Title Tags and SEO

[chriskrich878]

Title Tag

An HTML tag that is used to define the top line of a web browser, the search engine considers this as the most important part of text on the web page, as they base their natural results here.

Title tag optimization

There is not a single webpage in the top rankings that does not include their main keyword in their title tags. A web page may not use the keyword in their main body instead they use inbound links to rank well, but still in the title tag it is very critical to include it. There are several things to consider for title tag optimization:

1. Important keywords must appear in the title tag

2. Title tags should not exceed the length of 60 characters and must have only 7 to 10 words

3. It should be easily read by the web-surfer (user- friendly)

4. Stop words must be used sparingly and avoid dead weight words altogether if possible

5. Keywords must be as close together as possible (keyword proximity)

6. Put the keywords as close to the title tag’s beginning as possible

7. Proper word order of the title tag must be maintained

8. Repeating the keyword in the title tag should be very limited

Important keywords in the title tag

Title tag optimization requires that the most important keyword be placed in the title tag. Search engines are geared to look for keywords in the title tag that is why it is very critical that they are here. Title tag is also the part that web-surfers browse in the search results to see if the thing that they are looking for is somehow in that page. It is also a good idea not to put irrelevant words to your title tags so as not to dilute them in the search results, whereas, it is more advisable to include some more of your keywords instead.

Length of the title tag

Optimized title tags never exceed this length because some search engines will chop off the phrases over their limit.

User-friendly

Though title tag optimization requires your title tags to be search engine friendly, but your main target are the web-surfers. Title tags must be made as very simple and as easily understood as you can.

Stop words/ dead weight words

Dead weight words (i.e. Home page, web, web page) are ignored by the search engine spiders, and though the stop words are also ignored (i.e. the, is, of, that, is, etc), you still need some of them for your title tags to be easily understood

Keyword Proximity

Search engines ranks webpage who have their keywords that is very close to each other and has almost no stop words between them.

Near the beginning

Title tag optimization encourages that your keywords be near the beginning of the title, as the search engine do their search pattern in a linear order (top to bottom, left to right).

[Webfor]

Great explanation and comprehensive list of the parameters that influence the benefit you get from your title tags.

[Karan Singh]

I must say these are great tips of Tittle tag optimization and a newbie can take a lot of information from this.

[myndconsulting]

good, nice tips. for some search engines also requires keyword density and would require keyword repetition but as long as it is balanced, it is still good keyword optimization.