Question regarding **and <bold>tags</bold>**

[JasonHegarty]

I've read that these 2 tags both carry equal weight for seo purposes but in my opinion it looks a little spammy when you see keywords in bold type face scattered over your site. So will they still carry the same weight for seo if I applied a class to them that turned them back to normal?

[Alex-Harford]

If it looks spammy to your eyes then don't do it at all, it'll probably look spammy to the ranking algorithm too. This could also be considered a black hat technique as you're trying to fool the search engines...

[JasonHegarty]

Thanks for the reply - I read it on the seo cheat sheet on this site that using these tags on your keywords help your rankings. I agree though that it could look spammy if over done.

[DanHill]

That's bordering on cloaking - rather go ahead and bold your keyword within the content, but just do it once.  Try pick a spot in the first paragraph too

[ChapterEight]

Its quite common to use bold text within content to highlight terms, this is also done on a written document, however its all about the usage, if every other word is bolded or keywords are bolded over and over, it probably dilutes the weight given to bolded text and will appear spammy, so use with care and a human eye!

[JasonHegarty]

Ok Is this overkill?

http://www.keystonemortgages.co.uk

[NerdsOnCall]

Jason, (in my opinion) the best way to use Bold is to use it as the title of a list. In your example http://www.keystonemortgages.co.uk you used the Bold tag within a list. Instead you might want to use it like this " Why Use Keystone IMC for Independent Mortgage Advice" and then start your list.

Here is an example of bold tags, http://www.callnerds.com/blog/10-free-ways-to-clean-up-your-pc/

When you use the italics tag, try to use it in places that make sense and look attractive. I usually use them within blog posts. You can use italics to ad a "side note" or a quote to an article.

I agree with Daniel, applying a class to them will borderline on cloaking.  Hope this helps.

[kennyrowe]

I think that the bolding is less overkill for SEO than hard for the human eye to track. For instance, my eye is really drawn to the middle text where you've bolded "Independent Mortgage Advice." But the closer I look at the website, I see in the left-hand text column that the H1 says the same thing, not to mention your tag line above the hero image. It seems upon quick glance to be a lot of keywords and not enough substance. (I'm of the quality of content will draw in the customers and appease the search engines school of thinking.)

(Also, on a small screen, the "click to chat" covers up some of the left-hand text (using Chrome).)

[JasonHegarty]

Thanks for the feedback Erica I'm very conscious of creating content that does actually add value hence not littering my site with sales spiel and false promises.

However having a site with rich content is no use to me if no one ever comes to the party so I'm trying to balance seo with good content. I'll take another look at the home page to see if I can tone down the keywords a little - I've noticed the chat thing intruding on the content as well. I think it will have to go.

[JasonHegarty]

yes it really does help thanks and I will definately try your suggestion regarding the list title.

btw shared your page on twitter