On Page SEO – Keyword Placement

Posted by James Harrison on Jan 12, 2008 in Blog, SEO / Search Engine Optimization | 5 comments

I Hope y’all like my video on on page SEO. My buddy just asked me a pretty simple question, so I answered it with a video.

In my video about locations on your site to place your keywords, I mentioned the following locations:

• Title Tag – Everybody knows how important the title tag is. I sure as hell do! I love the title tag. It’s definitely one of my favorite tools in SEO. Remember to think prominence & density, but don’t forget to think about how it will look to the visitors on the SERP’s.

• Meta Description – Occasionally this will show up on the SERP’s so choose wisely. This can make a difference in your click-through-rate. Make sure you add keywords and make sure they are very similar to your keyword-rich content.

• Meta Keywords – They still work! I’ve seen sites rank for terms you can only find in their Metas. Don’t spam. Think prominence & density. Make sure every word in your keyword metas is in the page.

• Table Summaries – Add your keyword to the table summaries. Aim to make them similar to the headers in that table or the main keywords of that section.

• File Name – Save your file as your keyword. i.e. dirtbikers.htm. This way it shows up in the URL.

• Header Tags – <H1> = keyword 1 &/or keyword 2. <h2> = keyword 2 &/or keyword 3 & so on.

• First 10 Words of the Page – The more prominent you can make it, the better.

• First 1/3rd or Content – Make sure your keyword is in the first 1/3rd of your content. Try to trickle down the keyword priority throughout the content.

• Keyword Style – Bold, underline, italicize or give the keyword its own style (css & name that style that keyword). This allows the keyword to stick out to users and bots.

• Picture File Name – When you save your pictures, make sure you save them as your keywords. ie. blue-keyword.jpeg.

• Picture Attributes – If the picture links to another page, give it a title attribute. title=”main keyword of page linking to” and don’t forget the alternate attribute; alt=”keyword”.

• Caption of Picture – Adding the keyword to the caption not only tells the visitors how relevant that picture is to your site, it also helps the pictures rank in image searches.

• CSS File – This is probably one of those locations that doesn’t really matter, but it’s another spot that could give you the cutting edge necessary to compete. Think Ceteris Puribus.

• Internal Linking Page – Put the keyword in the anchor text and title attribute of a link pointing to another page on your site. This shows that you link to relevance and it’s also another chance for you to help that other page out.

• Last 10 Words of the Page – Give the bots something to remember. Be relevant head to toe.

Now, I have to be honest with you. I don’t really know the order of importance of these keyword placement techniques. I know some matter and some don’t. Some may make a difference in your rankings in one search engine but not in the others. Some may be beneficial to the user and some could actually hurt your site esthetics.

JUST DON”T SPAM!

Here are a few things to remember when placing your keywords on your webpage.

• USABILITY – You have to think, if the user searches for this keyword and clicks on your site, that person should be able to identify your words right away. Keep it natural. Stay away from the obvious keyword stuffing.

• DENSITY - Sometimes you may have a site that’s competing with other sites with high density of your targeted keywords. How dense should your keywords be? 6%, 16% 20+%??????  Density should probably be based on the engine & competition.

• SURROUNDING CONTENT – The spiders are getting smarter. They are starting to see if you have similar, latent and relevant content surrounding your keywords. Create content that intensifies your keyword within it. I like to use Quitura to see what kind of words should be surrounding my content.

• TOPIC - Ok, so your site is about commercial loans. Not only do you put commercial loans throughout your page, you make your page EVERYTHING COMMERCIAL LOANS. Commercial loan source, mortgage brokers, commercial & residential loans, bad credit loans, loan applications, etc. If the visitor just types in “commercial loans” you have to think to yourself what is the visitor trying to accomplish?

• COMPETITION - Look where your competition is placing the keyword. If theirs is in the <h1>’s, put yours in the <h1>. Make the keyword more prominent in the content, title and metas. One thing I like to do is, print out the top 10 pages ranking for my targeted keywords and highlight all the places my competitors are placing those terms. Sometimes you’ll see a pattern (sometimes you don’t) and you should do what it takes to fit right in. Remember to check your competition’s link strength. You make be wasting your time on all this on page SEO.

• PROMINENCE – This to me is big. I should have placed it first, but I like to save the best for last. Think of all the strongest places you place your keywords on a page. The title, the header, the url, near the top of the page… You can’t get more prominent than that. But if possible, try to make other prominent places on your page.

I hope this helps you locate more locations to place your keywords on your site. If you know of other places to place your keywords, PLEASE comment them in this post. Thanks!

Other SEO Related Blog Posts:

1. SEO Video – Keyword Placement
2. Keyword Placement: Thinking of Places to Place Your keywords
3. The 1st Page of Google for “SEO Blog” Pt.2
4. The 1st Page of Google for “SEO Blog”