While less and less importance is placed on keyword density in some quarters,
it still has an important role to play in the formation and execution of effective
search engine optimisation. Specifically, pages that have too high a keyword
density and appear over optimised are likely to face penalties from the search
engines. In contrast, a sensible but effective keyword density can help a website
get indexed and rank well in the search engines.
Website Content And On Page SEO
Website content is far from being the only facet to search engine optimisation,
but it is an important part of on page optimisation. Other on page factors
include the appropriate use of tags, optimised images, and excellent navigation.
In total, though, the search engines consider hundreds of factors when determining
the relevancy and overall value of your web pages and while keyword density
is believed to be weighted quite highly among these it is part of a bigger
overall picture.
Early Search Engine Results
In the early days of search engines, and therefore search engine optimisation,
the major search engines relied heavily on keyword density. They used the measure
of the number of times a keyword was found within the body of a content in
order to help formulate early search results. While it’s obviously not an entirely
precise method of measuring relevance it did provide the search engines with
a method to effectively index and rank all the pages in their index.
Early Keyword Density Requirements
During these early search engine days, websites that had high keyword densities
tended to perform well. Densities as high as 5% and more would virtually secure
a top spot in search engines like Google while Yahoo would happily rank sites
with even greater density in their top positions. This led to the early emergence
of search engine spam. Search engine optimisation meant generating content
that contained little more than numerous keywords repeated over and over again
along with some method of monetising the resulting traffic.
Algorithms Evolved
Eventually the search engines took steps to resolve this issue, led in no
small part by Google. Search engine algorithms evolved so that they included
many more factors than just keyword density and they even began to penalise
those sites that used unethical search engine optimisation techniques. Pages
that had previously fared well because of blatantly manufactured content began
to slide down the result pages.
Modern Search Engine Optimisation
Over time, this progression has continued and modern search engine optimisation
relies more on the use of several related keywords with lower keyword density
than ever before. This semantic form of indexing has led to improved search
results and greater benefit to the search engine users. As such, search engine
optimisation techniques have also had to evolve to prevent being blacklisted
and ensure the best possible results.
The Correlation Between SEO And Keyword Density
By using instances of a keyword in the body of web page content it indicates
to search engines the topic of a page. All of the major search engines, including
Google, are still believed to consider keyword density as an important factor
in their ranking equations. However, rather than creating disjointed and unnatural
appearing content it is possible to craft much more beneficial content that
will benefit you in terms of search engine optimisation but also visitor conversion
and, subsequently, website performance.
Related posts:
- Good ways to kill your optimisation efforts
- Avoid The Google Sandbox Trap
- SEO For The Big Three Search Engines
- Search Engine Optimization Tools 1 – Keyword Tools
- Keyword Density In SEO – How To Get It Right
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In earlier times, keyword density played a very important role in search engines. If you site has too much keywords related to your site’s content then it will help to improve your site’s page rank.
On page SEO factors such as better navigation, important tag and optimized image also helps in increasing the page rank of your site. It also helps to index your site.
Earlier, search engine find the number of keywords in your site’s content or body to calculate the relevance of your site with your content and it directly affects your site’s page rank.
When search engines fixed the page rank and quality of any site by calculating the keyword density, it becomes difficult for visitors to find beneficial information from sites because most of site owner use one keyword again and again to increase the keyword density of your site.
Nowadays search engines are improving your styles to define the quality of any site and now search engine sees relevant keywords with lower density to provide the best and desired results to search engine user.
[...] A Brief History Of Keyword Density And SEO While less and less importance is placed on keyword density… [...]
[...] For example, the ‘dark art’ of Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) traditionally requires a practice called ‘keyword seeding’. Keyword seeding involves working a particular density of keywords into your content in order to manipulate the position of your page within search engine results. This practice is a legacy from the days when a keyword density of 5% would practically secure your place in the top results of searches for that keyword [Source: A Brief History of Keyword Density and SEO]. [...]