site and they play a huge role in on page SEO.
Once you know what is a good keyword and how to do keyword research, then
you can find the keywords which you should be using for your on page SEO.
WordPress combined with a good free SEO plugin like All in One SEO Pack
makes implementing most of the following keyword related on page SEO factors
simple as can be, but let's take a look at where we need to make sure to
effectively use our keywords.
Keyword(s) In Title Tags - The title tag is the line of clickable text which
appears in Google's SERPs for each ranking page. This is also the text which
appears at the top of your browser's window in naming or identifying the
page which you are currently browsing. It's important to work your best
(most relevant, highest searched, lowest competition) keywords into your
title tags as Google will consider this over most factors when indexing and
ranking your page and in general in determining what it's about.
Keywords In Heading Tags - Effective use of heading tags helps Google know
what is most important on your site, and what text it should pick out over
the rest. It's been estimated that most people when opening a new page will
first instinctively read the top left of your page before other elements.
Consequently, your most important message using your most important keyword
that you want to get across should be here and ideally using the H1 tag.
From here, less important keywords should be put in H2, and even less
important but still noteworthy keywords should be in H3, and so on. An
effective use of heading tags is a valuable skill to have in on page SEO.
Keywords In the Body - There is no substitute for good content, and in SEO a
large part of good content is effectively including keywords where
applicable. This means no over saturation because as I mentioned in the last
chapter this will get you penalized and possibly de-indexed. A number of
SEOers have argued for years over just the right saturation which will get
you ranking well but not penalized and they have thrown out different
figures to try to answer this magical ratio.
My advice is to not waste your time trying to crunch ratios as there is no
perfect ratio. Besides, you have better things to do with your time and
other ways to optimize your site. Just make it look natural and don't over
think it and you'll be fine.
Words Surrounding Keywords - This all may seem a bit redundant, but the
words around the keywords are just as important as the keywords which you
include to begin with.
Google not only looks at the keywords which you are targeting, but it looks
at the words surrounding them to get a better idea of what your site is
about, not to mention that it does this to check you on keyword stuffing and
make sure you're not doing anything "black hat" which could get you in
trouble.
Keyword In Domain Name - This takes some careful planning, but many SEOers
agree that this has a decent amount of bearing on how Google ranks a site
for a keyword. In continuing with this point, you can set your site up as it
expands to be more SEO friendly by naming subdomains after keywords, as
well. So be as specific as possible when naming if you can. For example name
a subdomain of a music site "Gibson-guitars" rather than just "guitars".
Note the use of the hyphen in the example. Hyphens represent spaces, so if
you are using keywords in your URLs, break them up. While keywords in the
subdomains don't carry quite as much weight as the top level of the domain,
they're nonetheless important and helpful to Google in identifying what your
site is about.
Keywords In Alt/Image Tags - If you've got pictures on your website and want
them to show up in image search results, you've got to tag them by placing
the appropriate keywords inside the alt tags of each image. It's also
helpful in case some web browsers don't load your page/images properly so
that web users can still see what the image was meant to be since most
browsers will still show the keyword which you included in the alt tag.
Keywords In Anchor Text of Internal Links - Just like with external links
pointing to your domain and pages, whenever linking to another page on your
site, make sure that you make the link using anchor text consisting of
keywords which you want pointing to and associated with that destination
page because this greatly helps Google in putting the pieces together.
Keywords in Strong/Bold Tags - These tags make your keywords stand out a bit
more from their surrounding text to web users as well as Google's search
bots. These tags are ideal when something isn't on the same level as say
something in an H1 tag, but you still want them to stand out from the rest
of your
copy.
Keywords in Meta Tags - About where you included the title in your site's
code you can include a meta description tag and a meta keywords tag. If the
title tag as mentioned earlier in this article is the clickable title in the
SERPs, the meta description is the short summary of what your site is about
which appears below it.
If you leave this blank, Google or other engines will form their own
description of your site using some of your content. If you don't like the
sound of that, you can add your own. Keep in mind that while it doesn't have
much bearing on your ranking, it's important for display purposes/what the
web users will see when viewing your site in the SERPs.
my motto is "Keep it simple" and "don't leave anything for tomorrow that can
be done today."
Regards Gerald Crawford
Stellenbosch South Africa
Cell: +27-0720390184 (mobile)
E-mail: gerald@webcraft.ws
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