Keyword placement on home page or throughout the website

[polyniki]

OK, I find the courage to ask this because there is not supposed to be a dumb question. Like all of us, I want my website to rank great with a particular keyword. Do I have to use this keyword only on my home page (the start page which I want to appear on top Google results), or does it make a difference if I use the keyword on several articles that I post on my website. These articles all have seperate links. Eg i want the www.website.com to be found by Google, but this website contains www.website.com/link1.html, www.website.com/link2.html.. etc. Will keyword usage on link1.html, link2.html etc be relevant so that www.website.com is found by Google? Or is every single page for itself? Hope I have explained that well and I would really appreciate your feedback.

[RyanKent]

Any given page on your site should ideally focus one or two keywords or phrases. You can discuss similar topics on other pages but ideally there will be some variation. Let's use "Zinc" as an example topic.

Page 1 - Zinc

Page 2 - Zinc and aging

Page 3 - Zinc's effect on the immune system

Each page would reinforce their keyword or phrase focus with their titles, header tags, content, URL and other factors. What you don't want to do is discuss the exact same topic on multiple pages of your site as it leads to confusion on which page should rank in search results. That problem is called cannibalization where you have multiple pages of your site competing internally for the same keyword.

[polyniki]

Thanks, I think I understand what you mean. However, the keyword in this case is zink, and however you use it - either in connection with aging or with the immune system, Google reads zinc on page 2 and on page 3, which is what you want. But I am still not sure how to avoid cannibalization. Do you mean that the keyword can appear on the contents of page 2 and page 3, but with a different context?

How would this apply to my case? My keyword is free games but i dont aim for page 2 or page 3 to be found with that keyword, I just want to use them so that page 1 is found better. Page 2 or page 3 would describe a different game each, so that the contents of page 2 and page 3 are totally differnt, but they contain the keyword free games. Eg page2 would say Skyrama is a free game in which you manage your own airport and would describe skyrama. Page 3 would say If you like free games about farms, then Farmerama is your game! Harvest vegetables... bla bla. Is this how you mean it?

[RyanKent]

Based on the information you shared I would suggest the following:

1. Separate your site into a Greek and English version. It seems you are trying to do both on the same pages and the results will not be positive for users nor SEO. Since you are using a .gr domain either make the main site greek and add a /en copy of your site, or add both a /gr and /en section of your site.

2. Home page title: Free Games Online or Free Games Online | FreeGamesOnline.gr

header tag, alt tags, content, etc. should all support your focus of "Free Games Online"

3. Page 2 title: Skyrama  or Skyrama | FreeGamesOnline.gr

header tag, alt tags, content, etc. all support "Skyrama". You can have a header as "Skyrama is a free game" but then it seems every page of your site will be [game name] is a free game. You can take that approach and it is fine.

4. Page 3 title: Farmerama or Farmera | FreeGamesOnline.gr

the rest is same as Page 2 except replacing Skyrama with Farmerama

It you decide to use the phrase "Free Games Online" elsewhere in your site, make it anchor text which links back to your home page.

I hope this makes sense.

PS. Add Lineage2 to your site There are tons of Greek players and BnB is very active with L2 (or it used to be).

[polyniki]

Hello Ryan,

actually Greeks and I suppose many other people who are not native English speakers use this particular English keyword instead of its translation, so I don't think I need an English version of the website (too much work, too much competition). So to sum up, do you think my approach "game x is a free game" or "if you like free games about x try this game" actually helps? Or only if I make it anchor text? I am not sure I understand completely.

I really appreciate your help!

[RobertFisher]

All that Ryan is saying here is spot on. What might help you from a wider perspective is to change how you are thinking about your site. You state: "I want my website to rank great with a particular keyword." you then state you want the start page (home page) to appear on top Google results.

Sites do not rank in Google, Pages do. What Ryan is trying to communicate is that you need to have a focus for each page and a keyword/keyword phrase for each. So, Free Games Online is your homepage keyword phrase and you optimize that page for that phrase. Maybe, page two is a particular game "Farmeram." your keyword phrase might be Farmerama - Free Online. So, while the site title is Free Games Online, the page will be Farmerama  Free Online or Farmerama Game Free Online, Free Farmerama Game Online. etc. You then incorporate this into the other page elements and move to page three. By utilizing good keyword research (what keywords are gamers using to search for games with) you are able to choose phrases with higher numbers of searches.

When you get every page fully optimized, your site will then be optimized. (Oh, yeah, then go to the English version

[AlanMosley]

I would not worry too much about keyword being on all pages, but rather make sure you do not canablize in your linking, decide what page you want to rank, and make sure any pages that are relevant link to that page with keyword in link text., but do not link away from your main page with that keyword in link text. Since you want the home page to rank for that keyword, every page in your site should link back to home page anyhow for best linking structure.

Search engines will try to work out what pages is best, if you link as i suggested it will easerly be able to make the correct decision

[AlanMosley]

Sour comment Sites do not rank pages do, I understand what you mean, but it is a bit misleading.

I am sure Rand has preached about site theme helps you rank, but my point is that links do help you rank, having relevant pages pointing to your ranking page helps, exteranl or internal, make sure your linking is clear as to show the search engine what page is the the imporatnt one.

[polyniki]

OK, I get your point, thanks!

[polyniki]

OK, so if I understand you correctly instead of stuffing separate pages with the keyword i want the start page to rank with, I should focus on the rankings of each single page and this automatically will help the start page rank better as well?

So for example if I posted an article on my free games website about, say, what is the best oil for your car (which has nothing to do with free games) and this page about the car oil ranked well with the keyword_ car oil_, would it help my start page rank better with the _free games _keyword?

[RobertFisher]

Probably a bad example with the oil, but with free xyz game as that page grows in authority it effects the domain authority of the site. As the domain authority goes up, the easier it is for the page authority to increases. So, each optimized page ultimately effects every page.

[polyniki]

Thanks a lot, I think I got it.