SEO Training

Are your pages straining under the weight of keyword density and struggling to climb the Google ranks?

Keyword density is the number of keywords as a percentage of the total text on a web page.  Too little density and the search engine algorithms will presume that the page is not important for that keyword.  Too much density and the page will get penalised for keyword stuffing.

Since nobody has access to the search engine algorithms, how do we determine what the bounds are for keyword density?  What is the correct or optimum keyword density for your page?

If you have gone searching for the answer online you will have found the answer to be stated as anything between 1% and 8% (in general).  The truth is that keyword density is old news.  It just does not matter as much as it used to.  Nobody knows for certain, so this is just my opinion.  It is an opinion however, that is based on experience and experimentation.  Here is my view on Keyword density:

Forget about Keyword Density! The only check I do around density now is to make sure I have not gone too high.  I like to stick to not going over about 6% in general.  However, if the article reads well to me, then I’ll let it slide so long as it’s under 8%.  I do not have a minimum density.

Keyword Positioning is far more important than the number of times it is repeated.  I generally have the keyword in the title, and in the H1 / H2 tags and again in the body text.  This is particularly true of text immediately after headings.  I do not always keep the same word order, or even use exactly the same words.  I want what I write to be legible for humans.

Certainly I have repeated the words “keyword density” a fair bit in this post, more so than usual.  It is just how this particular post has gone.  I find it harder to write “SEO training” in posts, simply because it does not fit into the general flow of what I write.

A word of caution.  If you have a density that is too high, it may work for you.  It may get you up there in the google ranks… but not for long.  Keyword Stuffing is bad bad bad!  It worked back in the 90’s, and many SEO consultants in Ireland are still recommending it on a smaller scale than before.  I completely disagree with this.  Keyword stuffing is outdated now to the same extent that travel by horses has been replaced by cars!  Keyword densities are a factor still, but are not something to be pushed to extremes and do not hold the same weight as they once did.

Use internal links to chain your site together and make it work as one unit

One of the things I forgot to mention when I was talking about on-page SEO was internal linking.  This was very remiss of me so I thought I should cover it immediately.

Internal linking is the practice of creating links in your text that point to other pages on your site.  It is a part of SEO training that is often not covered.

Why use internal links?  After all you have a navigation menu so what use are more links to the same pages?  Navigation does not generally allow you use the keywords you would like a page to be found for.  The “home” navigation item is a prime example.  You could forgo the word “home” and put in something that relates to the actual page, but that would be at odds with good heuristics (ease of use) for your user.  Visitors to a website expect to see a home page.  So we need to give it to them.  The trouble is that the word “home” does nothing as far telling a search engine what the page is about (unless you have a property site perhaps).  The same is true with all your navigation links.  They do not give an ideal idea of what the page is about.  They are usually only one or two words long for a start.

With internal linking in your body text, because you control the website, you have total control over what text goes into those links.  Let’s look at it from a search engines point of view.  They look at links, the text in the links and the relevance of the page the link points to.  They assume that the text in the link is representative of the page you are pointing to (otherwise it’s a pointless link).  If you have descriptive text in a link, it tells the search engine a bit more about the page than it could gain from simply crawling the page itself.  You are telling the search engines that the keyword(s) you use in your link are important for that page.  The search engines take that information, and when somebody else types those same keywords into the search engine, the search engine goes, “oh, I know, This page here is about that”, simply because it has been told it is by the link text.  Link text is a prime SEO factor.

That over simplifies it a bit, but it’s all you really need to know about it for now.

How to use internal links.  Like with all areas in SEO, moderation is king.  But I thought it was content that was king I hear you say.  Well yes, but Moderation in SEO efforts is vital.  Otherwise you are stuffing.

Here is a wonderful benefit of using internal link text.  You get the benefit of the words twice.  Say, for example you have a front (home) page on your site (which doubtless you do).  On that page you want to inform visitors about the whole sites’ contents.  To do this you write text that talks about all the things you have going on in the site.  Within that text will be keywords that you want to be found for, and those keywords will relate to other pages on the site.  Make a link out of them and point them to the other pages.

