Strange client request

[NateStewart]

I have a client who attends an internet marketing meetup. I have been once myself. Good group of people but most seem lost when it comes to SEO and can't tell Black from White!

Well today my client emailed me and in the email she mentioned doing a trick to the title tags.

Client: "there is a trick to use with the title by putting keywords in quotes and parenthasis.   I'm sure you know how to do that little trick. If we do it in the title and in the first few lines of the verbage it will soar us near the top and hopefully on the first page of Google."

a few sentences later

"We could use a tad more content on the first page ( with parantesis and quotes) to boost us up in the ratings. At least it is an easy trick to do."

I have never heard of this. Has anyone else heard about this. Please share thoughts. It sounds completely bogus to me but I will be the first to admit that i don't know everything! However i would like to have more than just my opinion when I talk to my client.

Let me know what you think.

[BlueprintMarketing]

Unfortunately clients trick is to attract the exact match's of the words in quotes  not your normal broad search terms that include keywords. I think it's a very bad idea to implement

http://www.webdesignfromscratch.com/seo/what-is-the-difference-between-broad-match-phrase-match-and-exact-match/

[eTundra]

To be honest, it sounds bogus.  I've never heard of it, and just from a user standpoint, I'd imagine that would be annoying.  Let's try that sentence again with what was suggested...

To be "honest" (it sounds bogus);  I've never "heard" of it (and just from a user standpoint); I'd imagine that would be "annoying".

Not saying those are the keywords, but how annoying is that sentence to read?  From a grammar standpoint, it's giving me chills.  Anything in quotes is hinting at something other than what it is... what are we talking "about?"  I hate reading through paragraphs where people use  quotes out of context.  Here's a great example of what I'm talking about: what does this sign mean to you, http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Admin/BkFill/Default_image_group/2012/2/10/1328896276621/cheese-burgers-sign-on-sm-007.jpg?  Is it cheese or not?  Not sure, but I don't want that burger!

[BlueprintMarketing]

Google does allow for people to search exact keywords in that manner so if they think you're going to get more traffic because you know people will search identical keywords answer it just is written and  not a good idea to use "whatever" or (don't do it) as people just don't do  that as much as writing something unique in google

 

From a grammar standpoint it should be as user-friendly as possible unnecessary question parentheses is not user-friendly to me.

Thomas

[KeriMorgret]

If it worked, we'd all see text with lots of odd quotes and parenthesis, correct?

[DennisSeymour]

Keri just nailed it.

You will actually hear a lot of crap in places like that. Actually, ive been to events where speakers just talk crap. Stuff they don't even test, just "heard" or made up.

[KevinBudzynski]

Sounds bogus to me. Any time I hear something that is to good to be true, I typically will ask the presenter for data/proof behind the statement. 9 times out of 10, they won't have it or will "email it" after the presentation. The other 1 out of ten seems to be one example that is an outlier and can't be replicated for some reason.

[MikeGracia]

Bad bad idea!

As others have said, I suspect the theory here is to try to rank higher for when people use speech marks in their Google query.

In my opinion, the idea is bad for 3 reasons:

1. Hardly anyone searches like that these days - I do sometimes but only when the results without "" fail to return the results I need - or when I'm doing specific research (intitle:" " etc). Not many 'normal' users search like this

2. From a user perspective it doesn't make sense. In the body of content it would look very odd and unprofessional (unless you are citing a quote!) - Moreover using " " marks in the title tag is a bad idea - you only get a few characters for your title tag, so take FULL advantage of each character! I don't mean over-optimise keywords here either, but as well as having your primary keyword in there, use the title tag to help turn 'would-be' visitors into visitors - using " " marks in your title tag reduces the space you have to use, making it a bad idea.

3. It's a pretty blatant form of trying to manipulate results - Something that big G would likely not approve of... Ask your client if they want to gamble their online presence on something designed to 'trick' Google If they are promoting a crappy $7 affiliate product I'd maybe understand them being that silly, but if they want a long-term online business... Nah!

Kinda makes me wonder who suggested this to them! Did they enter a time-warp when they went into the meeting, going back to 2001?!

[NateStewart]

Thank you all for your input. I couldn't agree more with everyone. Like I said, i needed to have more points of views to bring to the table.