How 'Off Topic' can I go - site wide?

[philipjterry]

Hello,

I am currently number 1 for a competitive keyword - so don't want to push the wrong button and self destruct!

My site is highly focused on one relatively narrow niche with about 50-60 pages of content bang on topic. I was wondering if Google will discredit my site in any way if I start adding pages that are** 'loosely related' **to the overall theme of my niche. Some of them are what you might call sister concepts with maybe one mention of my target keyword in the body.....

Does the algo value what percentage of the whole site's content is on/ off topic? If so how important is this as a factor?

Thanks a lot

[DavidKauzlaric]

As long as the new content is relevant to a user and is even loosely related, you'll be fine. Just make sure you still focus on the main aspect of your website so that you don't get overrun by competitors. Build out your main theme and the sister themes at the same time, just dont value one over the other. You'll be fine.

[CPU]

Many large retailers will have ecommerce sites with products and pages of content in completely unrelated niches so your extra pages of loosely related should be fine. They may not rank highly for the terms related to the main theme though.