The higher up your page keywords appear, the better they will rank. This I'm fairly sure is accepted as fact.

Does whitespace make a difference? If I compress all the unnecessary whitespace out of my source code, I can save lines and lines of space. Would this further improve my rankings, or does Google, and other bots, just pass it by and search for the next content?

A link to an article on this would be great, I couldn't find one this morning.
Thanks!!

The higher up your page keywords appear, the better they will rank. This I'm fairly sure is accepted as fact.

Nope.

A link to an article on this would be great, I couldn't find one this morning.

There is a reason for this;

It's total rubbish!


Mind you that's never stopped the "experts" making things up before.

thanks.

so that's a no, it doesn't make a difference. that's a good thing.
anyone believe anything to the contrary?

Originally Posted by DaveTodd

The higher up your page keywords appear, the better they will rank. This I'm fairly sure is accepted as fact.

Accepting something as fact doesn't make it true. There are people who believe placing leywords earlier in the page make that page rank higher for them, but not only is there no proof of this, it makes little sense to me that that should be the case.

The presence/asbence of whitespace bears no relation to a page being the best fit for a searcher's query. You can verify this yourself by considering a page that is returned for a particular query. Now add some whitespace to it. Is the page a better fit, a worse fit or just the same?

"Ranking algorithms vary by search engine and are tweaked periodically to improve relevancy. However, we know all search engines look for key words on your page and assign a value to your major terms based on word density and position on the page." - BruceClay.com

i would have thought that text appearing towards the top of the page would be given a higher ranking by the engines as it would be viewed as "more important."

the whitespace thing follows on. if an engine views the higher source code as more important, by removing the whitespace it compresses more into the top and is therefore ranked better.

Originally Posted by DaveTodd

"Ranking algorithms vary by search engine and are tweaked periodically to improve relevancy. However, we know all search engines look for key words on your page and assign a value to your major terms based on word density and position on the page." - BruceClay.com

That's his (and others') opinion, not fact.

Think about an article that places the conclusion at the end. On that page the most important information doesn't appear at the top.

So to summarise:

1) there is no proof one way or another that keywords nearer the top of a document improve ranking
2) There are situations where using a rule like this wouldn't work

I go back to my original example: does the presence/absence of whitespace increase or decrease a searcher's satisfaction with a page that is returned? It makes no difference.

Ranking algorithms vary by search engine and are tweaked periodically to improve relevancy. However, we know all search engines look for key words on your page and assign a value to your major terms based on word density and position on the page." - BruceClay.com

I think Bruce still believes in the keyword density fairy

Search engines have long since progressed beyond simple things like word counting

Originally Posted by DaveTodd

The higher up your page keywords appear, the better they will rank. This I'm fairly sure is accepted as fact.

The world is flat, like a Frisbee or a plate of food. If you took a boat and kept going straight, you'd eventually fall off the edge. I'm fairly sure we can all accept this as fact.

Originally Posted by DaveTodd

A link to an article on this would be great, I couldn't find one this morning.

Well as long as we're making stuff up anyway, here's a link to an article:

http://www.great-library.com/2007/09...-the-bushisms/

Personally i find alot of these people quite stupid.

I personally am not a SEO freak, if/when i build a site, ill give it some nice description keywords, try and make it a nice valid site with good content and design.. the end.

if it gets high and makes me some money wow thats nice

i have seen alot of sites, where the webmaster doesnt know anything about SEO which becasue it has better content and that, it ranks better,
i think some webmasters are forgetting, that it Should be more important to worry about the users use and experience of the site.

its like a book, the author shouldnt be thinking about selling billions of copies and all that. Good books arnt written like that. i think this applies to websites

a lot of people come to these forums, in exactly the same way as i did, for help.
ripping it out of people for asking genuine questions is neither helpful, nor in the spirit in which these forums were created.

if all you have to offer is sarcasm and an expression of your own arrogance at how much you know and how stupid everyone else is, please keep it to yourself and leave the posting to those who are here in the right spirit - to help those who don't know as much as you and are seeking to learn.

people like you stop forums like these from becomming as good as they could be, because newbies are shot down for asking a genuine questions, and don't come back again.

Originally Posted by dansgalaxy

i have seen alot of sites, where the webmaster doesnt know anything about SEO which becasue it has better content and that, it ranks better,
i think some webmasters are forgetting, that it Should be more important to worry about the users use and experience of the site.

That's funny, but it happened to me four years ago when I started my first site. I made it by intuition with very little content and a few inbound links. That site recieved PR5 in almost two or tree month. Then I became much "smarter", that's what I think. Learned a lot of stuff, followed basics technics to promote my site, made optimization, made more safisticated content, etc. Do you know what happen then? Yes, I have more targetted traffic than before because I respect my visitors, but my PR was droped almost twice.
Here is a question, what is more important, raising a traditional PR and do not care much about the users or to provide bigger and useful content, which attract more customers at the same time potentially dropping PR? I think the second is better if it's not possible to approach both of it. IMO. What do you think?

Have a great day,
Peter

Originally Posted by DaveTodd

a lot of people come to these forums, in exactly the same way as i did, for help.
ripping it out of people for asking genuine questions is neither helpful, nor in the spirit in which these forums were created.

if all you have to offer is sarcasm and an expression of your own arrogance at how much you know and how stupid everyone else is, please keep it to yourself and leave the posting to those who are here in the right spirit - to help those who don't know as much as you and are seeking to learn.

people like you stop forums like these from becomming as good as they could be, because newbies are shot down for asking a genuine questions, and don't come back again.

If this is as i suspect aimed at myself, what is said was not aimed to be offensive or to shot you down. i know what that feels like when i ask things which everyone thinks is stupid. my sarcasum and the like was probally more aimed at whom ever or whatever gave you the idea that what you said was important.

I try not to offend, unless the person is offensive or rude themselves. both you were not. just in my opinion unknowing. like me with alot of things.

Dan!

Originally Posted by DaveTodd

a lot of people come to these forums, in exactly the same way as i did, for help.
ripping it out of people for asking genuine questions is neither helpful, nor in the spirit in which these forums were created.

if all you have to offer is sarcasm and an expression of your own arrogance at how much you know and how stupid everyone else is, please keep it to yourself and leave the posting to those who are here in the right spirit - to help those who don't know as much as you and are seeking to learn.

people like you stop forums like these from becomming as good as they could be, because newbies are shot down for asking a genuine questions, and don't come back again.

I think you're talking to me. You opened your question with:

The higher up your page keywords appear, the better they will rank. This I'm fairly sure is accepted as fact.

And no matter how much you don't want to admit it, the entire premise you based your assumption and question on is false. If you're seeking to learn, you need to unlearn some gibberish to make room for reality. I'm sorry, but that's just the simple truth.

o good i thought i was being nagged again? or was i hehe