How do search engines score "nested" keywords?

[Kp222]

I use "nested" for lack of a better term; what I mean is keyword phrases that contain other keyword phrases. For example, if I have a page that is extremely well optimized (on-page) for the phrase "old silver coins", is that page by default also extremely well optimized (on-page) for the phrase "silver coins"?

Or does google understand that I am optimizing for the longer phrase "old silver coins" and somehow exclude me from contention for the sub-phrase "silver coins"?

I understand that this gets more complicated when talking about backlinks (off-page), but the same general question remains. If I am getting good backlinks for "old silver coins", am I also getting good backlinks for "silver coins" at the same time?

I do understand that "silver coins" may be more competitive than "old silver coins" and so my page may not rank the same for the two phrases.

But I am really curious if there is some kind of multiplier effect with nested keyword phrases like the example I have provided, or whether google somehow only credits for the full phrase and not for any sub-phrases contained therein.

Any insight would be greatly appreciated!  (And sorry if this has been addressed already. I have looked around the site and have googled this question, but haven't found anything useful yet.) Thanks.

BONUS QUESTION: Are the answers to my questions above exactly the same when discussing singular versus plural keywords ("coins" versus "coin")? After all, that is a "nested case just like my examples above. On the other hand, I can see there being some special treatment of singular and plural.

[RyanKent]

Pluralized terms are treated as different words.

When I search for "coin" the wiki article is first. When I search for "coins" that same article is still on the first page but at the bottom. Other pages focused on "coins" have more relevancy due to the identical match.

[Kp222]

Thanks very much.

And how about the singular / plural question? Are singular and plural versions of a word treated as completely separate keywords, or are they somehow lumped together? In other words, is your answer the same with respect to "coin" versus "coins" or do the search engines return results for either if a user searches for on or the other?

Thanks again!

[RyanKent]

What you are asking about is relevancy. If you write an article on the topic of "old silver coins", if your page is perfectly optimized for that key phrase then your url, title, links, content will all use that phrase. Your page is still relevant for "silver coins" but all the pages which are optimized for "silver coins" will beat you assuming the other factors are equal.

When you perform a search for "silver coins" on Google.com, over 13 million results are returned. 90% of people do not look past the first page so the reality is you are competing for the top spots on the first page. If your result isn't on the first page, it doesn't really matter much.

The bottom line, yes your page would be relevant for "silver coins" but most likely it wont be relevant enough to make any meaningful difference.