Heading Tags | SEO | Keyword Phrases

Posted • December 5, 2008 • Comments Off

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Using Keywords and Keyword Phrases in Headings & Subheadings

The purpose of using keywords in headings and subheadings throughout your web-page is two fold.

To give your reader a quick way to scan your page and know what it is all about
So the search engines will know what are the most important topics on the page

Do you see a theme developing here?

The purpose of your web-page is to convey information to your readers and the purpose of SEO is to let the search engines know that this information is available.

Headings Should be Like an Outline of the Web-page

The code for typical headings and subheadings used for SEO might look like:

<h1>The Right Keywords will Bring Traffic to Your Website</h1>
More information will go here.

<h2>Choosing the Right Keywords for Your Website</h2>
More information will go here.

<h3>Keyword Research will Make or Break your SEO</h3>
More information will go here too.

Heading tags run from H1 to H6. H1 is the largest font with H6 being the smallest. The default style for heading tags is really ugly.
Default Heading Tags
Heading tags can be styled with CSS so they will go nicely with your website.
CSS Styled Heading Tags

The Practical use of Keywords in Heading Tags

Your headings should be used thematically. I usually try to get my primary and secondary keyword phrases and similar phrases in my page heading as well as in many subheadings

I use the page’s main topic keyword phrase (usually the most general) as well as one of the secondary keyword phrases in the single H1 heading on each page. You can use as many H2, H3, H4, H5, and H6 heading tags as you wish.

The text on your page should also be thematic and follow the topics presented in the headings. You should naturally use your keywords and keyword phrases in the rest of the text on the page.

Use a single H1 tag on each page. Try to use many H2 or H3 tags to break up the page copy, help structure the data and make your page easier for you readers to scan.

Break the Page into Subgroups

H1 (consisting of primary keywords and a modifier and/or a call to action for your readers). Only use one H1 tag per page and do not bold or emphasize it. Your H1 heading will work best if the wording is slightly different than your page title.

Subheadings Should Contain Keywords & Keyword Phrases

H2 (similar subtopic idea with some related keyword phrases in it)
More information will go here.
H2 (another subtopic with some thematically related words).
More information will go here.
H2 (Subtopics do not have to have the same keywords as the page title and H1 heading. If you are writing for conversion, not all of them will, which is also good for SEO. If your page title and your headings contain the exact same keyword phrase it will possibly look like an attempt to manipulate the search engines. Keep it natural looking.
H2 (Change word order and use plural and singular versions)
More information will go here.
Subheadings will focus on a keyword phrase that is slightly more specific than the main heading or what is considered as long-tail.

Descriptive, reader-focused subheadings improve the usability of your website for both the search engines and your human readers. Headings should help structure the information, but don’t get carried away and start placing all your content in an H1 tag, using bold on the H1 tags, or using bold or strong tags on every occurrence of your keywords. You could be giving search engines a reason to consider your page as spammy. This will be more likely to hurt your rankings since your content may look less appealing to search engines and your site visitors.

Late,
Gary Pool

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