Meta-Tags – Does the Keyword Tag Matter?

May 25, 2007 at 11:28 pm (keywords, meta tags, SEO)

Heheheh, it’s been a while, and if there is actually anybody out there reading this, I apologize. But my gut tells me this thing is a vanity log at best. Good thing I’m referring to it as a personal dumping ground for stuff I’ve learned and things I think.

One thing that keeps popping up occasionally is questions about the keywords meta-tag. Everyone goes on about the importance of the title tag (yeah, I know it’s not technically a meta-tag, but it is in the head and it is really important), discuss the description tag is useful but not so much for ranking well and decry those who still use the keyword tag as holder-onners to the pre-1998 days of optimization. Me, I say not so fast.

True, thanks to spammers and scammers of all sorts the value of the meta-keywords tag has lost a lot of value, if not all of it. But that doesn’t, in my book, mean you should totally right it off and quit using it. Perhaps you shouldn’t put as much effort into it as you do the title and description, but totally quit using it? I personally don’t recommend it.

One reason is that what we know about the search engines and their algorithms are extremely limited. When they say they don’t put any weight on it, it could very-well be red herring to throw of the spammers. I doubt they’d do that, but it would be a possibility. More than anything, I think there could be a day that as the use of them falls from fashion, it could gain some relevance as spammers and others put their efforts into other areas. After all, there is talk Yahoo! is putting some weight on them (I really need to find these references and cite them). Who’s to say MSN or Ask won’t (or don’t) do the same further down the road?

A second reason is there are probably some second and third tier search engines that may use them as part of their ranking algorithm. Sure, we all know or think that Google drives the lion’s share of traffic to websites. But that doesn’t mean other engines can’t or don’t drive traffic to your site. Look at your logs – are there any other engines other than the Big Three driving traffic to your site? Chances are there is. I know of one search engine that does use the meta-keywords tag, and it’s creator, Ed Dunn, says that’s gives Fooky.com it’s advantage over all the other search engines. And you never know – Fooky may be the next search engine touted as the Google killer. More importantly to you, it may be the next source of relevant traffic to your site.

A third reason has less to do with SEO and more to do with PPC.  When you’re building your feeds and setting up the ad groups for your pages, wouldn’t it be nice to have a way to look at a page see where you should start with your keyword selection and building?  This comes in super-handy when you’re building a feed for paid inclusion.

For those reasons I think the keywords meta-tag is important.  So, say you’re a newbie that by some act of God stumbled across this blog post.  The above convinced you to put a little effort into putting together keyword tags for your website.  With that, are there any tips I have for putting together a meta-keywords tag?  You bet your ass I do!

First, make sure each page has its own set of unique tags.  In my opinion, this is important.  Whether it’s for ranking well or trying to climb out of the supplemental index, having unique titles and descriptions are being discussed as helping for those.  I use the same philosophy for the keywords meta-tag.

Second, please make sure they’re relevant to the page.  If they’re not relevant, you’re wasting your time and making your page appear to be spammy.  Not a good idea.

Third, use keyword phrases, not single keywords.  Single keywords tell the search engine spiders nothing.  Unless it’s some obscure, super-important word, I strongly urge you to stick to keyword phrases.  They’re going to be more accurate to what your page is about and a helluva’ lot more helpful.

Fourth, I say keep to ten phrases or less.  If you’re using more than ten, and all ten seem to accurately reflect what the page is about, maybe it’s time to revise the page?  Or perhaps it’s better just to trim the list?  That’s up to you.  But as someone that might look at your source code, when I see more than ten keyword phrases I think this is a person trying to make this page relevant for some pretty obscure, irrelevant phrases.  Plus, remember, the spiders are only going to be able to harvest so much information.

Fifth, get your most important keyword phrase at the beginning.  It tells the search engines this is the keyword that is most relevant to the page.

Sixth, if you’re trying to capitalize on a misspelling, do it here.  Why have that garbage appear on your page where it can make you look foolish when you can instead put it there?

Seventh, remember, the value of this tag is questionable.  Don’t get bogged down putting it together when there are so many more important thing you could be doing.  I try to keep it to only a minute or two for a page.  Just make sure its unique and relevant to the page and your most important keyword phrase is at the beginning.  If you only have one phrase, not a big deal!

So there you have it, Mr Rex’s big take on a little respected tag.

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