Keyword density or No. of Time keyword used
-
Now, I know that there is no set figure to be used here, whichever metric you are using and it will depend on the article and what is natural.
However, lets suppose for a minute that we are taking a keyword in isolation, and I have a 2000 word article using the keyword 17 times and rank no. 3 in Google SERPS. The no. 1 slot uses the keyword 8 times but only has a 800 word article and only a B grade on the onpage ranker.
Of course, there are off page factors as well, but just wondering what your thoughts are on whether you look at density or total keyword usage.
It is easy to just write without think about keyword density or usage, but occasionally you end up using the keyword about 50 times, and it is then I have to actually think about it. Other articles I barely use the keyword because the article just writes itself and it works out fine, but these are generally shorter. With longer articles on my best converting pages, I can't help but think about it more and it ends up a little hit and miss.
-
Hi Jonathan,
I totally recognize your situation. Although I don’t really check the keyword amounts of the competition I do write articles and find myself using the keyword a LOT. This while I don’t really think about “using” it while I write the articles.
I these cases I CRL + F and search for the keyword and try to change a few sentences. I normally don’t put more than 5 minutes of work in it and I only change stuff if it’s still understandable for the reader. Unfortunate I don’t have case studies in were this method actually pays off, so would love to see some more about this topic as well!
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
-
Static content pages ranking dropping all the time
Hello all. I have been working three months in my current job in the hotel industry. I have been publishing a lot of content to our website (mainly articles), which in general have been ranking well and really boosted our website traffic. The problem that I am facing, though, is the fact that our static pages' rankings are basically constantly dropping. Especially one of our main pages, which is this hotel page. I haven't been doing any real changes to the content, but the ranking (with keywords "hotelli helsinki" [Hotel in Helsinki in Finnish]) has plummeted from 13th position all the way down to 19th... What has been happening during these last three months is that we did change to a new domain and we have done all the redirections and also informed Google about this change through search console. I have also done some minor changes to the on-page content, such as changing the meta titles and descriptions as well as the page title and some of the text content to more natural ones instead of clumsy SEO texts and optimizing the images. This hasn't helped at all though and the rankings seem to steadily drop all the time. What would YOU do with this page? Maybe add more text content to the page to be more informative? All tips would be highly appreciated.
On-Page Optimization | | haapalatuomas0 -
What tools or tactics do you use to identify which ranking factors Google is weighting for your industry or keyword?
Google ranking factors are increasingly more complex and less universal. Google is emphasizing different ranking factors for different scenarios. What tools are available that can help identify which ranking factors Google may be weighting for a given query or industry? For example, are there any tools that provide correlative analysis of Google's rankings for a given keyword?
On-Page Optimization | | AdamThompson0 -
Multi-Site SEO using Host Headers
Hi - I'm working on a proposal for a client who runs 3 different career websites. He uses "host headers" to direct the website visitor to the correct website. For example, if the visitor comes from Washington he goes to one url. If he is in Kansas, he goes to another URL. Does anyone have any experience doing SEO with this type of system? What do I need to know? What are hurdles I'll encounter? Thanks, -Hunter
On-Page Optimization | | HunterW0 -
Keywords & ranking
I am working for a social networking site called Yookos. Much our content is user-generated. How can i add keywords onto the site to make sure our site appears in the SERPS? Also what techniques can i use to make our social site rank highly? Do the other SEO techniques apply here?
On-Page Optimization | | seoworx1230 -
Avoid Keyword Self-Cannibalization
Okay so if my website has the keyword 'dog training'. My main page shows one of my posts in which the title is 'dog training'. I cannot change it because the SEOMOZ on page tool tells me to keep the keyword at the front of the title for SEO increase I don't understand... <dl> <dd>Although employing targeted keywords in the H1 tag does not correlate well to high rankings, it does appear to provide some slight value. It's also considered a best practice for accessibility and to describe a page's content, hence our recommendation.
On-Page Optimization | | 678648631264
However, keyword stuffing may be perceived negatively by the search engines and can impact rankings. Thus, we suggest keeping keyword usage in the H1 to 2 or fewer uses.</dd> <dd>If I remove it then this shows up or change the anchor text. It pisses me the hell off because this damn tool doesn't even say how to fix the problem. If I go into one of my posts, the main title of my blog shows up in the top right corner which happens to be my keyword (I cannot change it) so what the f' do I do?????</dd> <dd>If someone could just take a look at my blog and tell me all the wrongs about it and how to fix everything, that would be amazing.
</dd> </dl>0 -
Keyword Stuffing in Alt Tags!
Hello, I have on a main page over 50 images. The first page i want to optimize it for MAINKW (let's say). Now, if i use in the alt tags "MAINKW KW1", "MAINKW KW2", "MAINKW KW3" ... "MAINKW KW50" then Google may say that i stuff the MAINKW in that page? Those images are reprezentative for main Categories and i have direct links to them from the main page with the anchors KW1, KW2...KW50.
On-Page Optimization | | VertiStudio0 -
Home Page Keyword Retargeting
Hi Guys! I have a question regarding the risk of **re-targeting **your homepage to another **keyword. ** To give a little background: I am working on a clients site that targets a keyword we initially thought during the keyword research phase, would be an appropriate target. What we found out is that it is not. Everything in analytics points to this keyword not performing well. We now want to re target the homepage to another keyword target. My questions are: How risky is it to do this given we have already done a fair amount of link building to the home page with anchor text from the initial keyword target? Will this look suspicious to google? What sort of things should we consider before moving forward with this change?
On-Page Optimization | | gravityseo0 -
Use 301 redirects when deleting old products?
I'm removing old products (wines) from my site, and I've been using 301 redirects for each product page back to the winery page. My question is, am I using best practice? I want people who search for these now nonexistent products to go to the winery page where they will see what is now available. But does google approve? I've also tried leaving the product's page intact but saying that it is no longer available and putting a link in the text that points to the winery page. Which is better, in the eyes of the god google? Thanks!
On-Page Optimization | | JeanYates0