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It's official: Google ignores the keywords tag!

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25-Sep-09 02:24

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matt

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Posts: 3328

From: Southern Highlands, NSW, Australia

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/09/22/google_keywords_meta_tag/

Matt Cutts: "Our web search ... disregards keyword meta tags completely. They simply don't have any effect in our search ranking at present."

I always assumed this, but it's nice to hear it from the horse's mouth.

However the article hints that bing might use the keywords tag as a ranking factor.

Does anyone bother with the keywords tag when SEOing pages? I tend to add them just to be on the safe side...

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Matt Doyle, Elated
3rd Edition of my jQuery Mobile book out now! Learn to build mobile web apps. Free sample chapter: http://store.elated.com/

26-Sep-09 08:24

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Johno

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From: sydney, aus

Hi Matt,

Can't say I'm surprised - I've read this in several books & seo blogs.

I think the keywords tag is used by some directories, so I always include one for each page, just in case.

-j

26-Sep-09 11:07

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cat

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Posts: 454

From: Australia

I usually stick them in if I can be bothered, but I'm not usually too precious about it either way. I do like putting mis-spellings in the keywords meta tag though - I'm far too perfectionist to include them on the visible text

I think from memory some of the engines pay a small amount of attention to them, but not enough to make them worth agonising over.

Cat

[Edited by cat on 26-Sep-09 11:08]

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http://web.soothed.com.au/
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28-Sep-09 00:22

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matt

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From: Southern Highlands, NSW, Australia

@cat: Good idea to use the keywords tag for mis-spellings. I like it!

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Matt Doyle, Elated
3rd Edition of my jQuery Mobile book out now! Learn to build mobile web apps. Free sample chapter: http://store.elated.com/

11-Oct-09 23:58

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chrishirst

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From: Blackpool, Lancashire, England

The results of my meta keywords testing are at

http://www.webmaster-talk.com/seo-talk-forum/184012-meta-keywords.html

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Chris.
So long, and thanks for all the fish.
http://webmaster-talk.eu/

12-Oct-09 00:12

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matt

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Posts: 3328

From: Southern Highlands, NSW, Australia

Chris -- nice work! Great to see some hard evidence showing that pretty much all engines (including bing) ignore the keywords tag entirely. Yahoo! is a surprise though...

Matt

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Matt Doyle, Elated
3rd Edition of my jQuery Mobile book out now! Learn to build mobile web apps. Free sample chapter: http://store.elated.com/