38 replies to this topic

[ricka]

While the forum was down, I asked Phil a question or three. I'll post them and his answers here for the benefit of others.

Hi Phil,

Since the forum's down, may I ask you a question? Does it make a big difference with Google if the key words of a search phrase are in close proximity to one another in the title tag, as opposed to being separated by several words?

Hi Rick,

Yes it does. Proximity matters everywhere in the page. They specifically say it somewhere - dunno where though.

Phil.

Hi Phil,

How close does the proximity have to be? Immediately adjacent words, or is a separation of 2-3 words allowable? Also, what is the maximum
Hi Rick,

The closer a search term's words are, the better. Having the exact search term in the title and page is the best by far.

I've no idea about any maximum number of words in the title. The more words there are, the more diluted the search term in the title becomes - probably. Having the search term at the start of the title appears to do better in Google. But we get onto doorway pages again if there are several good search terms for each content page in a site That's the big failing of seo copywriting - it can't optimise fully for more than one search term per page, and there aren't enough pages to cover all the search terms.

Phil.

[Advisor]

That's the big failing of seo copywriting - it can't optimise fully for more than one search term per page, and there aren't enough pages to cover all the search terms.

Says who?

I always optimize for 2 - 3 different keyword phrases per page, and very often even more than that. I would never, ever recommend only optimzing for one search term. That's just a waste of a page, imo!

Jill

[ricka]

[quote name='"Advisor"][quote]I always optimize for 2 - 3 different keyword phrases per page' date=' and very often even more than that. I would never, ever recommend only optimzing for one search term. That's just a waste of a page, imo![/quote']

Hi Jill,

Missed you and the others during the blackout.

Would you mind sharing some of the details of your approach without giving away any trade secrets? Just some pointers on how you tackle a job, analyze a page to determire which key words would be best to optimize it for, etc. Whatever you care to share. Maybe you've already written this up in a newletter or on your site, and you could just point us to that. Thanks.

[Advisor]

Hi Rick,

I'm sure I've written about this a number of times in various places, but can't think of any one place off hand, so I'll just answer it here!

Basically, for existing sites, I first do keyword research with WordTracker or similar. With keyword phrase list in hand (all words that are highly relevant to the company's business), I then would go through the site and see which of those keywords in the list might make sense on which pages of the site. Many times a page is using some form of a phrase already, but perhaps not the exact phrase.

If a page already has a good amount of well-written copy, I can often simply edit in the relevant keyword phrases that we chose for that page. (I usually have the client choose which phrases go best with which pages because they know what the words mean better than I do.)

For some pages, it will be necessary to rewrite from scratch. In those cases, I simply take the 3 phrases we want to target, tell my writer what they are, and she whips something up. (She of course needs to talk to people at the company about their target market, etc. first.) Rewriting from scratch is great because you can really get a wonderful piece of work that doesn't sound stilted or anything because it was written with keyword phrases in mind.

That's really all there is to that part of the process. Once it's written/rewritten, the client makes any edits and we're good to continue on with the rest of the optimization. Some clients will even find MORE places to put keywords, others will want to take some out. It all depends on the client. I try and be conservative with the use of keywords so that the copy doesn't get ruined, but I LOVE the clients who see what I'm doing with the editing and find me additional spots for them!

Jill

[cre8pc]

Sheesh!!

Ya mean there's another topic going on here besides the one I just spent the past 3 hours on???????


:shock:

Kim

[Black_Knight]

I've been expecting a drop of a kind in the weighting given to TITLE tags for a while. There were just too many hundreds of sucky titles that looked more like a keywords meta tag content than a real title.

Google didn't have to drop the weighting though, they could have just adjusted the penalty for length and discounted repetition, which would then hit the 'spammy' titles without lessening good, punchy titles. I'm gonna be studying hard to see which method they have gone with.

Whichever they chose, I put this down as another change caused by poor SEO work out there.

