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.
Plural vs singular keyword usage - on-page optimization
-
The on-page report card appears to include both plural and singular versions of keywords in reporting the keywords within the body, which results in a keyword stuffing warning.
My question is, is it truly keyword spamming to use over 15 instances of a keyword that is spread across plural and singular versions of the keyword? If keywords are lumped together this way by Google's algorithms, why do pages rank differently for singular and plural versions of the same keyword?
-
Great answers here.
Keep in mind the idea of "keyword stuffing" is a fluid concept. A well-written Wikipedia article may use the same keyword 60 times without being flagged for stuffing.
Context is key. If it makes sense to use your keywords multiple times than it's usually fine. The biggest violators that we usually see are in the title tag "Buy Cheap Florida Homes - Florida Home Finder - Your Best Florida Home Broker" - ouch!
As for plurals, Google will rank different pages differently based on what they perceive as searcher intent. I don't know of any hard and fast rules here - some plurals are considered synonymous with the singular version, while other times it can make a difference in ranking.
-
Nice Article, Eliathah
-
replace about 10 of those with synonyms - less is better. make sure everything else lines up, file name, title tags, h1, internal anchor texts, etc.
-
Nathan,
15 repeats is a bit excessive but then again your question about why Google in ranking the terms differently is one I asked myself a couple of times now. I use singular and plural version of a word for one of my websites. The search volume for both is not the same. The plural version is a bit lower then the singular one.
Still if you optimize your page for the plural version the singular one should be taken into consideration because in my case the singular version of the word is part of the plural (minicamping and minicampings). The problem is in the fact that these words match for the biggest part.
I would suggest reducing the number of times the word(s) is/are repeated by at least 5 no matter how big the content is, unless it is completely natural off course. That all depends on the words you are using I guess.
Hope this helps
kind regards
Jarno
-
I guess it depends on the length of the content. Typically, 15 occurrences is excessive, even if it alternated between the singular and plural versions. I would suggest developing your content around keyword themes using many variants, not just the singular and plural versions.
here's a blog post i did on the subject of keyword theming - http://searchsolve.blogspot.com/2012/10/developing-content-around-keyword.html
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
-
Improving SEO for an e-commerce page with 1 product page
I'm trying to improve the SEO for an e-commerce store that I'm working for that sells custom car air fresheners where you select the shape of the item and then upload the photo. The site has been around for almost 10 years so has authority in the field and ranks number one for custom car air fresheners and other related high-traffic keywords. However, there is no blog, no social media and has 8 total pages: landing page, FAQ, contact, guidelines, shape/product (page that starts the ordering process with little text), scents, terms, and samples.
Keyword Research | | campionn
I'm struggling with how we rank higher for specific keywords that we are not number 1 with ok traffic (such as dog air freshener, custom air freshener for car with picture, custom photo car air freshener) and not affect the current keywords that we are ranking number one for. In addition, how do we rank higher for other keywords, if we don't have that many pages like a blog to create content? I was thinking of creating a blog to target more keywords, but I don't think there is enough relevant content to make. And I feel Google would find a blog about "top gifts for dad" or "top gifts for the holidays" not relevant. I was also thinking of adding more text to the shapes/product page which could be tailored towards a keyword. Maybe I could create another product page that goes into more detail about the air freshener with images, descriptions, and other use cases. On MOZ, the Domain Authority is 18 (really low), so I am thinking about working on getting backlinks from relevant sources with authority to improve our SEO. Or do we not mess with the text on the website since it works and not worry about the other keywords and focus on technical SEO items and backlinks to help with SEO? TLDR: How do you improve SEO for new keywords for an e-commerce business that doesn't have a lot of pages for content without affecting its number 1 ranking on other keywords?0 -
What defines what words in a title are considered Keywords?
Hi, sorry if this is a silly question. I'm curious how keywords are defined. Is every word in a title a possible keyword? If I have a keyword titled "Linear Shower Drain | 40" Long", does it take the whole thing as a keyword? Is just "Linear Shower Drain" the keyword? Would "Shower Drain" pop up as a keyword, since its nested in the title? Thank you in advance for your answers!
