WordPress SEO Toronto. Technical, on-page & local SEO built from the foundation.
Most people who come to me for SEO have a WordPress site that someone else built. It looks fine, it doesn't rank, and it isn't bringing in leads. I'm a WordPress developer in Toronto, so I start where most SEO consultants can't: in the code and structure of the site itself. First a technical project to bring the site up to date, then a monthly retainer for content and the ongoing work that actually moves rankings. And when I build a site, all of this is in from day one.
What good SEO looks like in the wild
“@type”: “Service”,
“name”: “WordPress SEO”,
“provider”: {
“@type”: “Person”,
“name”: “Warren Groom”
},
“areaServed”: “Toronto, CA”
SEO score
validation
Vitals target
optimised
Most WordPress SEO is
done too late, too thin,
or not at all
The majority of WordPress sites are built, handed over, and then someone turns to an SEO tool and adds a few meta descriptions. That’s not SEO, that’s tidying up. Real SEO starts with how the site is architected, how content is structured, and how fast the pages load.
I work the other way around. Technical foundations, schema markup, and performance targets are set before a line of content is written. Then on-page, local, and AI visibility work layers on top of a structure that was built to support it. That’s the difference between SEO that’s bolted on and SEO that actually works.
How I deliver SEO
Four ways to work
together on SEO
SEO isn't one thing. It depends on where the site is and what it needs. Most existing sites go through the middle two in order, a technical project and then a retainer. Sites I build get the foundations as standard.
Baked into
every build
Every site I build comes with the technical foundations in place: clean structure, Rank Math configured, schema generated from the content, and speed targets met at launch. It isn’t an add-on. It’s how a site should be built.
SEO for
existing sites
This is where most of my SEO work starts. A site built by someone else, usually a few years old, that needs bringing up to date before anything else will work: structure, speed, schema, redirects, metadata. If the foundations can be fixed, I fix them. If they can’t, I’ll say so, because a rebuild is sometimes the cheaper route.
SEO audit &
recommendations
Every existing-site project begins with an audit: technical health, on-page signals, schema, and AI readiness, written up as a prioritised list you can act on yourself or hand back to me. It’s also available on its own if you just want to know where you stand.
Ongoing SEO
retainer
Once the foundations are right, rankings come from what you publish and how consistently you publish it. The monthly retainer covers content, written by me and structured to rank and to be cited, alongside technical upkeep and reporting. This is most of my SEO work, and it’s where the results come from.
The full service list
WordPress SEO Toronto,
in detail
Everything here is available on its own, as part of a build, or inside a retainer. What a site needs depends on where it's starting from.
Everything else sits on this. If Google can't crawl the site, understand how it's organised, or trust that it's fast and secure, no amount of content will make up for it. On a new build I get it right from the start. On an existing site it's usually the first thing I fix.
The signals on each page that tell search engines and readers what it's about, who it's for, and why it can be trusted: titles, headings, descriptions, links. I set these up in the content model, with guardrails in the editor so they stay right as you add pages.
Schema is structured data that tells Google and AI systems, in a form they can read, what a page actually is: a service, a person, a business, a set of questions and answers. I generate it automatically from the site's content fields so it stays accurate as things change, and validate it before launch.
If you serve a city or a region, local signals are what put you in the map pack and in location searches. I connect the site's content to its geography, consistently, from the schema down to the page structure.
Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO) is the practice of making content discoverable and citable by AI systems like ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google's AI Overviews. It isn't separate from good SEO. It's the next layer on top of it, and I've been doing it for clients already.
Professional Rank Math setup & configuration for WordPress. Why it matters.
Most WordPress sites run Yoast, not because it’s the best tool but because it’s the one people have heard of. Rank Math has quietly become the developer’s choice: finer control over schema, a better fit with ACF, and a cleaner way of handling structured data, which matters more every month as AI crawlers become a primary audience.
I configure it properly. Not installed and left on defaults, but set up to match the site’s content model, generating schema from the fields automatically, and staying accurate as the content changes.
Warren covered everything from website management, custom web design, lead generation strategies, SEO leadership, and in recent times he was implementing strategies for AI visibility also.
For agency partners
SEO your agency
can resell with confidence
If you run an agency, all of this is available white-label. Most agencies either leave SEO off WordPress projects or install Yoast and call it done, and neither is something you can put your name on. I give you a technical foundation that’s actually been done properly and a retainer your agency can resell with a real value story behind it. I deliver the work, you present the results, and if you ever need me in the room to explain the technical detail, I can do that too. How I work with agencies.
What people usually
ask about SEO
01 Is SEO included in every build, or do I have to add it?
The technical foundations are in every WordPress build I do: clean architecture, Rank Math configuration, schema markup, Core Web Vitals, sitemaps and redirects. Deeper on-page work, local SEO and the ongoing retainer are scoped separately, because they depend on what you’re trying to rank for.
02 Can you do SEO on a site you didn't build?
Yes, and it’s the most common way people come to me. It starts with an audit, then a technical project to bring the site up to date. The honest caveat: if the site’s structure is broken underneath, I’ll tell you, and sometimes the right answer is a rebuild rather than patching over it.
03 Do you write content, or just optimise the structure?
Both. The technical work gets a site ready to rank; the content is what actually moves it, so I write it. On a retainer, that’s most of the month: pages and articles written for the people searching, structured so search engines and AI answers can read them, and published on a schedule. If you already have a writer, I’ll work alongside them instead.
04 What does a Rank Math setup actually include?
Full configuration of schema types matched to the site’s content model, automated JSON-LD generation from ACF fields, metadata field setup, sitemap configuration, redirect management, and Search Console integration. Not just installed, but properly configured for the specific site.
05 How is GEO different from regular SEO?
Traditional SEO targets Google’s crawlers and ranking algorithms. GEO (Generative Engine Optimisation) targets AI systems like ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google’s AI Overviews, which answer questions directly rather than returning a list of links. The technical overlap is significant, but the content architecture and entity signals required are different enough to warrant specific attention.
06 How do you report on SEO retainer work?
Monthly, covering what was done, what changed in rankings and technical health, and what’s planned for the next cycle. The report is written so you can forward it as it is, whether that’s to your own team or, if you’re an agency, to your client.
Want SEO that actually
starts at the foundation?
Whether it's part of a build that's coming up or a site that's been sitting there not ranking, tell me where it is and I'll tell you where I'd start.