WordPress SEO Plugins should be used by any WordPress powered site looking for high search engine rankings but they are not a magic solution because:

On Page SEO is only one part of the jigsaw

WordPress SEO plugins can help refine a site for SEO purposes but they can't help if the basics are wrong. Selecting the right keywords to target is of prime importance, they should have a reasonable search volume but not be too competitive and the primary keyword should then be included in the domain name. If a keyword is dominated by large companies with established domains and lots of backlinks it will be extremely difficult for a new site to rank, even if the on page SEO is perfect.

Off page SEO carries greater weight in determining search engine ranking so getting good backlinks to a site is essential and this is something that WordPress SEO plugins can't help with.

Content is key

Although WordPress SEO plugins can help is several ways they cannot produce content and good unique content, added on a regular basis, is an important part of on page SEO.

So if you want to achieve high search engine ranking you should:

• Select good keywords

• Include a keyword in the domain name

• Produce unique content with each page/post built around a keyword.

In addition you should make sure that you have the standard and legal pages that the search engines like to see (About Us, Contact Us, Terms Of Use, Privacy Policy, Anti-Spam Policy etc.) with a link to them in the header or footer.

Once the above is correct you can use WordPress SEO Plugins to maximise the SEO of your site in a number of ways.

• You should certainly use a plugin to generate a site map for the search engines.

• You should also install a general SEO Plugin (such as All In One SEO Pack) which addresses issues such as duplicate content.

• You can then add others to do things like shortening URLs, controlling title tags, managing redirections, automatic link generation or controlling paging of comments.

One of my favourite WordPress SEO Plugins is SEOPressor which is a bit different. Rather than helping to configure the site it checks the on page SEO of each page or post when it is created or updated. It then gives the page/post a percentage score and tells you what needs to be done to improve the score.