Keyword Research | | ezable0 -
Which keyword to use (plural / singular)
Hi guys. So I'm racking my brain with a question whether I should use plural or singular keyword as a focus keyphrase of my page. The page that I'm optimizing is basically a review page of different websites offering proofreading services. Considering the fact that this is a review and I mention a lot of websites on my page, I decided to rank for a plural keyword that ends with "services". However, this keyword is very unpopular (ahrefs doesn't show any volume for it), while singular "service" has about 100 searches per month. As far as I understand, Google sees both keywords as synonyms, because search results for both keywords are almost identical. Should I change my keyphrase to singular "service" (even though the page mentions a lot of services), or stick with "services" instead? Do I have a chance of ranking for "service" if I stick with "services" in this case? Thank you.
Keyword Research | | AslanBarselinov0 -
Setting Up a Keyword Matrix
Greetings MOZ community!! My real estate web site contains about 500 pages with perhaps 70 pages targeting low volume, somewhat valuable but not very competitive keywords. Three to four URLs target very competitive terms. The following terms are among the most valuable: New York City office space,
Keyword Research | | Kingalan1
New York office space,
Manhattan office space,
NYC office space Such variants as: Office space in New York City,
Office space in New York,
Office space in Manhattan,
Office space in NYC
ETCETERA convert really well How would I match different terms to different URLs? For example I have just re-written the following two critical URLs: www.nyc-officespace-leader.com (home page)
http://www.nyc-officespace-leader.com/commercial-space/office-space (product page) Would it make sense to use "Manhattan office space" and variants on the home page while excluding "New York City office space" variants? At the same time I would use "New York City office space" variants on the "office-space" product page while excluding all mention of "Manhattan office space". Is this logical and does it conform to SEO best practices? For the "NYC office space" terms I would add them to http://www.nyc-officespace-leader.com/listings. This URL has almost no text but a strong potential to rent because of a high number of incoming internal links. Is this approach sensible? In general what measures should I take to prevent URLs from competing for the same keywords? Also, is there a software package or tools that I can use to come up with keyword variants? As a non SEO professional, can I create my own keyword matrix or is this really in the realm of a professional SEO consultant? Thanks, Alan0 -
Keyword ranking by word order
If we have a keyword with 2 words like "SSL Audit". Will it rank in the same position the other way "Audit SSL" ?
Keyword Research | | Cistrust.com0 -
Branded vs Generic keywords - is Google treating their rank equaly!?
Several times I have noticed that website receiving sort of a rankings drop penalty for certain wrongly built on-page strategies that involves keyword stuffing, wrong keyword density(too much) etc. The question is - how you guys think - is branded keywords receiving the same treatment from Google then generic ones? And here is why - for one popular brand I see that they ranking for their brand keyword very high(1th) but keyword density is awful - more then 10%. So, my guess is - if this keyword density you would apply for generic keyword you will end up nowhere to be found for it! Is that could be truth? Any experiments info about that? thanks and regards, Jungles
Keyword Research | | Jungles0 -
Keywords for fabrication (welding) company??
I've been tasked with finding the keywords for our website. The difficulty I'm finding is receiving help from the fabrication personal to suggest keywords. I'm not sure if its peoples imagination or if there's a general unwillingness. Can anyone make any suggestions here? Is there a fabrication or welding keyword database I can put to them and hopefully get their brains working? Or even a way to see what keywords our competitors use?
Keyword Research | | Resolver1010 -
Help finding some decent keywords
Anyone care to help a SEO Newbie find a couple of key words that would be easier to rank for for my website that provides kayak fishing information? mysite: yakangler.com The key words that I've identified are as follows: best kayak
Keyword Research | | mr_w
fishing from a kayak
fishing kayak review
fishing kayaks
kayak and fishing
kayak fishing
kayak for fishing
kayak reviews
kayak rigging
kayak weight limit
kayaks fishing
kayaks for fishing But I'm worried I'm missing the point, I don't see hardly any traffic from most of these. I've really tried to rank for "kayak fishing" but seem to be totally lost in the Google Panda abyss. Any advice on a different word or strategy would be greatly appreciated!0