Ranking for Keyword
-
Hi,
In the last couple months my client has dropped for several main keyword (not all but some). I suspect this has to do with algorithm updates in March.
I am trying to better target the site for this keyword as I discovered it is only mentioned in the home page title on their site at this time.
The homepage did not have a good H1 tag, so I added the keyword to that as well. It's in the menu and item page meta descriptions (ecommerce site) and I added it to the homepage meta description. I also suggested to the client that we place it and variants of it in various places throughout the site (where it makes sense).
I have a couple questions:
- Is having an H1 tag at the bottom of the page a concern? It's there because there are various product banners and other information at the top and I didn't want to disrupt the flow of the site. It is above the footer of the page. Does there need to be text underneath?
-Is there anything else I can do to improve my rankings for this keyword? I haven't really dealt with this before and any input is appreciated.
I also suggested they should try to improve their site overall with more descriptive product descriptions and trying to get backlinks from vendors and relevant contacts.
-
Hi Ali!
H1s aren't really viewed as a strong ranking factor anymore. They just don't correlate very clearly with improved rankings (see: https://moz.com/blog/which-page-markup-tags-still-matter-for-seo-whiteboard-friday) though they provide VERY important signals to human visitors. I'm not sure why the site you are optimizing would have this tag at the bottom of the page. That's not really standard, so I'd advise rethinking this usage, for the comfort of users.
Regarding SEO, in general, if you've identified a top phrase your client needs to be ranking for, yes, you definitely want it in the tags and text of most important pages. But, beyond this, modern marketing is moving towards the understanding of building topical authority to help you rank for a variety of interrelated terms.
So, for example, let's say that the most important phrase to your client is "organic flower seeds". Of course, you'll have this phrase in your tags and text, but you must figure out how to move beyond simple on-page optimization if you want the company's brand to become authoritative in Google's eyes as relevant to this subject. So, in addition to simply having a page called "organic flower seeds", you'll be striving to:
-
Cover everything that can possibly relate to this topic that customers need to know. Why choose organic seeds? What does "organic" mean? How do you plant organic flower seeds? How do you know how many seeds you needs? How much do you need to water them so they germinate? How do you package your seeds to keep them fresh for successive plantings? Etc, etc.
-
Build recognition of your brand as synonymous with your most important search terms. In other words, I say "Mexican-style fast food" and you say "Taco Bell". I say "organic flower seeds, and you say "Seeds of Change". Linkbuilding, word of mouth marketing, old-school PR, content dev, paid advertising and a ton of other elements factor into becoming an authority. Google seems to be particularly swayed by this, as you will see very large brands getting away with very poor practices and still ranking, while small, unknown companies struggle. So, you've got to aim to become as "known" as you can, so that you become one of Google's go-to resources for queries relating to that phrase you've identified.
Hope this helps!
-
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
-
Two sites, heavily cross linking, targeting the same keyword - is this a battle worth fighting?
Hi Mozzers, Would appreciate your input on this, as many people have differing views on this when asked... We manage 2 websites for the same company (very different domains) - both sites are targeting the same primary keyword phrase, however, the user journey should incorporate both websites, and therefore the sites are very heavily cross linked - so we can easily pass a user from one site to another. Whilst site 1 is performing well for the target keyword phrase, site 2 isn't. Site 1 is always around 2 to 3 rank, however we've only seen site 2 reach the top of page 2 in SERPs at best, despite a great deal of white hat optimisation, and is now on the decline. There's also a trend (all be it minimal) of when site 1 improves in rank, site 2 drops. Because the 2 sites are so heavily inter-linked could Google be treating them as one site, and therefore dropping site 2 in the SERPs, as it is in Google's interests to show different, relevant sites?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | A_Q0 -
Keyword + Location domains
Hi All, Just wanted to get everyones opinions on this, I see it more and more now where businesses own multiple domains for [keyword] + [location], they have multiple domains for different locations and setup individual sites on them. I see these types of domains rank very easily for medium competition keywords, as long as the on page is good and there are a handful of back links, they rank. just to clarify, for example - iphonerepairmanchester.co.uk (purely an example not sure how this site ranks!!) What are Googles views on this? I've always insisted its better to build a strong brand with the "real" business rather than creating extra websites named by keywords. But I've recently had a client want to pursue this and it seems it currently works, but is there a danger down the line Google will penalise it? The short term traffic increase is undeniable but like anything in the world of Google at the moment, I'd rather persuade clients not to go this route if it will protect future interests.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | gamnaking10 -
Redirecting old domains for SEO ranking?
