific patterns covered in detail on our WooCommerce SEO page (faceted nav, Product schema, /shop/ canonicals). If WooCommerce is your primary revenue driver, the WooCommerce SEO page is the better starting point. If WordPress editorial is the main asset and WooCommerce is secondary, this page is fine.
Technical foundations land in 60 to 90 days. Some rankings movement appears in this phase from CWV improvements and schema fixes. Content compounding from month four. Attributed organic revenue or pipeline lift from month six to twelve.