9/24/2009
Let’s Clear the Confusion about Blog Post Titles and Optimization
Vague language is the arch enemy of SEO. People talk about the importance of blog post titles all the time, but there are different types of titles and different things that are important depending on what type of title you’re talking about.
Types of Blog Post Titles
Post Title Traumatic Stress
The Title Tag appears at the top of a browser or in a browser tab for a given URL (which for a blog post is referred to as a permalink). Every web page should have one and only one Title Tag, and its content should be relevant to the page, keyword optimized, and never more than 70 characters. On this post, “Blog SEO Tips | Blog Title Optimization | Word Sell, Inc.” is the Title Tag.
The H1 Title Tag appears as the title of a blog post. The H1 Tag is thought to carry a good deal of weight with Google, though not as much as the Title Tag. An H1 Tag should also be relevant to the page content – but also needs to capture the attention of human readers in the same way as a story headline in a newspaper. On this post, “Let’s Clear the Confusion about Blog Post Titles and Optimization” is the H1 Tag.
H2 and H3 Tags are used as subheads (subtitles) and carry more search engine weight than bold text, but less than H1 tags. On this post, “Types of Blog Post Titles” is an H2 Tag.
Learn How Your Blog Handles Titles
My blog runs on the fabulous WordPress theme Thesis. If I do nothing, my blog title defaults to being the Title Tag as well as the H1 tag. However, I can insert a custom Title Tag, as I have done on this post. The post title remains the H1 tag. Your blog setup my handle things differently, or you may need a plugin to give yourself the flexibility to customize.
Why would you want to customize your Title Tag? In this case, I wanted to insert certain keyword phrases for SEO, and add my company name for branding. But my goals for the post title, the H1 Tag, were quite different. I tried to compose the post title not so much for keywords but to (I hope) get people interested in reading the post.
Some SEO specialists feel that a Title Tag should not exactly match an H1 tag, for fear that Google will interpret the page as spam. But considering how many blogs duplicate tag content that way, I don’t think it is a major concern from an SEO standpoint. Just the same, why not enhance SEO with a keyword optimized Title Tag and appeal to human readers with a different, H1 Tag?
Besides being unique to the blog post, the H1 tag needs to balance keyword content with enticing language. I favor keyword rich, informational post titles, but sometimes a provocative, catchy title brings in far more readers than all the keywords in the world. A good balancing technique that was widely discussed several months ago recommended writing an alluring post title upon publication to generate buzz, and then rewriting the title later to incorporate keywords to generate search engine juice.
Title Tags, H1 Tags, and Twitter
If you use Twitter to publicize your blog posts, congratulations! You now have a whole new set of Tag issues to contend with.
I use HootSuite as my Twitter client, which has a feature called Hootlet. Hootlet is a one-click method of Tweeting a web page – and it populates the Tweet content box with a shortened URL and the Title Tag. TweetMeme, another popular Tweeting and reTweeting tool, works the same way. The default Title Tag might look boring to Followers, but it’s more likely to get picked up by Twitter users conducting keyword searches. On the other hand, overriding the Hootlet or TweetMeme default with a slick post title could generate buzz amongst Followers, yet fail badly on keyword searches.
In the case of this post, my Title Tag makes a poor default for Hootlet or TweetMeme – and the H1 Title Tag is more descriptive … but a bit too long.
There’s no clear answer. When I’m linking to posts, I tend to push keywords in my Tweets when I’m trying to reach people outside my network, especially on topics I don’t generally cover.
At this point you are probably crystal clear … or more confused than ever. I hope the former. The point is this, though. If you want to make headway with SEO and your community of readers, you should not approach titles haphazardly. They are arguably the most important pieces of content in a blog post and are therefore worth all the attention you can give them.
46 Responses to Let’s Clear the Confusion about Blog Post Titles and Optimization
Good information! Always going back to the basics (page optimization, H1, H2, title tags, etc.) is a great way to ensure you’re starting off on the RIGHT foot with SEO.
The classics never fail.
Lots of helpful information here, Brad! Thanks for breaking title tags down for us and explaining a fairly complex issue so clearly!
Hi Barbara, Jeanne – Glad the info helped and didn’t add to the confusion.
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Brad,
thank you for this very useful post!
That’s excellent, Brad. Thanks.
Good, precise information. Again, I will apply this knowledge to my next post. Your information on Linked-In is also very helpful.
I’m sorry but I’m really in learner mode here and unable to contribute much to the discussion.
Best, Robin
Hi Robin, I’ll bet one reason you are a great teacher (I read your blog daily) is that you are a great learner. Glad these posts, etc. are helpful.
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Your blog is like an encyclopedia for those who want to know more about this. Thanks for the interesting information.
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Well, thank you for the shout. I must say I’m impressed with your idea. I think it’s a great way to recommend people, without clogging the time line. Many times on a Friday I don’t pay much attention to twitter because of the mass #FF’s. I like to recommend people I know or my blog buddies. I think I may start doing it individually with a reason, or I may just follow your lead and do a blog post.
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Yeah, I find it so stressful I make myself scarce on Friday night. Well, if I know the tweeter and he or she has no history of being spammy, I find it easy to retweet the stuff out there. Otherwise, I’d tweet a few and stay away.
But there are people who just list @usernames in order to plump up their followers and I hate that tack.
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Hi Jan,
I think I found my name here! Thanks for the link . I love you Jan, Muah! Hehehehe!
I owe you bro! I will cherish this every moment and every letter in this post!
Kidding aside bro! Thanks!
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You’re welcome, Jhong.
This comment was originally posted on WritingToExhale
Hi Jan,
What a great list of links. I agree. Follow Friday is a good concept on Twitter, but like you say, the links can easily get lost. Several times I’ve posted, “If you want to follow good peeps, just follow everyone I tweet with”. Another time I did individual tweets for everyone and their blog, but don’t know if that helped their traffic or not.
