Website Page Content Search Engine Optimization

Part of search engine optimization is how you select keywords and target your content for them. You will want to select longtail keyword phrases relevant to your website theme and topic. Ideally you will want to optimize for terms with many searches in Google, Bing etc. and weak competition.

This help is about classic on-page search engine optimization which involves optimizing the content of pages with proper keywords in titles, headers and content. Beyond classic on-page search engine optimization, you will also have to remember off-page SEO such as building relevant quality links.

Some well known search engines are Google, Yahoo, Bing, ASK and DuckDuckGo. These are the biggest and/or most influential search engines left standing. With Yahoo and Bing merging more and more, we may soon only have two major search engines left, Google and Bing.

Even so, the algorithms between the relative few search engines left may vary considerably. Just because you have selected keywords that correspond and rank your website well in one search engine does not necessarily mean it will rank well in the other ones.

How your page content reflects your page topic is what page SEO is about. Both humans and search engines need to understand your page content. This requires making sure text in titles, headlines and body content match and focus on a single or few select key phrases.

However, it is important to keep a natural look and feel:

• People are more willing to link if your content is readable.
• People often use the website page title when linking to you.

If you are unable to get backlinks pointing to your website, you will have to select your target keywords and phrases with care.

Onpage SEO works best for niches where SERPS are not dominated by competitors with a huge amount of links pointing to them. It is often better to target secondary keyword combinations and phrases. This usually means your targeted phrases will consist of 2-3 words.

Research your competition. Find out if they have many backlinks or optimized content for search engines.

When you are designing your websites, you have to remember optimize at least the main elements for searchers. Make sure all pages have relevant keywords in page title and headers that match content. Do not make the common mistake of having your company and/or website name first in all page titles. Have the most searched keywords matching your content appear first in the page titles.

The text you use in titles is the single most important element in a page that determines how search engines rank your web page. In addition, all major search engines use the title text when showing your website in search result listings.

If you are trying to target a specific phrase such as search engine optimization, it is useful to know how often it occurs in your page content. That is keyword density.

It is also important where you mention the phrase. Some places weigh more than others with the title element being the most important. That is weighted keyword density. There are no definite answers, but 4-6% keyword density is often a good choice.

Do not spam keywords in your body text in order to achieve a specifc keyword density. It reads poorly and may be penalized by search engines.

If you are unsure how exactly to check the keyword density of a page, check our keyword density analyzer tutorial.

Here is a table of HTML elements and some estimates of their weighted keyword density importance.

Element	Importance	Notes
Normal text	1.00
Website title	3.00	Often used as anchor text in links
Headers <H1> to <H7>	2.50	H1 > H2 > H3 etc.
Image alternative text	0.50
Meta keywords and description	0.25	Is only rarely used by search engines

• Internal links should use keyword rich anchor text.
• Have urls contain keywords separated by hyphens -.
• Note that onpage SEO can also be used to optimize your quality scores in e.g. Google Adwords. By adding and removing keywords, your pages and ads may be perceived of higher quality and relevance leading to lower costs.