By creating a link in text you are saying to both users and search engines that they can find more information on the subject of the linked text by clicking on it.  The keyword is on the page and at the same time you are pointing out that another page on your site is also related to that keyword.  Sweet.

Blogging is a prime example of where this technique is used well.  I don’t do enough of it.  I sometimes write these posts just to remind myself of what I should be doing.  Take a look at copyblogger though.  Not only do they have a fair few internal links, but they also do a great job of teaching you about writing internet copy (that’s text to you and me).  They also write nice short posts in general, something I should learn from.

A word of caution.

I have seen this done to excess.  Try not to make your pages a horrendous looking sea of links.  Remember that guidelines say that you should have less than 100 links per page.  That includes all your navigation by the way.

Also, I should point out that including several links to the same page within your text is regarded by some (myself included) as a waste of time.  There is some evidence that if you use two different keywords to link to the same page, the first keyword will be given preference and the second will be ignored.  Somebody actually set up an experiment to test it and it would seem to be the case on Google.

Make sure the keywords you use in your link are relevant to both the page you link to and the surrounding text on the page you are linking from.  This is important.

I should have given you the short version of this post really:-

Create internal links with relevant keywords and don’t overdo it!  It will do you wonders.

How vital is on page SEO to overall SEO efforts?

Keyword Stuffing

On page SEO is absolutely vital.  On its own, on page SEO will not get you far. Without it however, your overall SEO efforts will not get far.  This  is where a lot of people make lots of mistakes though.  There is not a lot that can go wrong with link building by comparison with on page SEO.

The prime mistake by people with their on page SEO is keyword stuffing.  Lets take a look at each element of a page and see how keyword stuffing can stuff you up.

Page Elements

Page title

• The page title is the words that appear at the top of your browser when you visit a page. It is a meta tag that goes <title>some text</title> and lives in the head section of your html page.
• Try to keep it to 40 characters or so and do not repeat keywords in it (stuffing).
• That includes variations like “Jobs Dublin”, “Jobs Cork” etc.
• Try to place your keywords at the beginning.  If you must include a company name then put it at the end.

Meta Description

• The Meta Description also lives in the head section of the html page.  It looks like.. <meta name=’description’ content=’blah blah blah’ />  It is usually the text that appears below your page title in search engine results.
• This should be aimed at users, not search engines.  While Google has not ruled out that it may use the content, it is given little importance in terms of gaining rank in the SERPS. Use it to sell your page to a viewer.
• What is certain is that if you stuff it with keywords you could well find yourself penalised, while simultaneously putting off any human visitors (and these are the ones you are after).

Meta Keywords

• Meta Keywords also live in the head section of your html.  These used to be used by search engines to determine what the author thought were relevant keywords for the page. Widespread abuse in the forms of keyword stuffing and non-relevant text mean that it is quite alright to leave this section out.  I still include it, but I make sure that I only include a handful of extremely relevant keywords that are actually in the visible text of the page.

H1 tag

• This is the title of the page, and will appear on the actual page. It is found in the body section of you html page.
• I often have the h1 tag exactly the same as my page title tag.  If this does not make sense to the page then I make sure it is at least extremely similar, containing the same keywords.
• The h1 tag is the most important piece of text in the visible page.  Choose your content wisely.
• There should only ever be one h1 tag per page.

h2-h6 tags

• The rest of the h (heading) tags are also important. The higher the number, the less important.  Treat them in the same way as your h1 tag.

Paragraph tags

• Everything on your page should be contained within tags.  The text in your paragraphs needs to be relevant to your title.  Remember you are dealing with dumb machines.  If you have a keyword in your h tag then make sure it is also in your paragraph tag below it.
• Write for humans.  Do not repeat keywords too much.

How Do I know if I am Keyword Stuffing Unintentionally?