[Black_Knight]

So you're saying that me adding the word "Pagerank" to the start of my document's Title tag, to get it from the top 20 into the top 10, it was "poor SEO work"? 

Phil.

If you did it like some so-called SEOs out there, Phil, creating a title tag that reads:
[color=
Then, [b]YES!

A couple of illustrative examples:
here, here, and, best of all, here.

[Black_Knight]

Btw, how long has Google been putting adwords across the top of the serps? They look like search results but with a different background colour. Maybe they are sneakily moving towards incorporating them into the serps.

A long time now Phil, but they don't always manage to sell those top-listed spots because they are 'Premium' listings on the original CPM payment model. It's not long ago that they started allowing the top PPC ones to sometimes show there too.

The top ones came into existance at the same time (and possibly earlier) than the ones at the side, but that was back when it was all CPM, and it cost a lot more.

[sanity]

Personally I think as important as it is to have all your keywords in your title (and closer to the front) it's just as important to make sure your title is enticing and most of all - clickable!!

But hey, this is just my 2c.

[FantasticMoms.com]

Hi Rick,
I simply take the 3 phrases we want to target..............
Jill

Hi Jill,

Do you mind if I ask how you deal with the <title> tag? I always try to make my keyword/phrase the first word(s) of the <title>, so am intrigued how you manage to get three keyphrases or keywords into one title.

[FantasticMoms.com]

That was what I meant earlier when Rick posted what I'd written to him - that SEO copywriting can't optimise fully for more than one phrase per page. IBL link text is another weakness.

Phil.

I suppose the operative word is "fully".

Just goes to show SEO is certainly not an exact science, particularly as the goalposts seem to frequently be moving. :x

[FantasticMoms.com]

Oh, while I think about it, does this mean we should no longer be making one page for each engine? Supposing I make a page for Lycos entitled "where-to-buy-potatoes.htm", do I then have to make a "where-to-buy-potatoes.htm" and put it in another directory for AOL, and so on, or is it best nowadays to attempt a more generic page and hopefully catch more engines?

You can tell I have been out of doing this for quite a while, can't you?

[Advisor]

Oh, while I think about it, does this mean we should no longer be making one page for each engine?  Supposing I make a page for Lycos entitled "where-to-buy-potatoes.htm", do I then have to make a "where-to-buy-potatoes.htm" and put it in another directory for AOL, and so on, or is it best nowadays to attempt a more generic page and hopefully catch more engines?

You can tell I have been out of doing this for quite a while, can't you?

That's the fastest way to get your site banned from all the engines.

Don't make any pages for the search engines or for any individual search engines. They all want one thing, and one thing alone -- a great site that has lots of useful content relevant to the search at hand. Give them this with your existing site and you will do fine.

Each page of your site is already a gateway (or doorway) into the rest of your site. Why would you want to reinvent the wheel by creating additional pages just for the search engines, when the search engines explicitly state they don't want you do that.

Make your site be the best it can be for your user and it will be great with the search engines. Make sure you clearly state on each page what exactly that page/product/service is about in words that real people would use who were looking for that information.

There's nothing tricky, scary or hard about this. Just use words and be clear and descriptive with your visible copy that your visitors will be reading.

No doorways. No gateways. No different things for different engines. No different things for engines and different things for visitors. These things were ALWAYS a bad idea, and are even worse today.

Good luck!

Jill

[Advisor]

Hi Rick,
I simply take the 3 phrases we want to target..............
Jill

Hi Jill,

Do you mind if I ask how you deal with the <title> tag? I always try to make my keyword/phrase the first word(s) of the <title>, so am intrigued how you manage to get three keyphrases or keywords into one title.

You put all three phrases into the title tag and separate them with a hyphen. There's a few different ways I do it, but that's a good way to do terms that are less related than some.

And Phil, you most certainly can optimize for more than one phrase per page if you know what you're doing. I've been doing it for years and years and years, and have no problems at all.

Just because YOU can't do it, doesn't mean that it can't be done!

Jill