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Will Wordpress Heading Tags Negatively Affect My Ranking?

by Apollo-Articles
9 replies
  • SEO
    • |
Hi there,

I am using a WordPress theme which sets a standard title across all pages (in an <h1> tag, and within my page template puts the page titles (which I create as I create a page) as <h2> tags.

Will this negatively affect my rankings since Google sees H1 tags as more relevant, so ideally I need page specific H1 tags?

So should I remove the <H1>title tag (set in WordPress settings) and change my page titles to <h1> tags (within my page template)?

Or would this be a huge waste of time? (although using CSS saves me a huge amount of time in this case!)

Thanks!

Sam
#affect #heading #negatively #ranking #tags #wordpress
  • Profile picture of the author Fernando Veloso
    Since last G update I am testing H1 in page titles. Right now it's to early to find out what is going to happen BUT so far all the testing sites are performing well.

    My advice, as usual, is to test it yourself in 2 or more separate sites.
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  • Profile picture of the author Apollo-Articles
    Thanks,

    I think I will make the change, its just a pain since the extra size of H1 means they almost overlap the text, so I gotta go and edit each page to lower the content.

    Although theres probably a way to do this in CSS!

    Sam
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    • Profile picture of the author Fernando Veloso
      Originally Posted by Apollo-Articles View Post

      Thanks,

      I think I will make the change, its just a pain since the extra size of H1 means they almost overlap the text, so I gotta go and edit each page to lower the content.

      Although theres probably a way to do this in CSS!

      Sam
      You can edit H1 CSS and modify it to a smaller font-size.

      From this example:

      h1 {font-size: 2.15em; font-weight: bold;}

      to a different example:

      h1 {font-size: 14px; font-weight: bold;}

      etc etc
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  • Profile picture of the author WillR
    Just make sure you check both the homepage and then an actual post page before you go making any decisions. For example, with the standard Wordpress Twenty Ten theme, on the homepage the H1 tag is the title at the top of the blog. On the post pages however the H1 tag is the title of the blog post and the blog title on these pages is just ordinary text.

    So make sure the H1 is actually the site title on every page before you go changing anything.
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  • Profile picture of the author MarketItAll
    I wouldn't say it wil NEGATIVELY effect you but I would say you may get a little bit more credit for the h1 tag so u may want to work on this.
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  • Profile picture of the author Apollo-Articles
    Thanks for the responses, Fernando I'm now trying to change the page title in the page template.css

    It is currently:

    Code:
    <?php get_header(); ?>

<div id="contentwide">
<?php if (have_posts()) : while (have_posts()) : the_post(); ?>

<?php /* list_subpages_andreas01(); */ ?>

<div class="post">
<h1><?php the_title(); ?></h1>
<div class="contenttext"
<?php the_content('<p class="serif">Read more &raquo;</p>'); ?>
</div>
<?php link_pages('<p><strong>Pages:</strong> ', '</p>', 'number'); ?>
<?php edit_post_link('[e]','<p>','</p>'); ?>
<?php comments_template(); ?>
<?php endwhile; endif; ?>
</div>
</div>

<?php get_footer(); ?>
    Since theres no size in there, where exactly should I add it in, and what should I write in order to determine the height - line-height:1.3em;?

    @WillR Thanks for the response, I checked my theme and this isn't the case, although its good to know for the future.

    Thanks,

    Sam
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    • Profile picture of the author dfs_dean
      Sam - what you're showing is a php file. You need to grab your theme's css file to look at/change font sizes, etc.

      Peace
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  • Profile picture of the author Istvan Horvath
    Except WillR everybody got it wrong

    Take your time and study and dissect the new WP default, the TwentyTen theme.
    It does everything extremely well in this regard with the headings.
    Main index page:
    h1 = blog title
    h2 = post titles

    Single post page(s)
    blog title = span
    h1 = post title

    Older themes, including the former "default" (Kubrick) were all wrongly coded when it comes about headings. So, either get rid of old themes and use 2010 or re-write your old themes according to the model seen in 2010.
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  • Profile picture of the author Apollo-Articles
    Thanks Dean,

    I added it to the style sheet and it worked, then I changed the site title tag to an h3 tag.

    All is sorted!

    Yes Istavan, my them must be old! As unfortunately for me it wasn't in that nice format :/\

    Sam
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