The Keyword Meta Tag - Optimization Rights & Wrongs

• 5 to 8 Targeted Keyword Phrases Are All That’s Necessary •
• Stuffed And/Or Spammed Keyword Meta Tags Are Relics Of The Past! •

I can’t believe my eyes when I come across keyword meta tags that have been recently “optimized” using an out-dated and totally wrong method! Meaning … I find a keyword stuffed tag! And even worse, stuffed with one word terms that will NEVER EVER do any good ranking-wise for the site!

Incredulously, many of the sites where I see these extremely amateurish stuffed tags have supposedly been optimized by a “knowledgeable SEO specialist”. Come on people … this is the year 2008! Stuffing keywords is a thing of the ancient past! So is using more than eight keyword phrases! These techniques are loooooooong gone! 

After 1998, when Lycos dropped its ranking recognition of the keyword meta tag, and then in 2000 when AltaVista and Inktomi stopped paying attention to it, there was really little if any reason for people to optimize this tag. (Google never did pay any attention to it.)  Spammers had defeated its once useful purpose via fraudulent keyword stuffing.

The spammers inserted keywords that had nothing to do with the on-page content, thusly the terms “keyword tag stuffing” and “keyword tag spamming” became know as black-hat techniques.

To show you a real example of what is a very wrong, and very poor use of a keyword meta tag, here is a website that was recently tweaked for improved navigation and other issues, including (supposedly) optimization of all the Title and meta tags that had previously been ignored. I have knoweldge of this site, as this is an individual who choose not to hire me for my services. Obviously her loss … not mine!

OK … I have removed a few terms to provide anonymity to the site owner, but take a look at this meta tag - and no, I am not making this up:

‹META name=”keywords” content=”ND, naturopathic, naturopathic medicine, emedicine, natural medicine, hormone replacement, alternative medicine, ND, complementary medicine, CAM, supplements, [name of state] naturopathic doctors, healing, health, healthy, healthier, natural supplements, [abbreviation of state], phone, consults, consulation, NMD, consultation, Weil, homeopathy, homeopathic medicine, cholesterol, heart disease, prevention, men’s health, botanical, Xymogen, detox, oil, vitamin, prostate, women’s health, menopause, bio-identical, mind-body, skin, dysbiosis, probiotic, inflammation, progesterone, GI, Alzheimer’s, dementia, Huperzine, osteoporosis, nature, anti-aging, estrogen, testosterone, counseling, Caribbean, speaker, fatigue, [another state-nonrelated to this person's business], [yet another state-nonrelated to this person's business], [another country-nonrelated to this person's business], neurotransmitters, targeted amino acid therapy, depression, anxiety, non-drug, insomnia, [11 names of cities located near the place of business], free-lance, writer”›

Oh my goodness! 81 keywords and/or keyword phrases! And even if the search engines gave a lot of ranking value to the keyword meta tag, almost all of these terms would NEVER EVER EVER do anything to help get this website a higher ranking for those terms.

Why? Well … just how competitive do you think the terms “oil” or “consults” are?? But more importantly, how general and non-targeted to the site’s niche are these terms? I’ll tell you … TOTALLY too general and TOTALLY non-targeted!

Are you new to the concept of keywords?? No problem! Learn the difference between using one word versus multi-word phrases in my post: Keywords Explained: What’s A Keyword? A Keyword Phrase?

I’ll stop ranting here. Let me show you a general example of what this person’s so-called-seo-expert should have done with this tag:

‹META name=”keywords” content=”Naturopathic medicine, naturopathic doctor, alternative medicine, [name of practioner], [name of city & state]“›

Though I’ve done zero research into the terms I’ve used in this example, I do believe you get the idea that the keyword phrase terms ARE more targeted and related to a specific niche.

But hold on! I know you’re saying “then why Claudia, if you’re telling us the keyword meta tag no longer matters to the search engines … why are you telling us to optimize it? That doesn’t really make any sense!” I agree, but it is a common held belief amongst knowledgeable SEO experts that there is still a good reason to optimize the tag, and we do so for our clients. The reason is that Yahoo! and MSN do give a tiny bit of ranking weight to this tag (Google still ignores it). So, even though you may read elsewhere to just ignore this tag altogether, my professional advice is don’t. We never know if one day, this meta tag may prove to add a bit more weight to organic ranking positions.

When you are optimizing your web page’s keyword meta tag remember this: use 5 to 8 targeted, specifc terms relating to what your site and that particular web page’s content is about.

This is all you need to do to properly optimize the keyword meta tag. It’s that simple.