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Search Engine Ranking Factors from SEO Experts

search engine marketing wheel A few weeks ago - actually a couple of months ago - I mentioned a report on a study done by top-level SEO experts on search engine ranking factors, then stated I would be commenting on those over the course of the next few days. Oops! Never did that. Got sidetracked. But, I'm a doin' it startin' today!

Want to take a guess at what the experts agree is the numero uno most positive factor in getting ranked in Google? If you guessed using keywords in the title tag, treat yourself to a triple venti vanilla latte from Starbucks! (My favorite drink.)

Title Tag
Here's what one expert, Danny Sullivan, had to say regarding keyword use in the title tag of your website...

"Notice number one – that you have HTML title tags that reflect the key terms you want your page to be found for. That's been the advice since I first starting writing about SEO back in 1996. Eleven years later – and even in the age of it's all about links -- it remains the top ranked tip by so many experts."

The "title tag" is an HTML tag that looks like this: <title>your text</title>. It's found in the header of a given web page and is the part that shows up at the top of the browser window. You know, in the blue bar. Google really, really likes that. It likes the title tag so much that it gets bolded in the search engine returns. One SEO expert, Christine Churchill, said that "If you have time to do only one SEO action on your site, take the time to create good titles."

Let me give you the blog spin on that. Keep in mind that each time you write a new blog post a new HTML page is created. When you title the post most every blog platform I'm familiar with (including Active Rain) turns that title into an HTML title tag.

For example, click on my post 'Designed to Sell' or 'Buy Me' Blogging, then look up at the blue bar (assuming yours is blue) at the top of the browser window. What do you see? Yep, the post title. The platform has taken your post title and create that oh-so precious, search engine rich commodity...the title tag.

H1 Tag
Not only that, but most blog platforms also create another HTML tag that is almost as valuable, the H1 tag. "H" stands for "Header." Though there is some controversy over the importance of this tag, at least one SEO expert said it's the "second most important HTML tag available." I tend to agree.

I looked at the source code for one of my Active Rain posts and noticed that the AR platform uses not the H1 tag, but the H2. That's not quite as valuable, but still good nonetheless as it's still a "header" tag and Google does pay attention.

The cool thing about blogs are that they do a lot of the SEO heavy-lifting for you. The lesson here is...as often as possible, include keywords in your blog post title. It will give you a much needed lift where search engines are concerned.

Tomorrow, I'll touch on some more of the keyword-oriented factors the experts talked about, specifically keyword usage in body text and keywords in the blog post URL (permalink).

Posted by Paul Chaney on 06/05/2007 02:36 PM

Comments (41)

seo, real estate blogging, blog marketing, howto tips, search engine optimization

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41 Comments on Search Engine Ranking Factors from SEO Experts

JUN

2007

Interesting advice. I have to mull it over, since the terms are not second nature to me, and figure out how I am doing.

I've been trying to do this...

the question I have is:

OK... so I have been taking care of my TITLES...trying to keep consistency etc

but...do I need to be adding an internal H1 title as well?

Does ActiveRain naturally do this for us or do we need to force it in HTML?

David, the title tag is used within the code and is the name of your page that displays in the upper left had corner of the browser. You should always try to use both (always use the title tag though and I like to include company name there along with the topic of the page) If you look at this page you will see the title is Real Estate Blog - Search Engine Ranking Factors from SEO Experts. The H1 tag can use the same title but it can be different and it highlights the main point of the page.

If you think of the title tag as a way for engines to classify your and the H1 tag as a way to for users and engines to see what your page is about you will be on the right track. You should use heading tags in the following manner.

The h1 tag tells the search engines that the text included within that tag is the MAIN TOPIC of that page.
The h2 tag tells the search engines that the text included within that tag is the SUBTOPIC of that page.
The h3 tag tells the search engines that the text included within that tag is the SUBTOPIC of the SUB TOPIC of that page.

Paul this is tremendously helpful. I immediately went in and fixed mine (Live in Los Gatos). Thank you so much for a really useful and insightful post.

