I read that Google and Yahoo prefers no more than 800 words and 300 words respectively.

And, Google/Yahoo want at least 4% keyword density for the page.

I have about 980+ words on my index page and about 1.72% keyword density. The website is: http://www.mysteryshopperresource.com

My question:
1) Is it OK for have long page for Google and Yahoo?
2) How much importance is it to have 4% keyword density?

You see, I cannot shorten the word anymore and to increase the keyword density is going to sound very strange.

Any advice?

Where did you get such exact numbers? I doubt that anyone except G insiders can know this for sure, but they won't share them. I recommend to exchange links instead of calculating keyword density, that would be much more effective.

Ignore keyword density and exact number of words on a page. People make these up all the time to make it seem as if they know what they are talking about. When they start talking about exact numbers like this, they don't.

mtishetsky, I got the figure from using GRSeo software.

Chris, is it really true that keyword density has no bearing on ranking? It seems like I get top 10 rankings into Yahoo for 2 of my other sites after changes to my keyword density. Maybe Google don't consider density but I think Yahoo does.

nkthen, I told not about density of your keywords, but about 800 and 300 words per page. Don't trust shareware authors and don't trust SEO software especially, they will do anything to make you think they are confident. Exchange links instead, even a perfect density page will lose to a linked page even if the second one is not well optimized.

could I just point that all the top rankings in the world for every keyphrase are of utterly no use whatsoever if your page read like a load of sh**e and visitors leave very quickly.

Write your copy for users not search engines, users are the one with credit cards.

Ignore so-called keyword density it's something invented by SEO software sellers to make you think you need their crap.
No of words on a page, use as few or as many as it take to get the message across If it can be done in 50 words fine, if it needs 1000 words also fine.

and there is no such thing as perfect density, every phrase, every page, every site can be different.

As already stated, there is no standard that says what keyword density to go for. In my experience, MSN and Yahoo seem to value it higher than google, with anywhere around 5% - 12% being quoted as ideal by a variety of "experts"

Google, however, seems to be more geared towards incoming links, with appropriate keywords in the anchor text.

Personally, I believe in choosing a subject and then just trying to write in a fluent style that can easily be picked up by visitors. I do ensure that I get my anchor text spot on for my keywords though.

Just make sure the keywords are near the top of the page (e.g. code) and don't worry about the page length.

my method is basically write relevant text and see what positions it gets. I then add a few keywords in and keep checking back until it gets re-spidered and see what it does. Trial and error but it seems to work quite well

Not all the SEO software give this crappy fixed statistics on keywords density.

I use AWR and they don't even have the Keyword Density category. I use them because they have a very good reporting system.

I have to agree .... Google isn't going off of Keywords and such ... they are going off of content. I am getting hits from G for words that aren't even in my keywords. I am actually shocked by how they are bringing me up.

My only suggestion is to change your title tag. I see you have mystery shopper in your title but you should look at a few other keywords and create a phrase. For instance my page for Osteoprocare has a title of "Osteoprocare with Chondroitin and Glucosamine". As a result I have had several google finds because of those three keywords being in my title.

BUT ... DON'T JUST MAKE YOUR TITLE A BUNCH OF KEYWORDS!!! MAKE IT MAKE SENSE!!

Also you want to watch your google ads .... your site is a mystery shopper program and your google ad says "Mystery Shopper Job Scams".