This one strategy, keyword Prominence, can make a difference in whether your website is found among the millions of other websites being searched. Although it is not an important factor in search engine rankings but it is vital.
The concept is familiar to you already; it’s similar to reading the newspaper.
What is Keyword Prominence?
Keyword Prominence refers to how close your keyword appears to the start of a section or element on your page. As the name suggests, this is how prominent your keyword appears.
It’s like this: You wake up and grab your newspaper each morning. With your coffee in hand, you sit down for breakfast. What’s the first thing that you do? You look at the headlines. What are you searching for? You’re simply looking for those that grab your attention immediately. You quickly scan through the many articles you can read to find the most relevant, interesting, compelling, or useful. It takes only seconds.
Keyword prominence is exactly what search engines like Google mean: strategically placing words and word phrases on your website so search engines can find them.
Is Keyword Prominence Important for SEO?
The debate about how important keyword Prominence is to rankings in 2020 will be left to the SEO analysts who crunch numbers for each algorithm update.
This is not, what SEO is to us. While algorithm analysis is useful for content creators it’s best to keep your focus simple. What does keyword prominence do for you?
Keyword prominence refers to the position (or placement of) a specific word in the HTML source codes of a website. A rule of thumb is that the search engine assigns more weight to a word the higher it is placed on a web page when a user searches for that word. These are the rules for where keywords should be placed.
- Title
- Headings
- Start of paragraph
- Start of a sentence
- Start of a website
Let’s examine why keyword prominence is so important for your website SEO strategy. Let’s go back to the previous example. Imagine that you have just heard about a devastating fire in your community and that you are looking for the article in the local paper.
You instinctively know which page to read first. You would also scan the headlines. You would scan the headlines if it was not on the first page. If so, you would turn the page to check pages 2, 3, and so forth. You wouldn’t jump to the next page after the first.
You also know that the word fire would be near the top of any newspaper’s headline or the first few sentences. You know how to search through newspapers and you are able to find what you want. Similar rules apply to search engine optimization for your website.
Google will search for the word “fire” by entering the text “fire” in a search box. The rule of keyword prominence scans the HTML code starting at the top and locates the keyword “fire”. Your website page will be placed in search engine rankings according to this keyword.
It’s simple and effective if you are committed to it. Keyword prominence can be used in all areas of content creation and website design and it will not steer you wrong. Publishers can achieve better search engine results without technical SEO expertise.
Your website will be found more easily if you use keyword prominence. This means that keywords are placed in the most relevant places.
These strategies can help you determine if your website is found by internet users. To optimize your website, contact us.
