SEO for Ghost: configuration and publishing guide

Ghost SEO starts with its built-in metadata, canonicals, and sitemap, then verifies that the theme preserves their intended output. A publishing site should distinguish original articles, republished material, and member-only content before promoting URLs to search engines.

Edit metadata for the article's editorial purpose

Use post settings to write titles and descriptions matching the article's angle rather than accepting every fallback. Finalize the slug before sending a newsletter or sharing links. An updated headline does not always require changing an established URL. Open with a clear answer and organize longer articles with descriptive headings so readers can find specific information.

Use custom canonicals deliberately

Ghost allows a custom canonical for a post. Apply it when another address should be preferred, such as a genuine original source for republished material. Do not point all articles to the homepage or leave a former domain as their canonical after migration. When setting an override, review the post's sitemap presence too. This is a publishing decision about the preferred original, not merely an optional decorative metadata field.

Review themes and membership boundaries

After changing a theme or code injection, compare article head markup with the previous version to detect duplicate canonicals or descriptions. For restricted articles, inspect what an anonymous visitor actually receives. Sitemap inclusion does not mean crawlers can read the entire paid article. Assess the usefulness of the public introduction and make the membership boundary clear to visitors rather than optimizing an audit score by exposing protected content.

A worked publishing scenario

Illustrative scenario: a publication republishes an article from a partner. Record the original-source agreement, deliberately select the canonical, and verify that its destination is the corresponding article. Original reporting written by the publication needs a different policy and should not inherit the partner URL from a duplicated draft. Review those fields before distributing the newsletter. Keep the editorial origin visible in working notes so a later editor can distinguish legitimate syndication from an accidentally abandoned canonical override.

A release checklist you can repeat

Keep a small inventory of important pages before changing the website: record the current URL, intended audience, title, and preferred canonical. Make one category of changes at a time and preserve a way to restore the previous configuration. Start with an accessible, useful page rather than optimizing a score while its content remains unavailable.

For translated content, publish a complete version in each language at its own address. Review self-referencing canonicals and reciprocal language links, then include eligible URLs in the sitemap. A translated page is not automatically a duplicate merely because its meaning matches another language. Search engines still decide which pages to index; no configuration promises a ranking or a traffic increase.

Tools and related guidance

• Follow the Ghost diagnostic workflow
• Check a public URL
• Inspect a redirect chain

Official references

• Ghost: built-in SEO
• Ghost: post settings