Title Tags and Over Optimization Penalty

[hfranz]

In  the past, it was always a good thing to put your most important keyword or phrase at the beginning of the Title Tag with the company name at the end.  Now according to the over optimization penalty in the Whiteboard Friday video, it seems to be better to be more human and put the company name at the beginning with the keyword or phrase following. Am I understanding this correctly?

[DougRoberts]

You don't need to put the company name at the beginning, just write your titles in a way that would make sense to a normal person reading them. Make sure they correctly describe the page content in natural language (that includes your keywords).

One of the big problems comes about when you're trying to target multiple keywords and have title tags that are just a comma separated list of keywords.

Rand's recent Whiteboard Friday covered this: 6 Changes Every SEO Should Make BEFORE the Over-Optimization Penalty Hits - Whiteboard Friday

Also think about how to make these compelling for someone looking at the title in the SERPS. Can you give the reader a reason to click though on your entry?

Hope this helps.

[RankSurge]

I recently went through this with a client of mine. Previously, they had their top 2 keywords first, then the company name.

They were ranked #2 in Google for both of their terms.

We made the switch last Monday, placing the company name first, then the keywords.

The other sites in the top 5 with them all have their keywords listed first.

Impact?

Since we made the title switch, they are still in the second position, but they are now averaging 15 more clicks per day!

I know some will say it's because the company name stands out from the clutter - and I agree on some levels. But as Doug mentioned, the title is phrased in a way that we humans like to read, so I think that helps too.

[JCorp]

Thanks for the response RankSurge.

I am torn on this as I was raised on implementing keywords first and the brand second. I was also raised on left to right reading for importance of keywords that described the page you were about to visit. Visitors (to my site anyway) search for products first, not brand names.

Specifically, I rank #2 for "outdoor enclosures" (L-com.com). So, you're saying I should reverse the order and I might see an increase in daily clicks?

Thanks!

[SEODinosaur]

There are many ranking factors and yes, having keyword placement first in a title is great from a SERP perspective. The user typed "keyword" they will most likely click on "keyword" when its the first thing in your title it is more likely to get clicked on.

This should help you understand more about all the factors and how much they really matter.

http://www.seomoz.org/article/search-ranking-factors#metrics-6

[DougRoberts]

I think a lot depends on the strength of the brand/Company name. If you've got a well established reputation in your niche then having your company name in a prominent position is more than likely going to be beneficial.

I'm also wondering what affect this might have on brand related searches in the future. Be interesting to take a look at branded vs non-branded traffic and how the positioning of brand/company names affects things...

Also, what kind of searches are we talking about (navigational, transactional, and informational.)?

[nrv]

to add to the question, some people say that this is only affecting low quality sites, if your site is a well established site then you don't have to worry about this.

1. Define established site
2. Is this true?

Im freaking about this over optimization thing. I don't list keywords with commas I generally do (keyword) - (keyword) and only 2, and I avoid putting the company at the end...seems that now it has to be there....

[SEODinosaur]

Over optimizing is having an [Exact keyword] all over a page.

If you url is http://url.keyword

If your title is - keyword

H1- Keyword

decription - keyword

body - keyword... most people who overstuff will add a ton of words just so they can include there keywords many times. 1 keyword per 100 words is a good number to go by... so they add 10000 words and 100o keywords

image - keyword

footer - keyword

When everything on the page is designed for a bot the bot will know. The best practice to avoid over opting is to include your [Exact] key in some places where it would make sense.

To avoid over optimizing use broad for some keywords and exact for some.. Mix it up and focus on where things will be best suitable for your users.