Using Keywords to Improve Search Engine Rankings

Careful placement of keywords helps determine how relevant a search engine thinks your page is to a given keyword.

The more occurances of a particular word, the more relevant the page is to that topic. However, you need to have quality content too, otherwise you won't be included in manually reviewed directories. In general, your page should have at least 100 words to be ranked highly.

Keyword Prominence

Place keywords as close to the top of the page as possible. If you have images at the top of your page, make sure you use alt attributes with them.

Keyword Proximity

When keywords are close together this results in a higher ranking in search engines such as Google. Here is an example:

I like wearing cotton socks in the summer.

I like wearing socks, particularly in the summer when I wear cotton ones.

A bit contrived, but when searching for "cotton socks" the first sentence would rank higher because the keywords are closer to each other. The main thing is simply to make sure your sentences are clear and concise.

Keyword Density

This is also known as keyword weight, where the percentage of keywords relative to other words is measured. The higher the percentage the better. The basic concept here is that you should try using keywords as often as you can throughout the text.

Keyword Frequency

This is a measure of the number of times keywords occur within the text of the page. More than one repetition of a keyword is recommended.

Avoid Spam

Don't attempt to trick search engines by using white text on a white background (invisible text), or super small print to try and increase the number of keywords on your page. Search engines will reject your site for it when it gets noticed.