SEO Tycoon

**shonkyboy** · 11-24-2009, 08:16 AM

Hi - Im just wondering peoples thoughts on the multiple use of h1 tags in a page - a site that i am optimising has 7 H1 tags on the front page and i dont think that is right at all - it would be better to have the primary header as a h1 and the rest as h2/3 - but after doing some searching i found an interesting article here:
http://cssglobe.com/post/1213/how-to...adings-in-html

That states: . Exceptionally, if you have separate large sections on the same page you may use two or more h1.

Several people also commented about using h1 tags in more than one place. As i understood it is best to have only one. If i am looking at optimising a page such as this http://www.decision2day.com/ that has more than 1 h1 tag - what do you guys think on the subject.
Will the first one carry more weight than the others and am i in danger of spamming if i leave them at h1 as they are?
Just wondering what you all think?

**webcosmo** · 11-24-2009, 09:54 AM

Idea is to put most important title on h1. If you put more then it would just split the seo credit for them.

Then again this is just one parameter for SEO.

**chrishirst** · 11-24-2009, 09:56 AM

Just ignore the "spamming" junk. Most of it is made up by clueless "experts" who try to impress peole with their "knowledge".

The heading elements are there to give structure to the document. If the text on the page rquires the use of several <h1> headings to indicate a separate section of the text then use them.

**webuyallhomes1** · 12:49 PM

Don't use H1 tags as more repeated.You will be penalized by search engine

**chrishirst** · 11-24-2009, 10:00 AM

No you won't!!!!!

**Mike Smithfield** · 11-24-2009, 12:30 PM

To be more clear, just see the Google's matt cuts interview regarding multiple h1 tags:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GIn5qJKU8VM

**sevamaster** · 11-24-2009, 02:47 PM

There must be only one <h1> tag. Otherewise SE could not be able to understand what is the main subject of the page.

**chrishirst** · 11-24-2009, 02:55 PM

SEs could understand the page "subject" with NO heading elements at all.

**vangogh** · 11-24-2009, 04:18 PM

What Chris said. All Hx tags are for structuring your content. Don't worry about them so much when it comes to SEO. In fact there is some indication lately that heading tags have little, if any, affect on rankings.

As for how many to use on any one page you'll find people who say only use one and others who say use as many as makes sense for your content on that page. I only use one per page. To me there would only be one main heading on any page and if the content called for a second main heading I would sooner create a new page for that content than use the second H1 on the same page.

To me the most logical structure is one and only one H1 tag per page with all other headings being one or more levels lower.

But that's me. It's hardly an absolute rule you or anyone else needs to follow. In the end structure your content how you think it makes sense for your readers and use whatever heading tags make sense for that structure.

**Steve-Hostirian** · 11-24-2009, 04:25 PM

Quote:

In the end structure your content how you think it makes sense for your readers and use whatever heading tags make sense for that structure.

I think this is the best advice here. Structure your site that makes the most sense to your readers.

**SENukee** · 11-25-2009, 02:37 AM

Steve is right. H1 tags are not just for SEO but mainly for viewers of your site. But for me using one or multiple H1 tags doesnt affect your SE ranking it is really on how you optimize your site whether its through best unique keywords, bookmarking and other seo stuffs

**arnabme** · 11-25-2009, 07:07 AM

Logical use of Heading Tags is always useful. Nomadic use would drive nothing.

**shonkyboy** · 12-08-2009, 07:03 AM

thanks for the input guys

**FenceGuy** · 12-08-2009, 07:13 AM

The use of multiple H1 tags just don't make sense on my site (could be different for you) and I normally use H3 and H4 tags to break up the text on each page because it seems to fit well when reading the content.

I hate to read sites with massive amounts of content with no Hx tags, I like to skim for content that I am looking for or that sticks out to me so the tags help to find it. I feel like this applies to my readers as well (I hope!)