A Guide to Effective Use of Keywords and Anchor Tags
Keywords are an important element of web page design. When someone types a query into a search engine box, the words they type in are known as ‘keywords’. The search engine uses them to construct a list of web pages as a response to the query. It matches the keyword against words it has indexed for that web page. The words will have been used through the web page, and that’s what makes it relevant to the query.
The place on the page where the words are positioned has an important bearing on how the page ranks in the search engine listings. One of the most important places where keywords should be included is in the anchor tags or hyperlinks on the page, and on pages linking to it.
In the rush to include JavaScript effects and drop-down menus, Flash buttons and other unusual linking methods on pages, the importance of text-based hyperlinks is often overlooked.
Search engine spidering software finds it difficult to make sense of text in links that have been created with JavaScript and Flash. Where these forms of navigation are included in your website, it is a good idea to include text-based hyperlinks somewhere on the page as backup. They could be positioned at the bottom of the page where they are not prominent features for human visitors, but can be read by search engine spiders.
A technique that is more search engine friendly is to use a style sheet with CSS rules to control the appearance of the text-based hyperlinks. This can provide rollover effects, while still having a text link with keywords.
Keywords need to be included in all aspects of an anchor tag structure. Where this happens, the tag will give a very important boost to the page ranking for those keyword terms. The name of the page you are linking to should include keywords, either together or separated by hyphens. If the page is held in another folder, its name should include those keywords.
Having identified the file to which the tags will link, the next step is to create the link text with keywords included. The link text can consist only of the keywords, or it could include extra words where the link is included within a body of text, rather than as a menu item.
One aspect of a hyperlink that is often omitted is the ‘title’ parameter. This will provide a piece of text as a ‘tool tip’ display when the cursor is moved over the anchor tag or link text. This can be an effective display feature, but should also be used to include keywords.
The final hyperlink will have an appearance something like the following link:
<a href=”keywords/keywords.htm” title=”keywords”>keywords</a>
The effect of this is to leave the search engine in no doubt that the page this tag links to will be very relevant to a search on those keywords. This is true even before the actual content of the page is examined.
A website where text-based hyperlinks have been used throughout, and have keywords included, will be an important successful marketing tool for any organization.
Stephan Iscoe
