Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Exact keyword match for meta title and h1 what is best practice?
-
How exact should my meta titles and H1 one be compare to the keyword you wish to rank on.
Eksample. When I do a research with google AdWords the keyword tool shows me:
260 monthly searches for house for rent Hua Hin
140 monthly searches for Hua Hin house for rent
70 monthly searches for House for rent in Hua Hin
The first two includes the exact same 5 words while the last one includes the stopword "in".
That google have different search volumens for these very smilair search queries tells me that small differences matters. So how does that effect the way i shoulf write my:
a)meta titles
b)H1
I feel I get better sentences often by reordering the keywords etc.
“Top tips on how to rent house in Hua Hin” Instead of “Top tips if you want a house for rent in Hua Hin”
Do you use stop words like “in” hua hin. (only used in 25% of the searches queries)?
Also would it matter if i write a plural form of a keyword instead of a singular etc propeties and sted of property?
My goal is to write easy to read and unique content but i feel i can make exact matches if required with out compromising to much.
-
I agree with you Massimiliano,
Overall that is a great strategy and yes, just because they get more volume does not mean they are the best keywords. Different keywords are used at different stages of the buying cycles. In this case I was just telling Tamir how I would choose the order from those specific combinations of the same 5 words. Assuming he has done his research and those are the keywords he is going to target.
Getting traffic is one step in the game, converting the traffic is another important step as well.
Best Regards,
Joe
-
targeting the keywords with the highest volume can be misleading, they are not necessary the best converting keywords, and since usually everyone prefer to shot at the biggest target competition is fierce
I am not saying it's wrong, but I would be more selective and choose keywords on the base of a variety of factors.
-
Hello Tamir,
Realistically to write great content you want to use them all in different variations, singular. plural ect. I would pick the highest volume order of the keywords, in your case: 260 monthly searches for house for rent Hua Hin.
I would use this combination as the url, Begining of description as well as the H1 tag. I would then write some very thoughtful and informative content and add those other variations on the page in a natural flowing conversational way that sounds like natural talk when you read it out loud to yourself. You want to focus on the highest volume words and also build the others in as well so you may rank well for more than 1 combination of those keywords.
Here is the link to rand
s very informative article about keyword targeting: A Visual Guide to Keyword Targeting and On-Page SEO. Its a must read for sure !http://moz.rainyclouds.online/blog/visual-guide-to-keyword-targeting-onpage-optimization
Hope that helps,
Joe
-
I have seen google algo rank the same page for very similar phrases where the keywords where just changing places, but it's not "always" doing it. You can help him learn that page is a good fit for both queries with the copy of the page.
google knows about synonyms and does often show same or very similar SERP for different keywords which are considered to have the same "exact" meaning and usage in language. But in my experience does treat plurals in a different way.
I would use exact match for title and exact match for h1 if it make sense, but avoiding using unnatural language.
Unfortunatelly SEO is a land where certainity is scarce, and I would recommend testing different versions to find out what works best in your case.
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
-
Duplicate 'meta title' issue (AMP & NON-AMP Pages)
how to fix duplicate meta title issue in amp and non-amp pages? example.com
On-Page Optimization | | 21centuryweb
example.com/amp We have set the 'meta title' in desktop version & we don't want to change the title for AMP page as we have more than 10K pages on the website. ----As per SEMRUSH Tool---- ABOUT THIS ISSUE It is a bad idea to duplicate your title tag content in your first-level header. If your page’s <title>and <h1> tags match, the latter may appear over-optimized to search engines. Also, using the same content in titles and headers means a lost opportunity to incorporate other relevant keywords for your page.</p> <p><strong>HOW TO FIX IT</strong></p> <p>Try to create different content for your <title> and <h1> tags.<br /><br />this is what they are recommending, for the above issue we have asked our team to create unique meta and post title for desktop version but what about AMP page?<br /><br />Please help!</p></title>0 -
Page Title versus H1 title
What's the difference between the Page Title and the H1 title? It seems like both summarize the page. Is it a wasted opportunity to make them the same? Should they be similar but slightly different?
On-Page Optimization | | amybethmegjo1 -
Keyword Stuffing Question
Say your on a e-commerce category page "Shirts" every lower level category has "shirts" in it such as: T-shirt, long sleeve shirt, sweat shirt, v-neck shirt, and so on. Is this page going to be penalized in google for the keyword "shirts" just because it is in the title and on the page a thousand times because i'm targetting words like "long sleeve shirt? and if it is, will the "long sleeve shirt" keyword be negatively affected as well? Answer much appreciated,
On-Page Optimization | | Mike.Bean
Thanks in advance.0 -
H1 tag- on home page - what is it best to include
is it best to have in the H1 tag 1. just our website address 2. combination of website address followed by short keywords about our website
On-Page Optimization | | CostumeD0 -
Auto loading articles ?- best practices
Hi all! In the past months I see more and more website that doing 'auto loading articles in scrolling' - can you tell me if it's okay for SEO and what are the best practices for this? Thanks!
On-Page Optimization | | JohnPalmer1 -
Meta separators
I've been told that pipes are the best separators for title tags. Can anyone tell me the best ones for H1 and H2 tags? Do I go with pipes, commas, hyphens, underscores...?
On-Page Optimization | | Greatmats0 -
Best Way to Use Date in Title
Hi, I do most of the current copy for our blog which you can find here http://appointedd.com/blog/ I believe having a regular blog structure with a mix of irregular ad hoc posts to go in around these. So, for this blog, I write an article on "Beauty Industry News" every week. Now, I don't want to use the same title for each post, so I've peen butting in the date after each one i.e. "Beauty Industry News - 24/04/13". Is this best practice or is there a better way of naming regular posts? Thanks in advance!
On-Page Optimization | | LeahHutcheon0 -
Is it ok to use encoded special characters in meta titles?
I've read blog posts stating that encoding special characters in title tags is both ok and not ok. Any definitive answer out there? Do the extra characters from adding encoding count towards the total number of characters that Google displays in SERPs? Or do they just count as one character?
On-Page Optimization | | BostonWright0