What is the Importance of Keyword Density in SEO?
Anyone that has done some research on search engine optimisation (SEO) will have come across keywords. There are literally hundreds of guides on the internet that will tell you how important keyword use is in your SEO strategy.
The keywords you use, along with how you use them, vary from one piece of content to the next. It is important to remember than keyword density is not as important as your user experience.
Until a few years ago, website owners would shove as many keywords into their content in order to boost their ranking. Google and the other search engines are constantly looking at ways to improve their users experience, as a result, keyword stuffing has fallen by the wayside, but keyword density does still play a role.
Keyword density is a SEO technique that counts how many times a keyword is used in your content, this can be a blog or web page. Density is reflected based on the ratio of keywords used within the word count of the content. Keyword density optimises content for the keyword you want to rank for.
Keyword density encourages website owners to create content that is optimised for search engines, helping to improve your ranking in search engine results pages (SERPs). When using your chosen keyword, you make it clear to search engines what your content is about, encouraging the search engine to show your content in SERPs, helping your audience find your content, boosting organic website visitors.
Originally keyword density was used to determine how relevant the content is to the search term used by the searcher. It was the most important ranking factor. Today, search engines are wary that websites overuse keywords to manipulate their ranking. Keyword density is not the most important ranking factor, thanks to all the keyword spam on the internet, but it is still important.
These days if you overuse your keywords, known as keyword stuffing, you can be penalised by the search engine. This means you must use keywords in your content, but they must not be overused. What does this mean? It is best to write your content based on your selected keyword, focusing on creating content for your users, providing them with valuable and useful content.
To be honest, there is no ideal keyword density percentage when it comes to optimising your content. Most SEO professionals recommend a one to two percent keyword density. It is also important to ensure your keyword is seamlessly placed in your content and is not out of place.
Remember to write your content focusing on value, uniqueness, information, and engagement. If you don't hit the one percent keyword density mark, don't stress about it. Google algorithms are smart enough to read the cues from your content and rank it accordingly.
It is quick and easy to calculate your keyword density. Simply count how many times you have used your chosen keyword and divide it by the number of words in your content. So if your content is six hundred words and your keyword appears six times, that is one percent keyword density.
While keyword density is not as important as a few years ago, you still want to include your keywords in your content to help search engines identify what your content is about. This ensures the search engines crawl and index your web pages. At the same time, it is safer to focus your efforts on your reader, providing them with high quality, unique, relevant, and informative content that provides your users with value.
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