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.
Page Title versus H1 title
-
What's the difference between the Page Title and the H1 title? It seems like both summarize the page. Is it a wasted opportunity to make them the same? Should they be similar but slightly different?
-
of course! so my recommendation would be to inspect the page (with chrome dev tools) and see if it is styled as an H1, and if it isn't styled as a true H1, I would add that as a task to your backlog but I wouldn't suggest that you make it higher priority then other more important ranking factors. That being said, most of these SEO best practice recommendations come from people doing tests and identifying trends, so there is no 100% solid answer that "yes you NEED it to be styled as a true H1" or "no it does not matter at all".
My personal opinion is that it still carries some value, so if you can figure it out, I would recommend that you do have it read as a true H1 tag. Even if it does not impact your rankings significantly, I think that your site will be better off following all recommended best practices.
-
Thank you for the over and above response!
My quandry is that the text that is really the "H1" on each page is done in a certain styling on the web platform such that we can't control the text for it to be an H1. We can't choose it with a menu or do it on the back end through code and tagging. (Maybe we could if we really dig into it, not sure.)
The text is very clear on the page and functions exactly in the way I believe an H1 should function, clarifying what the page is about (similar to the page title but not always exactly that same words). We like the styling, and it's clear and visual. I was wondering if we should worry that tools like Moz Pro don't see it officially as an H1. It seems from most things I'm hearing is that it functions as an H1 already and we don't need to spend the time to get it to be stylized as official H1. That's why I was wondering exactly what H1s are for and why they are important. If it's for directing the viewer on the page, we've done that. If it's for something more that needs official H1 "status" we don't have that.
-
Thank you for the response! I really appreciate it.
-
Title Tags = Page Titles (if you're using a CMS, it is usually called page title, not title tag).Your title tag is the name that appears on your browser tab. This is one of the first places that search engine spiders crawl to see what a page is about. When it comes to SERP ranking, your title tag has far far more of an influence then the H1 does. In fact, so many people used to keyword stuff the H1 and use it for spam, that it no longer has much of impact at all, if any. The H1 of a page is now more intended for the user to get a clear idea of what they are about to read, as well as styling of your pages. Moz recommends the following format for your title tag: Primary Keyword - Secondary Keyword | Brand Name. However, if your title tag doesn't match what content of the page is about, than you're spamming.
Here's an example: Let's say you have a page about why organic apples are the best, and you sell organic fruit and your brand name is organics (which is probably a real brand name but oh well, it's for this example). Your title tag (page title) could be this: Why Organic Apples Are Better - Premium Organic Fruit | Organics. But your H1 could be: "Why You Should Start Eating Organic Apples Only" or "Why You Should Avoid Non-Organic Apples" and it would be the first thing on-page.
-
Hi,
Main Differences:
Title Tags appear in search engines and the Web browser’s title bar
H1 Headers appear within the body text of the webpage
Search engines give more weight to Title Tags than H1 HeadersPlease check this old thread on similar query @ https://moz.com/community/q/can-h1-and-meta-title-be-exactly-the-same-why-not
Hope this helps.
Thanks
-
Hello,
I refer to this Moz article when writing Meta Title tags https://moz.com/learn/seo/title-tag with the optimal format:
Primary Keyword - Secondary Keyword | Brand Name
The H1 tag would look unnatural in the same format. Personally I use the H1 tag to focus on my primary keyword if the page is mostly focusing on the primary keyword. The H1 tag should provide a good user experience when a visitor lands on the page and give an indication of the content within. If you make it unreadable it will result in a bounce back to the SERP.
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
-
Duplicate 'meta title' issue (AMP & NON-AMP Pages)
how to fix duplicate meta title issue in amp and non-amp pages? example.com
On-Page Optimization | | 21centuryweb
example.com/amp We have set the 'meta title' in desktop version & we don't want to change the title for AMP page as we have more than 10K pages on the website. ----As per SEMRUSH Tool---- ABOUT THIS ISSUE It is a bad idea to duplicate your title tag content in your first-level header. If your page’s <title>and <h1> tags match, the latter may appear over-optimized to search engines. Also, using the same content in titles and headers means a lost opportunity to incorporate other relevant keywords for your page.</p> <p><strong>HOW TO FIX IT</strong></p> <p>Try to create different content for your <title> and <h1> tags.<br /><br />this is what they are recommending, for the above issue we have asked our team to create unique meta and post title for desktop version but what about AMP page?<br /><br />Please help!</p></title>0 -
Is the URL Matching the Page Title Important?
