SEO and Underlining the Keyword

xento · 12-21-2011, 11:56 PM

Most SEO optimizing plugins suggest that you bold, italicize, and underline your keyword. Bolding can use the html markup tag while italic can use the tag but underlining, which used to be done using the tag is now deprecated and underlining should now be done through css as a best practice.

Old way:

Code:

<u>my keyword</u>

New way:

Code:

<span style="text-decoration: underline;">my keyword</span>

Does google read your css code like that? Do you think underlining the keyword is really that important nowadays or is it just a remnant practice of the old tag?

Lucas Becker · 12-22-2011, 03:04 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by xento

Most SEO optimizing plugins suggest that you bold, italicize, and underline your keyword. Bolding can use the html markup tag while italic can use the tag but underlining, which used to be done using the tag is now deprecated and underlining should now be done through css as a best practice.

Old way:

Code:

<u>my keyword</u>

New way:

Code:

<span style="text-decoration: underline;">my keyword</span>

Does google read your css code like that? Do you think underlining the keyword is really that important nowadays or is it just a remnant practice of the old tag?

It doesn't matter which method you use, both work well for SEO purposes. However, Google doesn't give that much weight to bolded keywords as it used to. Also, don't over-do bolding, italicizing and underlining, it could get assessed as keyword stuffing.

ashleysmith12 · 12-22-2011, 04:08 AM

Hi.
It doesn't matter if you use your keyword with bold, italic or underline, the main thing is that your keyword must be relevant to your website.

BackLinkiT · 12-22-2011, 04:19 AM

...takes me back to the good old days!

chippy361 · 01-09-2012, 02:46 PM

I had a steady page 1 position 2 ranking for one keyword phrase and a page 2 position 2 ranking for another keyword phrase (different product pages)
I had read about highlighting keywords and followed a suggestion that the phrase for which I was ranking should be highlighted strong, italic and underlined.
I did this and when Google next crawled the site, my page 1 position 2 slipped to page 3 and my page 2 position 2 slipped out of this world to page 300 odd.
No other linking or SEO work was done to these pages.
As a test I have now highlighted a different keyphrase on a page I am ranking on page 1 for to see if this also suffers a drop and I have removed the highlighting altogether on the other pages to see if they return to their high positions when next crawled. I’d be interested to hear your thoughts on this

steven Clayden · 01-09-2012, 03:32 PM

Well, i put up a site yesterday 5 pages and 2 posts. Homepage had bold,underlined and italiced keywords. Currently sat number 1 on google.Keyword density around 1.8%

Domain is EMD.

TerryL · 01-09-2012, 05:46 PM

I did an experiment with a few of my sites to see if using the H1, H2, and H3 tags in each article helped. I always bold, italicize, and underline my keyword once each per article. I did this on all the sites in my experiment. All the articles had the bold, italicized, and underlined keyword. But some sites also used the keyword once each per article in H1, H2, and H3 tags.

The sites all also had a 1.5% to 2% keyword density and each post had an image with the keyword as the alt tag (as well as a fully filled out All in One SEO plugin on each article).

The results were that the sites WITHOUT the keywords in the H tags ranked better and more quickly than the ones with it. So I can't say if the underline makes a difference, but all of my sites used the underlined keyword. The only difference was whether or not I was using the H tags, too, which DID seem to make a difference in the rankings.

Maybe next time, I'll test sites using the underline and not using it. It would be interesting to see what the results of that were.

12-21-2011, 11:56 PM	#1
xento Active Warrior Join Date: Apr 2011 Location: Canada Posts: 48 Thanks: 41 Thanked 3 Times in 3 Posts	SEO and Underlining the Keyword Most SEO optimizing plugins suggest that you bold, italicize, and underline your keyword. Bolding can use the html markup tag <strong> while italic can use the tag <em> but underlining, which used to be done using the <u> tag is now deprecated and underlining should now be done through css as a best practice. Old way: Code: <u>my keyword</u> New way: Code: <span style="text-decoration: underline;">my keyword</span> Does google read your css code like that? Do you think underlining the keyword is really that important nowadays or is it just a remnant practice of the old <u> tag?

12-22-2011, 04:08 AM	#3
ashleysmith12 HyperActive Warrior Join Date: May 2011 Posts: 231 Thanks: 0 Thanked 6 Times in 6 Posts	Re: SEO and Underlining the Keyword Hi. It doesn't matter if you use your keyword with bold, italic or underline, the main thing is that your keyword must be relevant to your website.

12-22-2011, 04:19 AM	#4
BackLinkiT HyperActive Warrior Join Date: May 2009 Posts: 176 Thanks: 24 Thanked 42 Times in 32 Posts	Re: SEO and Underlining the Keyword ...takes me back to the good old days!

01-09-2012, 02:46 PM	#5
chippy361 Warrior Member Join Date: Jan 2012 Posts: 1 Thanks: 0 Thanked 0 Times in 0 Posts	Re: SEO and Underlining the Keyword I had a steady page 1 position 2 ranking for one keyword phrase and a page 2 position 2 ranking for another keyword phrase (different product pages) I had read about highlighting keywords and followed a suggestion that the phrase for which I was ranking should be highlighted strong, italic and underlined. I did this and when Google next crawled the site, my page 1 position 2 slipped to page 3 and my page 2 position 2 slipped out of this world to page 300 odd. No other linking or SEO work was done to these pages. As a test I have now highlighted a different keyphrase on a page I am ranking on page 1 for to see if this also suffers a drop and I have removed the highlighting altogether on the other pages to see if they return to their high positions when next crawled. I’d be interested to hear your thoughts on this

01-09-2012, 03:32 PM	#6
steven Clayden HyperActive Warrior Join Date: Nov 2011 Posts: 181 Thanks: 13 Thanked 57 Times in 34 Posts	Re: SEO and Underlining the Keyword Well, i put up a site yesterday 5 pages and 2 posts. Homepage had bold,underlined and italiced keywords. Currently sat number 1 on google.Keyword density around 1.8% Domain is EMD.

01-09-2012, 05:46 PM	#7
TerryL Banned War Room Member Join Date: Jan 2012 Location: Australia Posts: 120 Thanks: 34 Thanked 24 Times in 20 Posts	Re: SEO and Underlining the Keyword I did an experiment with a few of my sites to see if using the H1, H2, and H3 tags in each article helped. I always bold, italicize, and underline my keyword once each per article. I did this on all the sites in my experiment. All the articles had the bold, italicized, and underlined keyword. But some sites also used the keyword once each per article in H1, H2, and H3 tags. The sites all also had a 1.5% to 2% keyword density and each post had an image with the keyword as the alt tag (as well as a fully filled out All in One SEO plugin on each article). The results were that the sites WITHOUT the keywords in the H tags ranked better and more quickly than the ones with it. So I can't say if the underline makes a difference, but all of my sites used the underlined keyword. The only difference was whether or not I was using the H tags, too, which DID seem to make a difference in the rankings. Maybe next time, I'll test sites using the underline and not using it. It would be interesting to see what the results of that were.