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Edwin Toonen

Edwin is an experienced strategic content specialist. Before joining Yoast, he worked for a web design magazine, where he learned how to create great content.

You can find Edwin on: Twitter

In 2006, after working full time in a bookstore for many years, I boldly decided to return to school. I wanted to combine my love for writing with the lure of the internet, so I picked Digital Communication at the HAN University of Applied Sciences in Arnhem. Four years later, I graduated with honors.

In the meantime, I started working for The Netherlands’ largest monthly magazine on web design and development. As a managing editor, I wrote, edited, and translated hundreds of articles on this fascinating subject. I also made sure the magazine’s day-to-day operations went according to plan.

At Yoast, I do much of the same work, except on a bigger scale. As a content specialist, I am responsible for delivering quality content that is engaging and optimal.

In my spare time, I love rocking my 1972 Fender Precision bass with my band (Every Other Me), fiddling about with synthesizers, listening to music, watching an endless stream of – classic – movies, taking long cycling trips, and enjoying life with my sons and girlfriend.

Edwin

Pressing questions about Gutenberg: the new editor in WordPress 5.0

5 December 2018 | 11 Comments Edwin Toonen

December 6th, 2018, we saw the release of WordPress 5.0. With it came one of the most talked about — and divisive — new features ever: a brand-new editor, the one we currently know as Gutenberg. Gutenberg is not just a simple refresh of the interface, no, it is an entirely re-imagined editor with a […]

Read: "Pressing questions about Gutenberg: the new editor in WordPress 5.0"
Pressing questions about Gutenberg: the new editor in WordPress 5.0


Yoast SEO 9.2: Getting ready for WordPress 5.0

20 November 2018 | 18 Comments Edwin Toonen

We are getting ready for WordPress 5.0 and the new Gutenberg editor — are you? In Yoast SEO 9.2, we’ve solidified our support for WordPress 5.0 to make sure nothing breaks when you update to the new version of the CMS. What’s more, we’re now using a brand-new WordPress API to get our eye markers […]

Read: "Yoast SEO 9.2: Getting ready for WordPress 5.0"
Yoast SEO 9.2: Getting ready for WordPress 5.0

Yoast SEO 9.1: The Hacktoberfest Edition

6 November 2018 | 7 Comments Edwin Toonen

October is Hacktoberfest month! Hacktoberfest is all about contributing to open source projects together. This year, we welcomed a nice crowd at Yoast HQ to help us improve our own and other peoples open source projects. Some of these fixes and enhancements made by this fine group of people made it into Yoast SEO 9.1. […]

Read: "Yoast SEO 9.1: The Hacktoberfest Edition"
Yoast SEO 9.1: The Hacktoberfest Edition

Yoast SEO 9.0: A much improved SEO analysis

23 October 2018 | 27 Comments Edwin Toonen

Welcome to the dawn of a new era. For ages, Yoast SEO has helped you optimize your content using a focus keyword. This works well but could be a lot more flexible. The plugin only recognized an exact match of your keyword and didn’t take plural forms into account, for instance. So, sometimes you had […]

Read: "Yoast SEO 9.0: A much improved SEO analysis"
Yoast SEO 9.0: A much improved SEO analysis

Yoast SEO 8.4: Helping you optimize taxonomies

9 October 2018 | 9 Comments Edwin Toonen

Most releases are all about incredible new features or fixing a gazillion bugs with the help of the community. But sometimes, there’s a small release that is unfortunately timed just before a big one. There may not be any new game-changers in Yoast SEO 8.4, but does that mean it shouldn’t get its own release […]

Read: "Yoast SEO 8.4: Helping you optimize taxonomies"
Yoast SEO 8.4: Helping you optimize taxonomies

Google at 20: Journeys, AI-driven results and visual search

26 September 2018 | 13 Comments Edwin Toonen

It’s hard to imagine a life without a search engine that knows what it’s doing. I remember the days of AltaVista and co, search engines that just dump random pages on you for every given query. I was so excited to see Google enter the scene and immediately do everything right — the results were […]

Read: "Google at 20: Journeys, AI-driven results and visual search"
Google at 20: Journeys, AI-driven results and visual search


Yoast SEO 8.2: Automatically add structured data with Gutenberg content blocks

11 September 2018 | 26 Comments Edwin Toonen

While we’re still only at the start of the Gutenberg adventure, we’re presenting an awesome, brand-new feature for the new WordPress editor today. Meet the Yoast SEO structured data content blocks! The content blocks automatically add valid structured data code to the content that is added to these blocks. Our initial line-up consists of How-to […]

Read: "Yoast SEO 8.2: Automatically add structured data with Gutenberg content blocks"
Yoast SEO 8.2: Automatically add structured data with Gutenberg content blocks

First things first: writing content with the inverted pyramid style

7 September 2018 | 33 Comments Edwin Toonen

Journalists have been using the inverted pyramid writing style for ages. Using it, you put your most important information upfront. Don’t hedge. Don’t bury your key point halfway down the third paragraph. And don’t hold back; tell the complete story in the first paragraph. Even online, this writing style holds up pretty well for some […]

Read: "First things first: writing content with the inverted pyramid style"
First things first: writing content with the inverted pyramid style