H2's are already ranking well. Should I rock the boat?
-
I recently began work for a company and discovered that they are not using h1's (using h2's) and rank in the top 5 for ~90% of their keywords.
The site is one of the original players in their industry, has massive amounts of domain authority and tens of thousands of linking root domains. However, they are currently being beaten on some of their top keywords by a few of their younger competitors.
Moving their current h2 text into h1 tags could be helpful. But to what extent? Since they already rank well for so many competitive keywords, Is it worth it to rock the boat by moving their h2 text into h1 tags and risk affecting their current rankings?
-
Thanks for taking the time to answer my question Claudio.
-
Thanks for taking the time to detail your explanation, Nakul. Your method is a good one for testing. Cheers!
-
Thanks for your feedback and experience Mark. I appreciate it.
-
I really appreciate your encouragement, Brad. Your experience provides me with some hope of further boosting organic rankings and besting the competition. Thanks for sharing.
-
I've been doing SEO for a decent amount of time. You would think I would remember "when in doubt, test it out."
It's funny how when you're in the thick of things that the most obvious of answers can elude you.This is why I love the Moz community. Thanks for the reminder Ade!
-
I agree with all of the others especially about testing on a few keywords that are not mission critical.
My experience and past sites I have optimized are not affected much by H2 tags. The main factors that really made a difference were the title tags, H1, page interlinking using anchor text (not over-optimized - vary it).
There are 200+ (from the last info I heard) ranking factors. Obviously having all of these work together in synergy is best.
The good news you already have domain authority etc. I would think that it definitely won't hurt and may even help slightly.
-
Hi Collin,
I recently did this for a client site of mine (alas it didn't have a huge amount of domain authority). The results were very pleasing, we noticed a jump in keywords simply from switching from H2 to H1.
My advice - definitely go ahead with testing like the others have suggested. You've got nothing to lose!
Thanks,
Brad
-
Dear Collin,
I agree 100% with my mates, but I want to add some of my experience, for years I was doing this :
1. the exactly content of your title tag (I assume you're using your most important keywords) should be in the H! tag and this H1 tag should be as close to tag as is possible (prominence) you can use only one H1 tag on the page.
2. The use the H2 tag is optional and you can use it two or more times (no bother), usually I use two H2 tags with keywords related to my H1 (main keyword).
In the past months I was feeling the H2 is not important as in the past, and google now disagree with "over optimization" thats mean "pages with perfect keywords distribution, prominence and density".....
So you should use your primary keyword in the title tag and H1 tag and optionally H2 tags, the key is original and useful content for visitors.
Hope this help
Claudio
-
I agree with Ade. Just test it on a small scale and see what the results look like. I would suggest you try a couple different options.
1. Keywords Currently in Positions 2-5
2. Keywords Currently in Positions 6-10
3. Keywords Currently on Page 2
Find 5 in each category, make the changes and watch and see where the most impact was and make sure you are not directly impacting the test with any other items of influence (as much as you can control) to get an accurate read on the test.
-
Hi Colin,
Why don't you take it slowly and carry out some testing?
I would choose a few pages where they are ranking well for some (not so important) keywords and switch these titles to H1's, leave it for a few weeks and see how it goes.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
How to use Google search console's 'Name change' tool?
Hi There, I'm having trouble performing a 'Name change' for a new website (rebrand and domain change) in Google Search console. Because the 301 redirects are in place (a requirement of the name change tool), Google can no longer verify the site, which means I can't complete the name change? To me, step two (301 redirect) conflicts with step there (site verification) - or is there a way to perform a 301 redirect and have the tool verify the old site? Any pointers in the right direction would be much appreciated. Cheers Ben
Technical SEO | | cmscss0 -
What's with the redirects?
Hi there,
Technical SEO | | HeadStud
I have a strange issue where pages are redirecting to the homepage.Let me explain - my website is http://thedj.com.au Now when I type in www.thedj.com.au/payments it redirects to https://thedj.com.au (even though it should be going to the page https://thedj.com.au/payments). Any idea why this is and how to fix? My htaccess file is below: BEGIN HTTPS Redirection Plugin <ifmodule mod_rewrite.c="">RewriteEngine On
RewriteRule ^home.htm$ https://thedj.com.au/ [R=301,L]
RewriteRule ^photos.htm$ http://photos.thedj.com.au/ [R=301,L]
RewriteRule ^contacts.htm$ https://thedj.com.au/contact-us/ [R=301,L]
RewriteRule ^booking.htm$ https://thedj.com.au/book-dj/ [R=301,L]
RewriteRule ^downloads.htm$ https://thedj.com.au/downloads/ [R=301,L]
RewriteRule ^payonline.htm$ https://thedj.com.au/payments/ [R=301,L]
RewriteRule ^price.htm$ https://thedj.com.au/pricing/ [R=301,L]
RewriteRule ^questions.htm$ https://thedj.com.au/faq/ [R=301,L]
RewriteRule ^links.htm$ https://thedj.com.au/links/ [R=301,L]
RewriteRule ^thankyous/index.htm$ https://thedj.com.au/testimonials/ [R=301,L]
RewriteCond %{HTTPS} off
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ https://thedj.com.au/ [L,R=301]</ifmodule> END HTTPS Redirection Plugin BEGIN WordPress <ifmodule mod_rewrite.c="">RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^index.php$ - [L]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule . /index.php [L]</ifmodule> END WordPress RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^mrdj.net.au$ [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^www.mrdj.net.au$
RewriteRule ^/?$ "https://thedj.com.au/" [R=301,L] RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^mrdj.com.au$ [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^www.mrdj.com.au$
RewriteRule ^/?$ "https://thedj.com.au/" [R=301,L] RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^thedjs.com.au$ [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^www.thedjs.com.au$
RewriteRule ^/?$ "https://thedj.com.au/" [R=301,L] RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^theperthweddingdjs.com$ [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^www.theperthweddingdjs.com$
RewriteRule ^/?$ "https://thedj.com.au/" [R=301,L] RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^thedjs.net.au$ [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^www.thedjs.net.au$
RewriteRule ^/?$ "https://thedj.com.au" [R=301,L]0 -
Joomla creating duplicate pages, then the duplicate page's canonical points to itself - help!