@Steven - Keywords are as important to SEO as gold doubloons were to pirates. Having a good set of keywords available to you is vital when using blogs for marketing purposes. I'd suggest printing out a list of your most relevant keywords and keeping them near your computer, maybe even tape them to the side of the monitor.

@David - AR does the work for you, so I wouldn't worry about it. No need to force it.

I did some more reading on what the experts had to say about H2, H3, etc tags and these were some of the comments..."2nd most important on-page criteria (weight changes every now and then and it can happen that h2/h3 have the same/higher importance than h1," "See comments for H1 tag," and "Same as h1 tags - good practice." My thinking, based on research I've done, is that as long as it's a header tag, Google will pay attention to it. Hence, the need to keyword-optimize them.

But, again, AR creates an H2 tag for each blog post title.

Paul... another great reminder. Something that I need to keep thinking about. One thing I notice about the headers is that on AR, it will only include your first several words. So...if I have some key words at the end, will this not get recognized then? If so, should the beginning of my subject/title be the part with my best key words?

And in regards to David's questions... I need to add one more to this. The H1 tag.... is this your first sentence? How do you create one? How do you find or how can you find your H1 tag on AR and or any other blog site that you might have. thanks

jeff belonger

And Paul.... does it hurt if you go back and change up and or around the titles. Is there a certain time frame. Can it hurt you if you change up a subject line that is 1 month old? thanks

jeff belonger

@David - Ooooo, good stuff! Thanks for adding to the conversation with such valuable insights.

@Jeff - I don't think the title tag clips words does it? I know the permalink does. In any event, yes, it's always a good practice to put your keywords closer to the front whenever possible. Most blog platforms associate a header tag with your blog post title. AR uses an H2 tag, which you can see by looking at the source code of the page. If you're using Windows, right click on a blank area of the page, then choose the menu option "view source." Look for the tag that says "h2."

If you have access to the CSS file for your blog (not your AR blog as the system doesn't allow access to source files), you can designate that the post title use an H1 tag, then set the style of the tag so that it has the look you want it to in terms of size, font and color.

@Jeff - Good question. David, any input there? I'd suggest that once the post has been indexed by the search engines that, yes, it could have some impact. As to a specific timeframe, I can't say. It all depends on how often the engines spider the site.

Good information. I have done almost no tweaking on my AR blog but I still find my results in the Search Engines. I need more time!

Paul, thank you! I am always learning from you. This is an amazing post. I'll be much more careful with the titles going forward.

Paul,

Thanks for your post here about SEO. If the stats still hold, about 7% of online leads come from search engines. Nevertheless, we still find SEO very important.

We're so focused on trying to help turn our market around through our main blog (www.laketahoerealestateblog.com) that we have very little time to explore all of the wonderful insights on AR. Your work here is a really helpful short cut to AR's best thinking.

You might appreciate checking out what we're doing. The left sidebar to our blog has all current real estate market statistics for both sides of our state line here in South Lake Tahoe. It's time consuming, but so far the public response has been encouraging, and growing.

Real Estate Information is a public service. Agents are not the gatekeepers, we're the conduits to it. If we provide it, they will come.

We've been working on this Lake Tahoe Real Estate Blog for a few months now. We've been so busy doing that, and putting on public real estate seminars every few months that I haven't had one second to focus on building our presence in the AR community. That will come for sure, and your work here is a helpful insight to it.

Cheers,

Gary

Great advice Paul - I totally agree that Search Engines see the Title Tags and H1 and the number one factor of what your page is about. All title tags are important as well - description and keywords though they are no weighted as heavy as the Title - thanks for the useful information.

You are correct, H1 tags are important. Very important. a factor you did not talk about and no criticism is the inbound links. They are important as well. But what kind of inbound links, Diverse yet relevant links pointing at your site, but even deeper than that, the anchor text for those links is important as well. Stay away from Realtor to Realtor reciprocal linking though, it is almost worthless and if you go to far with it, you can actually be hurting your website.

Paul - I always gain so much from your posts - thanks for the latest gold nugget.

Great post

Great information thanks for sharing with us.

Thanks for all your comments. When I need a ego boost I know where to come to get it! Ha, ha.

