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Is META keywords truly dead?

by ajetayo
15 replies
  • SEO
    • |
I remember how this used to be very important in SEO but these days, a lot of changes are being made to search engine algorithm and one must adjust or be left behind

I stumbled on this post yesterday

WordPress SEO Tip: Forget The Meta Keywords Tag

and I decided to remove META keywords on some of my sites.

Guys, what do you think?
Do you still use the META Tag?
#aglorithm #dead #keywords #meta
  • Profile picture of the author SEO Inspection
    Google doesn't use the keywords, but some other may. meta description is important to Google. It needs to be unique and engaging. Think of the meta description like an Adwords tag line since it shows up in search results (most of the time).
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    • Profile picture of the author maile15
      Also if you put all your keywords in the Meta tags, your competitors have it really easy to findout what your keywords are. So this is a masive minus point - besides the fact there are useless...but meta informations of your site are still very good!
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  • Profile picture of the author Jacob Cuculiza
    Just because Google do not use META tags it is not dead. So it is worth considering.
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  • Profile picture of the author Andyhenry
    Agreed.

    Do not stop using it - some search engines DO still pay attention to it.

    It's there, it's still a valid field - why stop just because some random person says it's not useful?

    Unless the meta tag gets removed or some clear inforamation about it hurting your pages comes out - why would anyone promote not doing it?

    This is another one of those situations where people like to be seen to be saying something new - just ignore it and carry on as usual.
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    • Profile picture of the author Kurt
      Originally Posted by Andyhenry View Post

      Agreed.

      Do not stop using it - some search engines DO still pay attention to it.

      It's there, it's still a valid field - why stop just because some random person says it's not useful?

      Unless the meta tag gets removed or some clear inforamation about it hurting your pages comes out - why would anyone promote not doing it?

      This is another one of those situations where people like to be seen to be saying something new - just ignore it and carry on as usual.
      Hey Andy,

      Google hasn't used the meta keyword tag for ranking for about a decade now...Yahoo for about the same time.

      Some reasons not to use it:

      -Possible over-optimization penalty (OOP).

      -Avoid duplicate tags on auto-generated pages

      -Avoid keywords being scraped by competitors

      IMO...Use various "SEO formulas", etc. My advice is to mix things up. I'd suggest using them on 50% of smaller sites and not hassle with them on larger sites.
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      • Profile picture of the author Andyhenry
        Originally Posted by Kurt View Post


        -Avoid duplicate tags on auto-generated pages

        -Avoid keywords being scraped by competitors
        Hey Kurt,

        Those are 2 reasons I can get behind.

        They're only an issue in certain situations, but then everything about what should or shouldn't be done comes down to where/when you're doing it.

        It's easy to over complicate and over simplify this stuff when the answer is almost always "it depends".

        Take care,
        Andy
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        • Profile picture of the author Kurt
          Originally Posted by Andyhenry View Post

          Hey Kurt,

          Those are 2 reasons I can get behind.

          They're only an issue in certain situations, but then everything about what should or shouldn't be done comes down to where/when you're doing it.

          It's easy to over complicate and over simplify this stuff when the answer is almost always "it depends".

          Take care,
          Andy
          Here's another reason...All the words (non stop-words) on a page on keywords and have the potential to bring traffic. What if a potential keyword phrase your page may have that could bring traffic is NOT in the meta tag?

          Anyone that's done SEO for any period of time knows that often a page will rank and get traffic for phrases other than the ones that the page was optimized for. It's possible having a meta keyword tag that does NOT contain the secondary keywords could hurt.

          IMO, almost all SEO advice is given on the basis that a person is creating one, and only only one site. In this case, I'd suggest using the meta keyword tag, even though it's been extinct for a decade.

          In reality, most people create multiple sites over their careers. In this case, I say mix it up. If Google ever decides to reward or penalize sites with the meta keyword tag, you'll be in good shape with some of your sites and not have all your SEO eggs in one basket.

          And I also suggest on pages you do use a meta keyword tag, to mix up the number of keywords included. On some pages, focus on just 2 or 3 keywords, other pages include 12-20 keywords, etc.

          ...Which brings us to another possible penalty...Having keywords in the meta keyword tag not included on the page itself. This could create a possible "keyword stuffing" penalty. So if you do use the keyword tag, make sure all those words are included in the actual body of the page.

          Again, I prefer to mix it up, using the keyword tag on some sites and not on others. The keyword tag hasn't been used by Google and Yahoo for about 10 years, but it's possible this may change.
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  • Profile picture of the author Paul200
    Heres my take on it

    Firstly never put your eggs in one basket. There are more search engines than just Google. If you are soley working on getting high rankings in Google and no other search engines you are makig a big mistake. Google with the new Panda algorithm can take your site off the first page very quickly.
    Use your meta tags and meta descriptions, use your backlinks, use your unique content, use videos, and engage with your users. Use every thing you can
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    • Profile picture of the author MattVit
      Can't hurt to spend an extra 15 seconds writing a few keywords, can it?
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  • Profile picture of the author Tommy Smith
    Not it's not. Its just that only few IMers using META keywords. Because there are many methods aside from Meta.
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  • Profile picture of the author Memo
    But I don't think it is good idea to remove it once you have had it there for a while. It won't hurt your site or anything like that. And I still use meta keywords on my sites...
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  • Profile picture of the author Khal
    According to Matt Cutts:

    there’s no harm to using the keywords meta tag other than wasting your time
    The above statement was taken from the following site:
    Google doesn’t use the keywords meta tag in web search

    So, according to him, keyword research is a waste of time?
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  • Profile picture of the author JCorp
    It doesn't hurt to leave it on there. Just concentrate on getting out good quality content and driving traffic.
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  • Profile picture of the author mmginc
    Meta Keywords is not important for big search engine like google, bing, yahoo they don't prefer meta keywords but the small search engine still using meta keywords for ranking so don't remove from your pages.

    Focus on Title and Meta Description: dont use keywords base title like
    seo services - expert seo - online seo services
    make it clear and one sentence title
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  • Profile picture of the author JamesCarrey
    I believe its truly DEAD. It does not affect to my site. There is no change in my ranking in google too.. I am not sure why people even not considering though it is declared by Google.
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