Hello I have tried searching for an answer on this but I can't get a clear answer due to the results when searching for URL title. I have just launched our second Shopify site for one of our brands. My first site launched in 2014 but when I launched I didn't pay much heed to SEO for page titles, URLs, etc so have retrospectively fixed this over time. For my Shopify site just launching I want to get it as right as possible from the start (learning from mistakes). My question is regarding URLs and what my approach should be for better SEO. So, I have a page with a Title of Newton Leather Wallets, Purses, Card Holders & Glasses Cases and the URL is https://www.tumbleandhide.com/collections/newton-leather-wallets-card-holders It was my understanding that I should try and make the URL reflect the Page Title more accurately. The problem is that this takes the character count to 77. On other pages it can be in the 80s. Will the above link be better for SEO than say just https://www.tumbleandhide.com/collections/newton I am just wary of the URL's being too long as my Moz Site Crawl is returning a lot of URLs that are too long. Thanks in Advance.
On-Page Optimization | | lukegj0 -
Will it upset Google if I aggregate product page reviews up into a product category page?
We have reviews on our product pages and we are considering averaging those reviews out and putting them on specific category pages in order for the average product ratings to be displayed in search results. Each averaged category review would be only for the products within it's category, and all reviews are from users of the site, no 3rd party reviews. For example, averaging the reviews from all of our boxes products pages, and listing that average review on the boxes category page. My question is, will this be doing anything wrong in the eyes of Google, and if so how so? -Derick
On-Page Optimization | | Deluxe0 -
H1 tag- on home page - what is it best to include
is it best to have in the H1 tag 1. just our website address 2. combination of website address followed by short keywords about our website
On-Page Optimization | | CostumeD0 -
Duplicate page titles and Content in Woocommerce
Hi Guys, I'm new to Moz and really liking it so far!
On-Page Optimization | | jeeyer
I run a eCommerce site on Wordpress + WooCommerce and ofcourse use Yoast for SEO optimalisation I've got a question about my first Crawl report which showed over 600 issues! 😐 I've read that this is something that happens more often (http://moz.com/blog/setup-wordpress-for-seo-success). Most of them are categorized under:
1. Duplicate Page Titles or;
2. Duplicate Page Content. Duplicate Page Titles:
These are almost only: product category pages and product tags. Is this problem beeing solved by giving them the right SEO SERP? I see that a lot of categories don't have a proper SEO SERP set up in yoast! Do I need to add this to clear this issue, or do I need to change the actual Title? And how about the Product tags? Another point (bit more off-topic) I've read here: http://moz.com/community/q/yoast-seo-plugin-to-index-or-not-to-index-categories that it's advised to noindex/follow Categories and Tags but isn't that a wierd idea to do for a eCommerce site?! Duplicate Page Content:
Same goes here almost only Product Categories and product tags that are displayed as duplicate Page content! When I check the results I can click on a blue button for example "+ 17 duplicates" and that shows me (in this case 17 URLS) but they are not related to the fist in any way so not sure where to start here? Thanks for taking the time to help out!
Joost0 -
301 redirects from several sub-pages to one sub-page
Hi! I have 14 sub-pages i deleted earlier today. But ofcourse Google can still find them, and gives everyone that gives them a go a 404 error. I have come to the understading that this wil hurt the rest of my site, at least as long as Google have them indexed. These sub-pages lies in 3 different folders, and i want to redirect them to a sub-page in a folder number 4. I have already an htaccess file, but i just simply cant get it to work! It is the same file as i use for redirecting trafic from mydomain.no to www.mydomain.no, and i have tried every kind of variation i can think of with the sub-pages. Has anyone perhaps had the same problem before, or for any other reason has the solution, and can help me with how to compose the htaccess file? 🙂 You have to excuse me if i'm using the wrong terms, missing something i should have seen under water while wearing a blindfold, or i am misspelling anything. I am neither very experienced with anything surrounding seo or anything else that has with internet to do, nor am i from an englishspeaking country. Hope someone here can light up my path 🙂 Thats at least something you can say in norwegian...
On-Page Optimization | | MarieA1 -
Title tag for category page
I'd like to know your views on the best approach for title tags for category pages for ecommerce sites. 3 examples A) Category name | Free delivery on $50 purchase | Brand name B) Discover best "category name" on brand name C) Category Name | 1st Keyword, 2nd keyword | Brand name Thanks!
On-Page Optimization | | walidalsaqqaf0 -
Creating New Pages Versus Improving Existing Pages
What are some things to consider or things to evaluate when deciding whether you should focus resources on creating new pages (to cover more related topics) versus improving existing pages (adding more useful information, etc.)?
On-Page Optimization | | SparkplugDigital0