Keyword density and how it relates to webpages, articles, SEO, etc. is one of those *sneaky* little things that everyone needs to know about... especially if you're trying to get indexed in search engines.

No discussion about keyword density can take place without defining a few of the terms and how each affects your search engine rankings.

Keyword Density

When people talk about keyword density, what they are referring to is the total ratio of keywords contained within the content (the indexable words) of a webpage.

There are a lot of opinions as to what the correct keyword density for most search engines is. Generally, most experts claim that 1%-3% keyword density is best. In my personal experience, I've had the best luck by staying between 2% and 4%.

As you may have guessed, trying to figure out what your keyword density is on your own can be a real pain in the rear... that's why I've set up this keyword density analysis tool to help you.

Keyword Density Analysis Tool

	Keyword One:		Ratio: %
	Keyword Two:		Ratio: %
	Keyword Three:		Ratio: %
Cut-and-paste your article below:
If the ratios don't appear to update in real time, just click the update button.

Keyword Frequency

When experts talk about keyword frequency, they are referring to how many times a keyword appears within a webpage. This is different than keyword density in that density only refers to the indexable words of a webpage.

It is thought that the number of times a keyword appears on a webpage, affects it's relevance to the search engines. If you've done your homework with regards to keyword density, you'll probably be fine for keyword frequency too... There's just no point in making yourself crazy about this stuff.

Keyword Prominence

Keyword prominence refers to how the keywords actually appear on a webpage. For example, keywords might be within the title, the headline tags, bolded, etc. as well as where they actually appear on the page.

It's generally thought that keywords should be placed within the meta tags, in the title, and within the first four words of the first sentence whenever possible.

Keyword Proximity

The last term you may want to be aware of is keyword proximity and it refers to how close together two or more keywords appear on a page. Generally, the closer keywords are the better.

Here's a couple of examples:

How To Make Money with Affiliate Marketing

How Autoresponders Help In Email Marketing

Pages are thought to rank higher within the search engines if keywords are close together.

Don't Make Yourself Crazy...

Search engine optimization can drive you absolutely nuts if you try to follow every single tip and trick out there. You'll end up spending all your time optimizing rather than just adding the content.

In general, I recommend:

1. Do your keyword research.

2. Write your content around the keywords you choose.

3. Run your content through the keyword density analysis tool above and see how you're doing with regard to density.

4. Weave in a few more keywords until you've reached the keyword density you want.

5. Publish the page and move on to the next one.

Remember that you're writing for people too, so don't get wrapped around the axle on keywords... Just build keyword rich content!