@James - Inbound links? I'm gettin' there!

Thanks Paul. There is so much to learn. Please keep the informative posts coming.

Please view our website WWW.REINNH.COM

Browse and comment! Thanks!

You are correct. Title tags are very important and the easiest thing to take care of. But a title that doesn't reflect the content of the page won't help you much either. -Charles

Great post. Thanks for the information. It is very helpful...

Great information. I love to try to understand this stuff. It all gets a little jumbled in my head.

Is this information just from common observation or does someone have an inside track as to what the search engines are looking for?

....and a very smart and coach of mine once told me that the sooner in that title that you can include those keywords, the better! hmmmmmm I wonder who that was

This is great stuff Paul, does your wealth of information ever run out?

Paul, very informative! Thanks for the tip, I look forward to more from you.

Interesting insights. Thanks for linking the Search Engine Ranking Factors site.

SEOmoz is a great resource. Thanks for spotlighting it on the ActiveRain community!

As usual, very valuable, helpful info from Paul. Thanks!

JUN

2007

great tips not, but to get good reasults you need all five not just title and H1 headers. Without anchor text a new page may not me found. If you give your page a backlink from a high pr site google will crawl it within two days.

-most inportantly title

-next anchor text

-h1 headers

-description

-meta keywords tags

Paul, thanks for sharing this. I'm looking forward to reading the additional information you have on keywords.

Thanks Paul.

Every bit of information about SEO helps. We may not know what to do or why or when, but we learn the right questions to ask.

Very helpful.

@Michael - The information comes from the combined experience of several SEO experts who participated in the creation of the report. Much of it is conventional wisdom gleaned from years of experience. However, let me refer everyone to this article which discusses how Google works and explains PageRank.

Also, let me borrow this quote from my company's ever-so-young, ever-so-smart (not to mention ever-so-good-looking in a young Elvis sort of way...and he hates it when I say that) lead developer, Michael Favia...

"Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft will be changing tack in the next year by emphasizing the personalization of search. This means that individual results will begin adapting to your search history and perceived success rates. For instance if you are a 'Fruit Farmer' and constantly search for things related to your field, your search for 'apple' will display a lot more fruit results than fancy white music players and laptops.

"The real lesson to learn here is to create good, accessible content that people find valuable and Google et al will take care of the rest. 'Context' will become increasingly important in the next year or two."

Pretty good stuff huh.

re: Jeff B - I can't imagine that it would HURT you... in fact I've seen it help me. I didn't know my stuff early on so I was naming for cleverness more than impact... if the title is for impact and it isn't being found, I don't see that it would be an issue. On top of that, wouldn't it make sense to have some uniformity to your own titling in that you're not trying to get ALL keywords - just pound the ones you want to be found under... so if you wrote three articles on something in Lafayette LA titled

Condos and Lofts in Lafayette, LA
Townhouses and Villas in Lafayette LA
Houses and Historic Homes in Lafayette LA

The TITLES and the matching URLS aren't pounding on your desire to be found in Lafayette, LA... so going back and changing them to

Lafayette LA: Condos, Lofts, and other multistory dwellings - this would get you Lafayette LA Condos Lofts for Google in the URL and the Title
Lafayette LA: Townhouses Villas and Carriage Houses - this would get uniformity and keep pounding Lafayette
Lafayette LA Houses Historic Homes and other Single Family Dwellings - ditto but now all the titles on this type of post are uniform and could also just strengthen your rankings on Lafayette LA by itself

Or did I miss something?

now that I think about it... on Jeff B's comments...

if you thought it would hurt... then why bother reworking an old post...

just reformat it and repost!!

Just look at Chris G and how she's pounding neighborhood posts. They are all formatted exactly the same and that should elicit the desired effect of SEO for Placement... plus it looks PROFESSIONAL

Thanks Paul for sharing this information. I also really liked the graphic you used. Where did you find it?

I look forward to reading your next post on keywords.

Valuable information. Thank you

It would be interesting if you would write another post with examples of good versus bad titles (unless you've already written one and I missed it!). Thanks. Mike C

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SEP

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Paul Chaney

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