How to Use Keywords in Your Articles

Even after the Google Panda and Penguin episode, keywords in your articles are just as important as it has always been. How will your website visitors know what your article is about if you do not have keywords in your articles? Google has not stopped SEO, they have only made you do it properly.

We all know that having too many keywords in your articles is a definite no-no. So there are a few things that we need to avoid and a few things we need to include to get your articles perfect.

Have you ever watched a TV commercial and wondered what they were trying to sell? I guess you have. This is the same for an article with no keywords; you cannot leave people wondering what the point of your article is.

What is your keyword?

You need to ask yourself what your article is about. Make a list of about five keywords that you think your article is about. Then choose the one that is really closest to your subject.

Then you can use this main keyword to find other related keywords that you should also include in your article.

Keyword density

Now this is where some webmasters may split because their views will be very different. I can only give you my point of view here as there are no clear rules to keyword density in your articles. I personally only like 1% to 2% keyword density and then include various related keywords scattered amongst the article. I find this to be a great mix and I never have a problem with over optimization. This means I mention my main keyword 5 times in a 500 word article.

Some Webmasters will tell you that you need 3 to 5% keyword density. I do not like this as I have read articles with this much keyword density and they look awful. 5% keyword density means the main keyword is mentioned 25 times in a 500 word article. We should be writing SEO content for humans and that kind of writing just does looks terrible!

Related Keywords

Including related keywords in your articles is a fantastic way to not repeat a keyword too many times. If you include related keywords, you will have a list of keywords to use instead of just concentrating on one keyword. This make sure article interesting and covers the subject well. To find all the related keywords and which ones I should be targeting I like to use Keyword winner. Before I had this program, it would take me hours to sort out the keywords for my articles.




Headings and subheadings

Now that you have your keywords and your related keywords, you need to use their use only here and there, in your headings and subheadings. This not only breaks up the article and makes it look fantastic for the actual reader; the search engines also love these keywords as subheadings. Again we cannot overdo the keywords but only mention them in one or two headings. Of course we need to mention the main keyword in the title of the article, but only twice in the subheadings. This is all included in SEO basics but some webmasters still forget to use these methods.

Using keywords in your articles will help you rank in the search engines and will also let your human readers know what your article is really about. Just do not forget that after writing your article, you should use your keywords and your related keywords to link back to your article. Again we must not overdo this either!