Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Keyword Phrases - Can You Break Them Up?
-
Can you break up a search query across a sentence and have Google still recognize which query you are targeting?
Let's say I'm trying to rank a page for the phrase "best haircuts calgary".
Is Google's algorithm advanced enough to look at page title "Best Haircuts - Where To Get Them In Calgary" and know it's targeting the query "best haircuts calgary"?
If it can't do this right now, I could see it advancing to this at some point in the future, which would then change the game quite a bit in terms of how creative you can get creating pages for queries.
-
Kane,
I could not agree with you more. For instance I have a client that currently has 26,000 visitors a day because of a awesome campaign that went viral could not be happier. One page that contains the news story receives 10,000 visitors. While the homepage might get much of the direct traffic from all the news sources online there is a call to action to view the specialty item. Sorry I can't get more into it.
Either way we just picked up traffic immensely and because of the amount of social sharing along with the incredible link velocity being pushed to the homepage and the item page only granite the item page is starting to get more links and the shares are beyond what the home page is by tens of thousands.
What I'm getting at is because of the links and the social aspect the fact that this keeps snowballing is something I'm extremely proud of.
We are going to be on the largest news network morning show next week and I anticipate this is just the beginning of the attention focused on just to pages 1 being the home.
So obviously I know you are right the more links and social shares the better the page will rank I could write gobbledygook is the title and it would still Get insane traffic.
I hope that helps,
Thomas
-
So - hard to give a good answer for this aside from subjective opinion of what we've noticed recently. And, whatever answer I write will probably be dated 3 to 6 months from now.
With that said, the above answers are about right. Google should be able to understand these, and probably does (especially when there are no exact match results), but that doesn't mean that the page will rank if there are a bunch of people specifically targeting the "best haircuts calgary" variation.
If there were two pages, one with a split keyword and multiple links and social shares, and the other one with an exact match keyword and zero links or social shares - I'd put my money on the page with the split keyword.
-
It's one thing to understand it, but does it mean the same thing to Google in terms of ranking the page?
Let's say you have two pages that are exactly the same except for the page title:
"best haircuts calgary - where to get them?"
"where in calgary to get the best haircuts"
Duplicate content aside, do you think Google would rank one of those higher than the other for the query "best haircuts calgary", or rank them the same?
-
Hi Steve,
On page title tags are just one element that Google looks at when placing you in the SERP's. In addition to the on page you also need to have strong off page elements signalling the importance of that phrase to Google on your site. One of our clients is ranking at the top for a non profit keyword even through a different variation of that keyword phrase is mentioned on the title tag.
Cheers,
-
Yes Google could easily understand that and I agree with you quite a bit I think some of the stuff that's coming down the pipe in the next few years will be complete game changers and nothing we could expect not everything but they'll be some things that no one expected of course.
I think Google is going to get more and more personal the fact they use Gmail, android phones Google is an ISP now there kind of a monopoly taken over but we have to live with them.
But Do not jump the gun didn't think that anything you think is possible is going to work to get you ranked right now follow their rules. Until they change.
I think your predictions are correct.
Sincerely,
Thomas
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
-
Topical keywords for product pages and blogs
Hi all, I have a question regarding keywords. Of course we all know that keyword research should be focused on a certain topic and on user intent (and thus on answering specific questions) instead of trying to put keywords in a page to make it rank. However, duplicate content is of course still an issue. So here's my question: A client that sells floor heating systems that you can install yourself, has a product page for this topic and blog pages for questions regarding this topic. So following pages are on the website: Product page about the floor heating systems the client sells Blog article with tips how to install a floor heating system yourself Blog article about how to choose the right floor heating system These pages all answer different questions and are written about different topics. However, inevatibly all these pages also talk about different aspects of floor heating systems so this broad term comes up on all pages naturally. You could say that a solution is to merge pages and redirect the blogs to the product page, so the product page would answer all questions. But that is not what a customer is looking for. The goal of a product page is to trigger a conversion: let a customer contact the company or ask for a price offer. If the content on a product page is not comprehensive enough, the goal gets lost. Moreover, it doesn't make sense to talk about tips and tricks on a product page. So how do you tackle this problem without creating duplicate content? In search results, the blog pages rank for the specific questions, but the product page doesn't rank for the generic term 'floor heating'. The internal link structure is ok: the product page has obviously more incoming links than the blogs. All on page SEO factors are taken care of as well. Any ideas on this? Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Mat_C0 -
Can you apply schema to a newsletter signup link?
I was curious if it is possible to markup a newsletter signup link for a client. If yes, what schema property should I use? https://schema.org/Action?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | RosemaryB0 -
Can you buy backlinks from fiverr?
Hi Mozers, I though a while ago I heard that buying backlinks was a no go, until I seen and read this article: I notice the guy that wrote the article suggested that you can buy backlinks from fiverr, and also just make sure they are do-follow backlinks. Can someone please correct me and perhaps clear my confusion over this. As far as I knew it was best to build backlinks by doing guest posting and engaging in relevant forums? Heres the article: http://socialmediafuze.com/10-backlink-strategies-business/ Thanks guys
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | edward-may2 -
"Null" appearing as top keyword in "Content Keywords" under Google index in Google Search Console
Hi, "Null" is appearing as top keyword in Google search console > Google Index > Content Keywords for our site http://goo.gl/cKaQ4K . We do not use "null" as keyword on site. We are not able to find why Google is treating "null" as a keyword for our site. Is anyone facing such issue. Thanks & Regards
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | vivekrathore0 -
Can Google Read Text in Carousel
so what is the best practice for getting Google to be able to read text that populates via JQuery in a carousel. If the text is originally display none, is Google going to be able to crawl it? Are there any limits to what Google can crawl when it comes to JavaScript and text? Or is it always better just to hardcopy the text on the page source?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | imageworks-2612900 -
Should I remove Meta Keywords tags?
Hi, Do you recommend removing Meta Keywords or is there "nothing to lose" with having them? Thanks
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | BeytzNet0 -
Meta Keywords: Should we use them or not?
I am working through our site and see that meta keywords are being used heavily and unnecessarily. Each of our info pages will have 2 or 3 keyword phrases built into them. Should we just duplicate the keyword phrases into the meta keyword field, should put in additional keywords beyond or not use it at all? Thoughts and opinions appreciated
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Towelsrus1 -
How to Target Keyword Permutations
I have a client that wants to rank for a keyword phrase that has many permutations.. ex. "Alaska Hill Country Resort", "Hill Country Resort Alaska", "Hill Country Alaska Resort" But I'm wondering if I should target these all on the same page or not. I'm assuming all of these permutations are actually valid searches because I did my keyword research for 'exact match' keywords and got results like this.. (let me know if I'm missing something here, or if this sounds right) [Alaska Hill Country Resort] - 230 Local Searches [Hill Country Resort Alaska] - 140 Local Searches [Hill Country Alaska Resort] - 30 Local Searches The phrase we're targeting is their main keyword phrase, so I've chosen their home-page as the page to rank for this phrase. My thought is to optimize for the most popular phrase (ex. "Alaska Hill Country Resort"), and sprinkle in the other phrases throughout the copy. Next I would run a link-building campaign targeting the main phrase first.. then the next phrase, and so on, so that my anchor text is more heavily focused on the more popular terms, but I would also make sure to include the less popular terms. Do you think this is the best way to go about this? Do I really need to make individual pages for each of the permutations, or is it okay to target them all on one page since they are essentially the same keyword?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | ATMOSMarketing560