How important is sticking to an exact keyword?
-
The latest article I'm writing for my site is "Friends With Benefits Rules"... So the first part of my question is, what does SEOMoz advocate as being the ideal # of times to include the entire key phrase in the article? I know nobody but Google knows for certain, but is 4 (including in H1's etc.) generally considered enough, other than in the page title?
Second part is, what is the consensus about how important is it to stick to the exact keyword? For the example I gave, is it just as good to include a comma, E.g. "...friends with benefits, rules..." or a hyphen "Friends with Benefits - Rules for..."? One thing I'm unclear about on this topic is stop words and plurals. I've been told before that Google ignores stop words, but results for searches with or without the word "how," for example produce very different results... Same thing with plurals.
In any case, all of the above is assuming that the quality of the content would not be affected in either case...
-
Ok Forget keyword density, it only affect the site in a non user friendly way.
This is what you should focus on(in my opinion), I call this the three simple keyword rule.
Here we go:
- The title must have the keyword in it. eg: title: Rules for Friends with Benefits
- The heading shall reflect the title but in a more focused and detailed way, eg: These are the rules for friends with benefits.
- The content delivers the answer to the heading. eg: You will naturally include the keyword in the text content since you structured the article around the heading. Make sure that you start with a summary that reflect the title.
Let's break this down in a descriptive way:
- The title describes the heading and content in a summary way with no more than 65 characters. this keeps it focused and relevant.
- The heading explains the title in a more detailed way.
- The content reflects the title and heading in a descriptive and informative way that has a summary that reflect the title and the full length article reflects the heading.
There we are, now try to follow these rules and you don't need to wonder about the keyword density and you'll automatically create good content that is visible and often better than the competition in the SERP.
Best,
Gustav
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Are keywords in the title tag becoming redundant?
I've noticed that lot's of the world's leading digital agencies are not using keywords in their titles. Eg AKQA, DigitasLBi, POKE, SYZYGY etc. Why is that? Are keywords no longer that important? This can't be accidental seeing as it's the case for so many leading agencies.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | RRoginator0 -
Where is the best location for my primary keyword in my URL?
http://moz.com/learn/seo/url says: http://www.example.com/category-keyword/subcategory-keyword/primary-keyword.html However I am wondering about structuring things this a little backwards from that: http://www.example.com/primary-keyword/ (this would be an introduction and overview of the topic described by the primary keyword)
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | TheEspresseo
http://www.example.com/primary-keyword/secondary/ (this would be a category landing page with snippets from articles within the niche described by the secondary keyword, which is itself a niche of the primary keyword)
http://www.example.com/primary-keyword/secondary/article-title/ (in-depth article on a topic within the scope of the secondary, which is within the scope of the primary) Where http://www.example.com/primary-keyword/ is the most important page targeting the most important URL. Thoughts?0 -
How to increase the traffic and keywords ranking
Am working on a website http://www.greavescotton.com. A month ago most of the keywords were in first page. This month I have noticed the fall of keyword rankings. I have checked the webmaster tools for any mails and messages but I did not find any. So can anyone please visit the site and check it and please give me the suggestions accordingly to increase the traffic and keywords. Also I would like to know the advantages of commenting in Youtube.com.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | PrasanthMohanachandran0 -
Keyword research with smart search suggestions?
I found a smart search suggestion plugin that looks amazing and thought I'd see if anyone has experience with it. www.suggest.io looks like a great usability improvement and even helps to do keyword research with what your visitors are searching on your site. I'm excited about it and feel like it is too good to be true. Does anyone have experience with this plugin or something similar?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | TheDude0 -
Is traffic and content really important for an e-commerce site???
Hi All, I'm maintaining an e-commerce website and I've encountered some related keywords that I know will not convert to sales but are related to the subject and might help becoming an "authority". I'll give an example... If a car dealership wrote an amazing article about cleaning a car.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | BeytzNet
Obviously it is related but the chances of someone looking to clean his car will go ahead and buy one now are quite low. Also, he will probably bounce out of this page after reading the piece. To conclude, Would such an article do GOOD (helping to become an authority and having more visitors) or BAD (low conversion rate and high bounce rate)? Thanks0 -
Keyword weight in Domain Name
Hi All, I'm looking for some advice on URL structure. Our domain name includes 1/2 of many keyword strategies that we're considering. For example our domain is like, dive.com Keyword strategies that we're looking at targeting would include things like, "dive shop", "dive equipment" etc etc Are we competitive to have a structure like this? dive.com/shop/ dive.com/equipment/ Or will this structure yield stronger results? dive.com/dive-shop/ dive.com/dive-equipment/ Your thoughts are appreciated. Thanks! Malcolm
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | MAGNUMCreative0 -
Magic keywords in Google Webmaster Tools
Hi All, Recently moved a friend to a new WP back-end website as they were on Flash which is pretty, but not necessarily the best for SEO. http://francesphotography.com My question is that once Google finally indexed the site, I noticed in Google Webmaster tools that it found the most significant keyword to be: automatically On the following top pages: | tag/snow-boarding-photography/ |
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | BoulderJoe
|tag/style-photography/ |
|tag/underwater-photography/ |
|tag/vacation-photography/ |
|tag/wedding-photography-beaver-creek/ |
|tag/wedding-photography-copper-mountain/ |
|tag/wedding-photography-denver/ |
|tag/wedding-photography/ |
|underwater-photography-scuba-diving-cozumel-mexico/ |
|wedding-photography/ | The goofy thing is I can find anywhere that "automatically" is used - perhaps it is coming from a plug-in or magically keyword beans that Google found? Any guidance is appreciated.
0 -
Optimising a website for multiple keywords and multiple towns
Hello, We have a clients site who we are trying to rank for 10 keywords accross 20 towns so a combination of 200. What would be the best way to tackle this. Their url is www.abbottclarkeifa.co.uk. Thanks Shehzad
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Gareth_Cartman0