Using WP Ghost is unlikely to negatively impact your SEO or rankings if configured correctly. In fact, it can indirectly benefit your site’s performance and rankings by improving speed and security, which are key SEO factors. Here’s a detailed breakdown:
Protects Against Negative SEO
WP Ghost enhances your site’s security by hiding vulnerabilities in your WordPress core, themes, and plugins. This reduces the likelihood of hacks or malware injections, which can damage your site’s reputation and SEO rankings. A secure website builds trust with search engines.
Improves Site Speed
WP Ghost offers features such as disabling unnecessary WordPress libraries (e.g., Emojicons, embed scripts, and WLW library) and supporting CDN mapping. These features optimize your site’s performance, and faster load times contribute to better user experience and higher rankings.
Preserves Existing Indexed URLs
WP Ghost does not affect the accessibility of existing media files, such as images or PDFs, which Google may have already indexed. These files remain accessible through their default paths.
If you enable the Hide WordPress Common Paths option and include media files, WP Ghost will automatically redirect old URLs to the new paths. This ensures search engines and users are seamlessly redirected without encountering errors.
Maintains Crawlability
WP Ghost allows you to exclude critical paths from being hidden or blocked, ensuring search engine crawlers can still index and understand your site’s content structure. Proper configuration prevents any accidental restrictions on bots.
Conclusion
WP Ghost, when configured properly, will not negatively impact your SEO or rankings. Instead, it can enhance your site’s overall performance and security, indirectly contributing to improved search engine rankings.