What are Meta Keywords?
Webmasters create meta keywords to be able to tell search engines what particular pages are about. However, you should know they have seemingly outlived their usefulness.
Meta keywords were created so webmasters could tell search engines what particular pages are about. However,
you should know they have seemingly outlived their usefulness. The engines determine the page's relevance mainly based on its content, so most of them pay less attention the Meta keywords tag nowadays.
However, this does not mean you should not use them. There are a few search engines which still use them. You will need to place the tag somewhere in the head section of your HTML page. You can put more than one keyword or phrase inside the tag as long as they are separated by commas.
It is important to note Meta keywords are supposed to work in combination with the page's content and the overall theme of the website. In most cases, you will only need to include important keywords which are actually found on the page.
However, it is sometimes useful to include Meta keywords not found on the page. You can use synonyms or other words related to your chosen keywords. Using your site's main keywords can also be a good idea. Some people even include common misspellings in the tag.
When choosing Meta keywords to use, make sure you choose those people actually search for. There is really no reason to target keywords people do not use since you will receive little traffic from them. You should consider targeting multiple keywords on any given page to increase the chances to get traffic.
Another factor which determines the Meta keywords you should use is the amount of competition they have. You will find it can be pretty hard to rank for terms which are quite competitive. There will be a lot of work and time involved in order to get ranked for these highly competitive keywords.
It is important for you to realize the most popular search engines do not place a lot of importance on Meta keywords anymore. If you are optimizing for Google only, there seems to be little importance. Yahoo, on the other hand, may still give them a bit of weight. Two engines that still take them into account are Teoma and Inktomi though.
Although the main search engines do not value them highly, it does not mean you should not make use of the Meta keywords tag. Using it can do no harm and it might do a little good. Just make sure you target searched keywords which are not too competitive.
