If I optimize for a long tailed keyword, will I also catch the short keywords within it?

[Scratch_MM]

Say my long tailed keyword has three words in it that I also consider keywords. Will I catch the searches for those short keywords, or just the long tailed keyword phrase?

[TimHolmes]

Not really sure about what to say except, yeah pretty much. This happens quite a lot for me on a couple of my key phrases that I have worked hard to optimise. Depending on either of the searches we rank well.

But remember it is not just about the phrase but all of the peripheral page and site optimisation that also contribute to the page doing well as without all of the elements coming together you may lack behind any competitors / authorities.

[EGOL]

I usually optimize mainly for the short tail keyword, and try to include lots of diverse content that will also qualify my page to rank for long tail queries.  Why?  Because many of the long tail queries contain the short tail keyword within them.

I will make an effort to place my most important long tail queries in the title tag to give the page extra ranking strength for them.

If you have really strong content that is competitive with what is ranking on the first page of Google for a short tail query, you should not hesitate to go after the short tail query.  If you can produce competitive quality content - Do Not Fear Competition -  because where you have heavy competition there is also lots of traffic and lots of money changing hands.  Optimize your page, make sure that is as good as you can make it, toss it up, and you will probably connect with traffic.   Promote it as you feel necessary.

Although I currently don't believe anyone who claims to understand RankBrain, I believe that it is going to strongly favor long tail content that is highly competitive.