This has always bugged me, I just never got around to asking, until now.

Let's say your website deals with travel photography. In your keywords, do you put the following:

travel, photography, photos, vacation... where each keyword is just one word?

Or would you put something like this:

travel photography, travel photos, travel images... where each keyword is more than one word?

The reason I ask is that with the latter (more than one word), some website checkers see a duplicate word and stop checking. But I'm wondering how Yahoo or Google might process multiple search terms as *one* keyword.

Thanks.

Put in whatever you like it will make very little difference.

the meta keywords is pretty much totally ignored.

I have done some small-time experiments and been able to get results with the Yahoo Search using unusual terms in which only one part of the term appeared on the page, and the other did not.

I am told that Google ignores meta keywords completely.

Yes, it seems Google ignores them completely these days but I see no harm in putting them in.

it's good practice for a couple of reasons:

1. If you add your keywords first, it can help to focus your writing. I have an editor which allows me to highlight words in my HTML document as I go along. I like to make a list of my keywords, throw them in to the meta tag and then mark them off one by one as I work them in to my copy.

2. Keyword meta tags are still used in content management systems as a way of judging a page in relation to another. If you later decide to adopt some kind of "similar pages" function, you can use your meta keyword tags to link documents together.

In regards to fragmenting your key phrases, I wouldn't take that route. Just use the proper search term. You won't be penalized for it.

You may add a keywords tag nevertheless; it also is a good reminder to you, the webdesigner, while writing the page's contents (to always use strong words, so it helps to have a list of them ready at hand).

also try focus first on specific keywords before targeting generic keywords. If you want to target generic keywords maybe try to find keywords having high searches per month but less in searchers in SEs search results.

A lot of this depends on your competition. If you've got a proper target market then try putting in, for example, the keywords 'sydney web design, 'sydney', 'web design', 'web', 'design'. The problem is that you've got to ensure that your keyword density roughly matches the #1 site in google. However, on saying this, there are a lot of #1 rated sites in google that do not use either the keywords or description meta tags. The title metatag, page content and link popularity are more important.

The problem is that you've got to ensure that your keyword density roughly matches the #1 site in google.

that's not a problem at all!

Because you really really really don't HAVE to do something so pointless!!

the title element is NOT a meta tag

When it comes to keywords, i mix up 1-2-3 words keywords... it benefit much on SEO.

Unless I missed it, I didn't see where meta keywords were mentioned in the question. Most people search starting with a generic term and narrow it down to a three keyword phrase ie restaurant; then mexican restaurant; then mexican restaurant miami. Where possible I optimize pages for one and only one three keyword phrase.

In the posters example " travel photography, travel photos, travel images" I would write three different pages each optimized for one and only one of those key phrases.

While it is generally thought that meta keyword and possibly description tags don't do any good, its not exactly a days work to put them in. Add them to match the key phrase for the page. The description tag should be longer because it is often used by google as the displayed description which is key to getting the page clicked on.

Unless I missed it, I didn't see where meta keywords were mentioned in the question.

In your keywords, do you put the following:

Originally Posted by chrishirst

In your keywords, do you put the following:

keywords aren't necessarily meta keywords. Meta keywords can be a subset of keywords. To me, a keyword (or usually a keyphrase) is what the searcher plops into the search bar on a search engine.

I guess the original poster needs to explain what he meant.

Google may ignore them but there are still some search engines that use them. I have had a lot of success with MSN. I tested the theory of separating each word by a comma and noticed that it is less effective than using two to three word phrases. There is no penalty for using the keywords tag and most often you already know what phrases you want to be found for so copying and pasting will only take a few minutes. It won’t kill you.

Originally Posted by tehfincheh

1. If you add your keywords first, it can help to focus your writing.

No - I don't think James Joyce or William Shakespeare ever did anything like this!

long tailed keyword is easier to optimized.. so 2-3 keywords is better and you can use travel photography as a keyword.

I always list keywords and then keyword phrases. I don't know which ones the search engines pick up but I am told the first 3 words of the phrase is the most important when submitting articles.