Say you are using an online site builder that analyzes the number of times a keyword appears in your copy.

Sometimes it gives some really weird analysis (like “you need to use your keyword 32 more times on this page!”). Yet you have been reading that Google hardly pays attention to keywords at all these days. Should you even bother dealing with keyword density?

Keyword density is now an outdated concept in SEO, especially when it comes to Google. In the past, it was the single most important factor for judging the value of a web page.

But this was back in the pre-Google era (now if THAT doesn’t give you a hint about how outdated keyword density is…). With Google’s reliance on its PageRank algorithm – and the general trend towards off-page factors determining more and more of your website’s rankings – the importance of keyword density as an on-page optimization tool began to diminish.

Yet people continued to theorize about what the ideal keyword density should be. Estimates ranged from 2% to 8%.

Keyword density, in case you are wondering, is measured by the following formula:

Keyword Density Formula

d = x / y where:
x = number of times a keyword is used in a block of content (page)
y = total word count of the page
d = keyword density

The problem with keyword density is quite simple – it is very, very easy to manipulate and spam. Spammers used automated content generators to create highly optimized web pages with high keyword densities.

As search engines started to set limits on “acceptable” keyword density, spammers got smarter and smarter and reduced their keyword density as well, making it especially hard for search engines to separate spam content from genuine, useful content.

Search Engines and Keyword Density
Since search engines could not conceivably check every page manually (Google indexes about 8.1 billion pages – and pages are added daily), and they couldn’t tolerate spam in their search results, search engines have significantly devalued keyword density as a ranking tool.

Keyword positioning (placing the keywords in title tags and header tags) as well as thematic keyword relevance (a fancy term that refers to how related your core keywords are to your website’s main theme or niche) are far more important that the number of keywords in terms of onpage optimization.

And that, of course, pales in comparison to how important off-page optimization, or link building, is. If the page building tool you’re using was designed way back in the days when keyword density mattered, it may rely on a fairly high keyword density percentage (32 keywords on a page is probably more than most ultra-spammy auto-generated sites contain).

It’s almost impossible to repeat a keyword that many times in a normal web page and make it readable.

So ignore those messages about keyword density and focus on the following instead:

• Good, useful, quality content
• Keyword positioning
• Keyword relevance