Most WordPress SEO tools stop at telling you what’s wrong. This page explains what happens when the tool can also make the change: what the free RankThat Bridge plugin can fix, how to set it up, what a month of work looks like, how review and undo work, and where the limits are. The example is Brightside Dental, a fictional three-dentist practice whose WordPress site uses Yoast SEO and a page builder theme.
What the Bridge plugin can change
Every fix starts as a draft in RankThat. Nothing changes on your site until someone approves it, and every approved change can be undone in one click.
| Fix | What it does on your site |
|---|---|
| SEO titles and descriptions | Writes them into the fields of your existing SEO plugin: Rank Math, Yoast or SEOPress. Shop and category pages are covered with Rank Math and SEOPress |
| Redirects for broken pages | Sends dead addresses to the closest live page, never just the homepage |
| Links that point at redirects | Updates your internal links to the final address |
| Page schema | Adds JSON-LD that describes each page |
| Organization or LocalBusiness schema | Your business name, address, phone and hours in a form search engines and AI assistants read |
| llms.txt | Writes and serves a short guide to your site for AI assistants |
| AI crawler access | Adjusts robots.txt so the AI search crawlers you choose can read the site |
| Security headers | Adds the recommended headers browsers check |
| Image alt text | Describes images that have no alt text |
| Image compression | Shrinks oversized images |
| Main image priority | Tells browsers to load each page’s largest image first, which helps loading speed scores |
| Internal links for orphan pages | Adds links to pages nothing else links to |
| Mixed content | Changes http image and script addresses to https |
| Broken outbound links | Points each dead link to another site at an archived copy, or removes the link and keeps the text |
| Mobile call and book bar | Keeps your phone number or booking button on screen on phones |
| Tappable phone numbers | Turns phone numbers into links that dial with one tap |
| Trust page drafts | Drafts missing About, Contact or Privacy pages for you to edit and publish |
The plugin works alongside your SEO plugin rather than replacing it. Yoast, Rank Math or SEOPress keep doing their job; RankThat fills in their fields for you at scale. Our glossary entry on WordPress SEO plugins explains how the pieces fit.
Setting it up
- Check the basics. The plugin needs WordPress 6.0 or later and PHP 8.0 or later. Your host’s dashboard shows the PHP version.
- Add your site as a project in RankThat.
- Download the plugin from your project’s settings, then in WordPress go to Plugins, Add New, Upload Plugin, and activate it.
- Connect it to your project. RankThat detects which SEO plugin you use.
- Run a full site audit. This is the list of everything that can be fixed, with a plain-English reason for each one.
If your site sits behind a firewall or security service that blocks outside connections, that’s fine. The plugin can pull approved changes from RankThat instead of RankThat pushing them in, so nothing needs to be opened up. For the audit itself, the crawler identifies itself honestly as RankThatBot and can be allowlisted; it never tries to get around bot protection.
A month on Brightside Dental’s site
Week 1: titles, descriptions and the big errors
The first audit finds 64 pages with titles that are missing, duplicated or too long, mostly blog posts titled exactly like their headline plus ”- Brightside Dental”. RankThat drafts new titles and descriptions for all of them. The office manager reads through the list, edits six that don’t sound right, and approves the rest. The plugin writes them into Yoast’s fields. That took about twenty minutes, against a weekend of opening posts one by one.
The audit also flags 11 old service pages that return 404 from a redesign two years ago. RankThat drafts a redirect for each one to its closest live page: the old “whitening-special” page to the current teeth whitening page, for example. Where no page is a clear match, it leaves the address alone rather than guessing.
Week 2: schema, images and AI readiness
Next come the site-wide fixes that take one approval each: LocalBusiness schema with the practice’s address, phone and hours, an llms.txt, and robots.txt rules that let the AI search crawlers in. Then the images: 140 photos without alt text get descriptions, and the oversized ones get compressed. The homepage hero image is marked to load first.
After each fix, RankThat re-checks the live page, so you know the change is what visitors and Google actually see, not just something saved in the database.
Week 3: links and the phone
Four blog posts had no internal links pointing to them, so nobody could reach them except through search. RankThat suggests links from related posts and adds them on approval. For a dental practice, the mobile call and book bar matters more than most fixes: most new-patient searches happen on phones, and a booking button that stays on screen removes a step.
The Bridge plugin also counts enquiries: contact form submissions and taps on phone, email and WhatsApp links, with where each visitor came from. It never sends names, numbers or messages.
Week 4: content
With the technical issues handled, the practice turns to content. RankThat suggests topics from the searches the site nearly ranks for, writes a brief, drafts the article in the practice’s own voice, and publishes it to WordPress when they’re ready. The content tools also flag older posts losing traffic so they can be refreshed rather than rewritten.
Approve fixes by type, not page by page. Reviewing 64 titles in one list is faster and more consistent than visiting 64 pages, and you can still edit any single one before it goes live.
How review and undo work
- Drafts first. Every fix is a proposal until you approve it. You can edit drafted wording, such as titles and descriptions, before approving.
- One-click undo. Every applied change is recorded. Undo puts back exactly what was there before.
- Live re-check. After a fix, RankThat checks the live site to confirm it took effect.
If you work with a developer or agency, they can review and approve on your behalf, and you can see every change that was made.
What to report each month
A short monthly report is drafted for you in plain English at the start of each month. It works as a note to yourself, an update for a business partner, or a client report: clicks from Google, enquiries, ranking changes, and the work completed, including each fix applied. You review and edit it before anyone sees it; nothing is sent automatically.
Pricing fit
| Plan | Price | Suits |
|---|---|---|
| Starter | $50 a month | One WordPress site: mini audits of up to 50 pages, 10 a month, 100 tracked keywords, 5 AI articles a month |
| Professional | $99 a month | Up to 5 sites with full site audits, 1,000 keywords per site, 25 AI articles a month, brand voice and publishing to WordPress, Search Console, 3 team members per site |
| Enterprise | $199 a month | Agencies and businesses with many sites: unlimited projects, keywords, audits and articles |
The Bridge plugin is free on every plan. Each plan has a 14-day free trial: you enter a card at sign-up and aren’t charged until the trial ends. Paying yearly costs 10 months’ price. See pricing for details.
Honest limits
- It fixes what’s on the list above. A slow host, a heavy page builder or a theme that prints three H1s on every page still needs a theme setting or a developer. The audit tells you which of these is holding you back.
- WordPress.com sites need a plan that allows plugin uploads.
- Automatic fixes are WordPress only. On Wix, Squarespace or Shopify you get the audit and reports, and make changes yourself.
- Shop and category titles need Rank Math or SEOPress to be applied automatically.
- It’s not a page builder or a security plugin. It adds recommended security headers; it doesn’t replace your firewall or backups.
WordPress setup checklist
- WordPress 6.0+ and PHP 8.0+
- Bridge plugin installed, activated and connected
- Your SEO plugin detected (Rank Math, Yoast or SEOPress)
- First full audit run
- Titles and descriptions reviewed and applied in one batch
- Redirects for broken pages approved
- Organization or LocalBusiness schema, llms.txt and AI crawler access in place
- Alt text added and images compressed
- Orphan pages linked
- Mobile call or book bar on (service businesses)
For the settings that come before any of this, our WordPress SEO setup guide covers permalinks, your SEO plugin and sitemaps. To spot-check a page at any time, use the free Website SEO Checker, and for the full list of what the plugin does, see the WordPress feature page.