It's been a while since I read anything seriously out of the box on SEO but I thought I would see what others thought of the bold assertions made in this article. Most of it revolves around buying expired domains and using a 301 to point them, and their juice, to new sites. This guy makes a living doing this so he has to know a bit more than the average Joe but I'm wondering where the other shoe is and when it drops.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | Highland0 -
Homepage bombed from rankings 2
I've had some varying advice on here regarding the best way to proceed with [i'll PM the URL] which was hit by Penguin 2.0. There were previous issues with the homepage and before the 22nd had started creating new decent links. Some have suggested to ditch the domain and start again. There are several reasons not to and branding is the deciding factor at this stage. I'm going down the route of initially trying to manually remove links and then follow on with disavow. I would really appreciate another pair of eyes taking a quick look to see if i'm missing anything other than a dodgy link profile.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | MickEdwards0 -
Avoiding Keyword Stuffing
I'm using this in my title, "Used Cars and Used Car Loans in _____" Is this a good practice since they're similar but different keywords? Thanks!
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | OOMDODigital0 -
My ranking dropped 3 pages on 18 november 2012
Hi There my site ranking dropped suddenly today for my main keywords such as security companies in london and security services in london from first page to 4th-5th page. these keywords were ranked on homepage http://www.armstrongsecurity.co.uk/ other keywords from some internal pages, such as this one http://www.armstrongsecurity.co.uk/security-services/event-security-london.html theygot hit slightly and went couple of listings down the road for event security london, event security companies london as well. same slight hitting happened on this page for main keywords http://www.armstrongsecurity.co.uk/bodyguard-for-hire-london.html can anyone help me, how to get the rankings back? my site authority is around 60 which is far better than most sites ranking higher than me now. these are some problems that i understand so far. keyword rich anchor text link profile for my main keywords over optimised pages let me know if anything you might find suspicious on my site that i can fix either on site or in my link profile. looking forward to your help. thanks gill
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | spciuk0 -
Why does my competitor rank so well with so many paid/traded links?
Greetings everyone! I've really been enjoying my Moz membership these past few weeks after studying my data and comparing it with my competitors I think it's high time I started asking some questions. The website I manage has a very good ranking history but over the past year we've seen a slight decline in our SERP positions. I don't think this has anything to do with on-page optimization but rather with our link profile. We have only about 10k links total while they have 175k - our mozranks are nearly identical, but his moztrust is 4.46 and our's is 3.51. I am guessing, on our end, I need to remove some of these low-quality nofollow links (though I'll be honest I have no idea how we obtained them to begin with) but what I don't understand is how our competitor is ranking so well because when I browse their link profile, it is filled with paid link and traded link directories that don't appear to be penalized for what they are. I was under the impression that this was bad SEO, but now I am thinking I should just play his own game and submit to these sites too. Looking for any advice or ideas on a better way to compete... ❤ Jennifer
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | Virage0 -
How does Google rank a websites search queries
Hello, I can't seem to find an answer anywhere. I was wondering how a websites search query keyword string url can rank above other page results that have stronger backlinks. The domain is usually strong, but that url with the .php?search=keyword just seems like it doesn't fit in. How does Google index those search string pages? Is it based off of traffic alone to that url? Because those urls typically don't have backlinks, right? Has anyone tried to rank their websites search query urls ever? I'm just a little curious about it. Thanks everyone. Jesse
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | getrightmusic0