Using Joomla, every time I create an article a subsequent duplicate page is create, such as: /latest-news/218-image-stabilization-task-used-to-develop-robot-brain-interface and /component/content/article?id=218:image-stabilization-task-used-to-develop-robot-brain-interface The latter being the duplicate. This wouldn't be too much of a problem, but the canonical tag on the duplicate is pointing to itself.. creating mayhem in Moz and Webmaster tools. We have hundreds of duplicates across our website and I'm very concerned with the impact this is having on our SEO! I've tried plugins such as sh404SEF and Styleware extensions, however to no avail. Can anyone help or know of any plugins to fix the canonicals?
Technical SEO | | JamesPearce0 -
Will you get more 'google juice' if your social links are in your websites header, rather than its footer?
Hi team, I'm in the process of making some aesthetic changes to my website. Its getting quite cluttered so the main purpose is to clean up its look. I currently have 3x social links in the header, right at the top, and i would really like to move these to the footer to remove some clutter in the header. My concern is that moving them may have an impact on the domains ranking in google. Website: www.mountainjade.co.nz We've made some huge gains against our competitors over the past 6 months and I don't want to jeopardise that. Any help would be much appreciated as i'm self taught in SEO and have learnt through making mistakes. This time however, with Moz, i'd rather get some advice before I make any decisions! Thanks is advance, Jake S
Technical SEO | | Jacobsheehan0 -
Consistent top 10 in G image search - but a different 'stolen' version every time!
I have a photo that was uploaded back in 2005. It is an aerial shot and has received a fair bit of traffic over the years. I'm pretty sure it was ranked #1 in Google Images for the town name for a while. Now, however, it never ranks. Well actually it does. But every single time it is a version on a different website that is being used without permission.
Technical SEO | | Cornwall
And I'm not talking about one website. Every time I fill out a DMCA and have the image removed only to see a completely different website featuring in the top 10. This has happened 5 times so far and I'm just about to fill out another DMCA request. What is going on? Surely Google in its infinite wisdom is smart enough to check the timestamp or date cues on page to figure out which is the original. These other sites are often complete unknowns compared to my site which is a 12yr old authority site on the subject.
Don't get it!0 -
Does adding Tool Tips to a site hurt it's SEO?
I'm wanting to add tool tips to my site as it's intended for non-technical people that are wanting high tech equipment and services. I thought that by adding tool tips, I could clear any confusion they may have about a particular word right there rather then them having to search for what it means. I did some research online and saw that it may hurt SEO ratings but wanted to verify here first before deciding.
Technical SEO | | sDevik0 -
Adding 'NoIndex Meta' to Prestashop Module & Search pages.
Hi Looking for a fix for the PrestaShop platform Look for the definitive answer on how to best stop the indexing of PrestaShop modules such as "send to a friend", "Best Sellers" and site search pages. We want to be able to add a meta noindex ()to pages ending in: /search?tag=ball&p=15 or /modules/sendtoafriend/sendtoafriend-form.php We already have in the robot text: Disallow: /search.php
Technical SEO | | reallyitsme
Disallow: /modules/ (Google seems to ignore these) But as a further tool we would like to incude the noindex to all these pages too to stop duplicated pages. I assume this needs to be in either the head.tpl or the .php file of each PrestaShop module.? Or is there a general site wide code fix to put in the metadata to apply' Noindex Meta' to certain files. Current meta code here: Please reply with where to add code and what the code should be. Thanks in advance.0 -
Do you get credit for an external link that points to a page that's being blocked by robots.txt
Hi folks, No one, including me seems to actually know what happens!? To repeat: If site A links to /home.html on site B and site B blocks /home.html in Robots.txt, does site B get credit for that link? Does the link pass PageRank? Will Google still crawl through it? Does the domain get some juice, but not the page? I know there's other ways of doing this properly, but it is interesting no?
Technical SEO | | DaveSottimano0