SEO Tycoon

**blogdog** · 06-17-2008, 07:37 PM

I've read some conflicting infromation (of course, not on this forum

) on header tags and whether they help with SEO.

One source says you should use 3-4 header tags under the title tag and repeat your keywords in them to maximize SEO.

Another source says that's old school and search engines don't consider them in ranking anymore. What gives?

**chrishirst** · 06-17-2008, 07:52 PM

The best way you can use heading elements is for what they are designed for. To give the document an hierarchical structure.

If the document structure needs "keyphrases" in headings, then do so. If not, don't.

**johniman7** · 06-17-2008, 09:55 PM

Chris said it very well. And also, why not use them in most cases. Most cases you will have some sort of heading even if it is just the same as what is in the title tag. Make it an H1 and if you need it smaller or styled different use css. I would recommend not having H1 exactly as title though change the order or wording around a bit. If you have enough content on the page break it up into sections labeled with H2 tags that you think are good keywords.

**northbeach23** · 06-19-2008, 05:24 AM

Yes it depends on your site structure.

**Learning Newbie** · 06-20-2008, 06:13 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by blogdog

Another source says that's old school and search engines don't consider them in ranking anymore. What gives?

It's true. Search engines don't even consider HTML or keywords anymore. Ever since Old Josie invented that perfect random number generator, search engines have worked very differently from how you'd expect.

Let's test the logic. If you've got a keyword in your title, why would that keyword also being in a heading give it any more weight?

I can see from my logs that key phrases in <hX> elements are given more weight than text that's just in a <p>, when those phrases aren't in my title. In other words, headings are a benefit. They're also inconvenient to use in WordPress, so I don't use them very often.

Title + hX = Same as Title
hX > p

**Kaabi** · 06-20-2008, 11:52 PM

Of course the header counts! Google weights a lot of factors in to their rankings, including header, title, domain name, special text (bold, italic, underlined text), and repeated text. Header is a big thing, so Google considers it. Whoever said they don't is WRONG!