A simple rule of thumb is that if it does not read well to a human, you are probably guilty of keyword stuffing.

To avoid unintentional keyword stuffing try to keep your keywords to about 5% of your page text.  If you go too far over then you will be penalised.  If you see a competitor above you who has a higher proportion of the same keyword it is likely that they are above you as a result of off page optimisation rather than on page optimisation.

Sometimes keyword stuffing works.  I have had pages usurped by pages from competitors with tons of keyword stuffing.  The good news is that it rarely lasts.  They climb and then they drop again as a general rule.  I want to teach you how to have more stable, long term results.

SEO should not be about cheating your way to the top, it should be about working within guidelines and optimising your efforts within those guidelines.  Anything else is risky.  You may get away with it for a while, maybe even a long time, but eventually your site will suffer.  It is easy to be temped by the ‘dark side’, but it is not a good idea for a business that depends on its website.  If you have a non-critical website, then feel free to practice all the dark arts of SEO – it will teach you a lot.  Just don’t host the site on the same server as any sites you care about.

The really bad keyword stuffing practices

• Hidden text. This is where you make the text the same colour as the background so that it is not visible to humans.  This text is often smaller than 8 pixels.  It is always full of keywords.  It works – until you get caught.
• Cloaking. Displaying different text to search engines than to human visitors.  Again this works – until you get caught.

If in doubt, don’t do it.

How far can I push it?

There is only one way to find out…. and that is to push it.  You can either slowly increase your keyword ratio on the page until you lose rank, or you can put in as many keywords as you can and slowly remove them until you gain rank.

The great thing about losing relevance as a result of keyword stuffing is that you can reverse it by fixing the problem.  It can be a slow process though, since it takes days for most sites to be crawled enough for changes to be reflected in the search rankings.

Final Advice on Keywords

• Beware of having keywords (particularly long tail – several worded – keywords) in close proximity.
• Make sure that your headings relate to the surrounding text.
• Remember that on page SEO is just the start.  You need to build links too.

The text in your inbound links is extremely important.  Like with everything in SEO it is not the only factor with links that you have to take into consideration, but it is one of the ones you need to concentrate on.

The trouble with links (natural ones) is that people tend to link to your page with your site url.

If your site is http://www.jackiebrownmedical.ie and your site is about medical recruitment, then a link with the text www.jackiebrownmedical.ie is not going to do you much good.  However a link that reads Medical Jobs is far more useful.

So how do you make people use that version when they link to you?

In all probability you will not be able to (directories etc all use the site url).  The best way to control your inbound link text is to create those links yourself.

Here are some ideas of how to do that.

1. Create a blog like this one.  Every time I write I can include and links I like with whatever text I like.  The example above will not be particularly useful to Jackie Brown Medical for several reasons.  But If this blog was called www.medicaljobs.ie and the article was about medical jobs then it would certainly be useful.  You get the idea.
2. Forums.  Create a signature in every forum you use with a link that uses a keyword you want your site to show up for.  In addition you may be able to put the odd link into the text of your forum posts.  Beware though that if you abuse it you will fall foul of the forum moderators.
3. Feeder sites.  Blogs are simple, but why not create a whole site about the keyword you want to show for.  Then use that site to link to your main site.
4. Blog commenting.  Comment on other peoples relevant blogs.  Make it useful or interesting though.  Blogs get huge amounts of spam.
5. Ask for it.  Contact the webmasters of other sites and ask for links.  If they are willing to give you one then they will probably be willing to give you one with the text you want.
6. Social bookmarking. Digg, Delicious, reddit etc. Submit your pages.  You can alter the title text of your page on most of them to be your keywords. ( I always alter them a bit just because I don’t want two pages with exactly the same title if I can help it).

Search Engine Optimisation is not an exact science.  Link building is more of an art in many ways.  Experiment and try new things.  Some may work, some not, but that’s the best way to learn. (other than SEO training of course)