Thank you for including me in you list of link. I am humbled and honored.
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I was surprised in a delightful way to see my post under your above Recommended Reading section along with blogs from great minds like Mashable, ExtremeJohn and DailyBlogTips. Thanks for the honor and making em blush! And yes, I almost forgot to mention – you have got a very nice blog here.
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#FollowFriday lists in Twitter have short shelf-life. As as these are retweeted it’s all right it’s getting eyeballs. And I’ve read too that Twitter only keeps a database of tweets for only X number of months. After that, and unless you’ve downloaded a copy of your own tweets, these are gone.
I’m sure a lot of people have referenced your recommendations, Barbara. Chalk it up to credibility. If you’re using Hootsuite, it has statistics – so you can check the click-throughs in your tweets and all sorts of metrics.
Anytime, Barbara. It’s my pleasure.
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Your post resonates with me. It adds value to the topic. And that’s why I didn’t hesitate to point my readers to your well-written post.
This comment was originally posted on WritingToExhale
Jan, Thank you for including me in this spectacular list. Now I have a whole bunch of new people I hope to connect with!
This comment was originally posted on WritingToExhale
This is long overdue and no doubt inspired by your post on the same subject quite a while back. @joannayoung had a similar post, too, right?
It took a while. I had to get the Apture plugin first – again, inspired by your example.
So you see, you’re the Pied Piper. I march to the beat of your beautiful music.
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Thanks for including me in your top conversationalists. I was about to retweet this post (as a gratitude) as well as some other interesting posts I’m seeing, but at this time I’m lending my Twitter timeline to those who need help (that is, the poor victims of Typhoon Ondoy), so I’m leaving a comment here and a hi.
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Ah there you go again, giving acknowledgement to others in such a grand way. I am honoured you would acknowledge me for those traits within in such a prestigous list.
I am inspired by your inclusive nature, and the manner in which you nurture others success.
This comment was originally posted on WritingToExhale
Thank you for including me in your FF list, I was following most of these fine people already, but now I am following everyone on the list except one who had their updates protected.
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Thanks for the FF Jan! It’s 5am. I’m up early, trying to make up for the lost time last night. I hope you’re fine now.
This comment was originally posted on WritingToExhale
I’ve been on twitter long time… since 200& I think… never really figured it out! Time to bite the bullet.
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Hello Jan,
Thanks for the mention. I would still post my #FF but only those I truly read and follow. That’s why I only have around 2o plus. Yours is an enterprising idea, the first of its kind I read so far. What do you expect from the Jan Geronimo himself?
Way to go.
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Your blog is so damn good that someone scrapd this post… ^^
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Hi Jan. Damn you for giving me so many great people to follow:) Do you like giving me “homeworks”? And I thought I was done going to school, lol. Just kidding.
Anyway, thank you very much about the mention. Also, I can not stop but think who the hell scraped your content? Care to give me a hint, I’ll take of that person for you, hehe..
You are so right about #FF that I was close to start my #NOFF (No Follow Friday) movement. People were just slapping my face with that thing that I really didn’t bother for the past two weeks. This post however made me rethink my position and will act on it.. Will go to my Weekly Echo later on today. Be on the look out, lol
This comment was originally posted on WritingToExhale
There were three of them. The first two copied the lead paragraphs, but
then pointed a link to my blog. You know the drill, “Read the whole post
here…” Which is okay, at least it’s something like a digest or a teaser
of my post. I got a link back – I didn’t approve the trackback by the way.
But the third one was something else. From the title of the post, the
picture I searched in Flickr, practically the whole post. I was alerted
because the scraper included Related Posts, which of course pointed to my
blog. LOL!
The next #followfriday post will be a lot leaner. I’d limit linking to
those who’d actively engage me in Twitter for the previous week. That’s a
good incentive, right? Makes everyone to be on their best behavior.
Ahehehe.
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Indeed a very good incentive. I like the idea of recommending only people that you have actually engaged with.
As far as your post being “stolen”, are you interested in doing a DMCA?
BTW, check out my latest “Weekly Echo”..
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I might – will check out Holly’s post about that. “,) Ah, so we have a new
edition of Echo today. Okay, checking it out now…
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Jan. Figured out for myself where that scrapper is (would not be an SEO Master if I didn’t, hehe). Left a comment there, check it out too:) Man so many checking out’s huh:)
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I hope I am not at all to late to be here. Jan, you are indeed right, this is a great blog. On this post alone, I already learned great things about these tags on my blog and how they are to be used.
DiTesco is right, you are giving us homeworks, but good homeworks at that…. this deserves to be on my reader.
Hi Elmot, It’s never too late to stop by, and I’m thrilled you found some of my posts useful.
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Good information. I’m especially happy to see one more important blogger to highlight the importance of headlines.
search engine bots only sees in your website is ‘text’ for them to categorize and indexed your website…they dont really care how good your design is, the design is to attract visitors for them to stay…and of course the ‘relevancy’ of the content. Therefore, put great information in your content for them to hunt you down
Yay. No offense, but I always give them the evil eye just to be sure I’d not be inconvenienced. “,)
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I’ve commented on a few blogs that have mentioned titles but yours is the first that highlights the importance for SEO reasons, so thank you. I agree that a good title is key to getting your readers drawn in as well as making your blog ‘ headway with SEO’. Thanks for this Brad.
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http://cli.gs/DWR8A Blog #SEO Tips Blog Title Optimization
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This page has three H1 tags. SEs expect one only. It is not enough to change the post title from H2 to H1, but also to prevent the H1 tag being applied to blog title on every page.
Thank you – when we switched to a new theme they used h1 tags where they didn’t belong. I never noticed.