Customer Street SEO Articles & Help

The Keyword Meta Tag argument

There are various Meta tags we use at Customer Street but the keyword Meta tag causes by far the most arguments and disagreements between Webmasters and SEOs. When first conceived, the main function of the keyword Meta tag was to tell the search engines what subject / product / industry your site was orientated around and in the early days of SEO it was one of the key elements to high search engine rankings.

The keyword Meta tag:

<META name="keywords" content="keyword 1, keyword 2, keyword 3, keyword 4, keyword 5">

The advice below DOES NOT relate to keyword research (which I will cover in my next post). Keyword research is still the basic fundamental behind SEO and has implications far beyond the keyword Meta tag.

Yahoo and the Keyword Meta Tag

The original “big daddy” search engine was Yahoo. When Yahoo first started indexing and ranking the world’s online content they placed a great deal of ranking weight on the keyword Meta tag. The problem with this ranking method was that black hat SEOs realised that to get to the top of the search engines all they needed to do was stuff the keyword Meta tag full of keywords and wait.

The Keyword Meta Tag today

As time went on (and we saw the arrival of Google) algorithms improved and, due to the abuse it received, the keyword Meta tag was made semi-redundant.

Debates still go on about whether or not the keyword Meta tag is taken into account by any of the search engines, but the common consensus is this:

• It is widely agreed that Yahoo is still placing SOME weight on the keyword Meta tag but it is thought that they do not place any way near as much weight as they did.

• It is also widely agreed that MSN is still paying SOME attention to the keyword Meta tag although not as much as Yahoo.

• It is also agreed that Google pays little (if any) attention to the keyword Meta tag and it never has done.

How should we handle the Keyword Meta Tag today?

Just because Google doesn’t pay much attention to the keyword Meta tag doesn’t mean that we should ignore it, although many SEOs and webmasters do. One thing is clear – the keyword Meta tag is still used in some way, so you should observe the following:

• Add no more than 5 or 6 keywords to each page.
• Add geographical references if you engage in localised business.
• Add any common spelling mistakes that relate to your business.

There is also a theory that the search engines look at how the keyword Meta tags relate to the content of the page and try to observe correlations. There is also a theory that on page served ads (such as Google AdSense) generate their ads based on the keywords Meta tag.

So the evidence conclusively suggests one thing – get them right from the start but don’t get too wrapped up in the whole keyword Meta tag area!