SEO for Food Blogs

Geoff Allen, ZipList

August 27, 2011

SEO for Food Blogs: Overview

•  Content is King, but Structure is Queen

•  Let Search Engines Know You Have Recipes on Your Site

•  Get to Know Rich Snippets & hRecipe

•  Importantly, Make Your Food Blog More Findable

Above All Else, Be Consistent

•  Recipe Title, Title Tags & URL Should Match

•  Always Use the Labels “Ingredients” & “Instructions”

•  Keep Heading Styles Consistent (e.g., <H2>, <H3>)

Source: Two Peas and Their Pod

Tell Search Engines You Have Lists

•  Use Bulleted Lists for “Ingredients”

–  Unordered Lists <UL>

•  Use Numbered Lists for “Instructions”

–  Numbered Lists <OL>

•  Free Form Text Prevents Search Engines from Differentiating Recipe Content

–  Don’t Use <BR> and <P> in Lists

Source: Hoosier Homemade

Give Special Treatment to Special Sauces

•  Ingredients for Sub-Recipes Need Special Sub-Heads

–  Glazes, Sauces, Frosting, Marinades –  Example, For the Glaze:

•  Do Not Include the Sub-Heads Within HTML List Elements

–  Example, <OL>, <UL>

Source: Steamy Kitchen, “Mother’s Famous Chinese Egg Rolls Recipe

Don’t Forget a Meta Description

•  Always Include the Name of Your Recipe

•  Stick to 150 Words (First 30 are Key)

•  Recipe Searchers See This First Before They Click, So Make This Count

–  A good meta description can increase your click-through rate

Optimize Your Recipe Photos

•  Make the First Photo That of the Finished Recipe

•  Your Post Title & Photo Name Should Match

•  Describe Photos Beyond the First Photo in Your Post

•  Put Dashes Between Each Word When You Save a Photo

Source: $5 Dinners, “Spanish Stew – Vintage Recipe”

Converting Your Recipes to hRecipe

•  The hRecipe Microformat Tells Google “This is a Recipe”

–  e.g. <li class=“ingredient”>2 eggs</li>

•  hRecipe Makes Your Recipes More Relevant to Google

•  Free WordPress Plugins –  ZipList Recipe Plugin

–  RecipeSEO –  EasyRecipe

Contact Me

•  Facebook: www.facebook.com/ziplist

•  Twitter: www.twitter.com/ziplist

•  Email: geoff.allen@ziplist.com

•  Free E-Book: 26 SEO Tips for Food Bloggers –  http://bit.ly/foodblogseo

•  ZipList Recipe Plugin –  http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/ziplist-recipe-plugin/