by Mouhcine Azizoun

Created on: August 10, 2010

Each field of knowledge has its own jargon.   The field of SEO or search engine optimization is no exception.   SEO is the practice of improving websites ranks on the search engines.  One of the common White-Hat SEO tactics (ethical, valid and acceptable tactics) is using keyword-rich content.  In order to write keyword-rich content, one needs to learn about three terms: keyword density, keyword prominence, and keyword frequency.

Keyword Density

Keyword Density (KD or KWD) refers to the number of times your main keywords are used on a certain web page.  This also applies to links, images, tags, etc.  In order to calculate KD, one should either use the software available online or calculate it manually.  To calculate KD, you need to divide the number of targeted keywords by the total number of words.

Keyword Density = the number of keywords/total number of words

For instance, suppose the number of keywords is 10, and the total number of words is 300, the KD is:

10/300= 0, 03

KD is always referred to as a percentage.  Thus, we need to multiply the result by 100.

0, 03 x 100= 3

The KD is this example is 3%.

As far as the appropriate KD is concerned, the major search engine, Google, does not disclose any information about it.  Some people say it is between 2% and 8%.  Some others it is between 3% and 12%.  The truth is that the appropriate KD is unknown.

Google’s main concern is to satisfy its users because they are the main source of revenue.   For Google, when you try to know the appropriate KD, you are focusing on the search engine more than you focus on users.  And if Google disclose the right KD, they would be contradicting themselves. In Google Webmaster Guidelines, Google states: “make pages primarily for users, not for search engines”.  Google wants webmasters to focus on pleasing their visitors more than the search engine spiders.  Therefore, they will never disclose the appropriate KD.

Another reason why the right KD is shrouded in secrecy is to control the use of frowned upon SEO practices (Black-Hat SEO or Gray-Hat SEO).  If the KD is known, unethical SEO would spread online and Google would lose its users just like the 1990s leading search engines lost them due to Spamdexing.

Keyword Prominence

Keyword prominence refers to the placement of a certain keyword within a web page.  The placements of the keywords help the search engines spiders

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