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Confusion about H1, H2...tags on a page with multiple posts
bigarsenalbear
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Joined: 08 May 11
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21 Oct 11 2:01 pm

Confusion about H1, H2...tags on a page with multiple posts

Hi there,

I'm relatively new to the world of creating websites and using wordpress and have become totally confused about "H1 tags," "H2 tags" etc.

Here's the background. My wordpress blog home page has 4 posts on it and looks something like this:

Title of first post

First post content

Title of Second post

Second post content

Title of third post

Third post content

Title of fourth post

Fourth post content


Also the post titles are in LARGER font than the content.

Here's what I've been told so far and what I'm confused about:

"Make sure your keyword is in your H1 tag"
"Make sure your keyword is in your H2 tag or H3 tag as well"

Here are my questions/issues/confusions:

(1) How many H1 tags are there?!

Does the whole page (which has 4 posts on it) have a H1 tag? Does each invidivual post have an H1 tag?

Which H1 tag am I supposed to be optimizing?

(2) I'm told that wordpress (which is what I'm using) automatically makes your first post your H1 tag, your second post your H2 tag etc. (Is that right by the way?)

This suggests that to "optimize my H1 and H2 or H3" tags all I have to do is to make sure my first and second (or third) post titles include my keyword

This also suggests that the entire page has an H1, H2 and H3 tag.

But then what about within each post?

I've seen that within each post you can make certain text a Heading 1 or Heading 2.

Does that mean that each post itself has H1, H2 and H3 tags? If so, do I have to include the keywords in these as well?

Thanks for your help. I realize this is probably a newbie's question and may seem pretty stupid to the more experienced!

Adam

P.S. I wonder if my confusion stems from the fact that it's one page with multiple posts. I've heard Matt Carter talk about a page with a single post, where you then have to manually click on the text you want to be H1, H2, to make things your heading tags.

What confuses me perhaps is that if you have multiple posts you can create such tags within each post as well...
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michellerana
Posts: 1874
Joined: 05 May 09
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21 Oct 11 3:59 pm
bigarsenalbear wrote:Hi there,

I'm relatively new to the world of creating websites and using wordpress and have become totally confused about "H1 tags," "H2 tags" etc.

Here's the background. My wordpress blog home page has 4 posts on it and looks something like this:

Title of first post

First post content

Title of Second post

Second post content

Title of third post

Third post content

Title of fourth post

Fourth post content



Many articles/posts are appearing on your homepage because you have not selected a post to be your homepage. To select a particular post as your homepage, you need to go to Appearance > Theme Options and then, on the Whole Page tab, look for Choose a Homepage. Click on the dropdown and then select the post you want as your homepage and then save the changes.
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Michelle
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bigarsenalbear
Posts: 61
Joined: 08 May 11
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21 Oct 11 4:45 pm

 HI Michelle,

Is it bad to have many posts on homepage, then?

I thought that since it was a wordpress blog, it's natural for the posts to be stacked one on top of the other on the homepage.

If I do what you've suggested, where will all the other posts appear? (i.e. the ones I don't select as the homepage)
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newstart
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22 Oct 11 4:41 am

 It is my understanding that each post should be optimized as if the post were a static page. If this optimization method is used, each post with an H1 tag, title, description, etcetera than you can have a blog with the latest post showing up as the homepage.

I have used this method acquiring confirmation using TT. Traffic Travis has provided each post with a high rating.

Margene
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bigarsenalbear
Posts: 61
Joined: 08 May 11
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22 Oct 11 9:34 am

 Hi Margene,

So does that mean you need to optimize the page AND each individual post?

I was assuming that to optimize the H1 and H2/H3 tags of the page as a whole I just need to write good titles for the first post and the second/third post.

I assumed this because I read that these post titles automatically become the H1 and H2/H3 tags (for the page, presumably).

But within each post I have the option of making certain text a Heading 1, which suggests (to me) that I can have H1, H2/H3 tags within each post too.

It's just that the course I was following said nothing about using these within each post!

Adam
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newstart
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23 Oct 11 12:41 am

 I have several sites using the 2010 Theme. With these sites a post shows on a post page with up to 10 other posts. The same posts can be brought up individually. So each post should be optimized. I believe it is a good idea to have the whole site search engine optimized able to get maximum benefit of your on-page SEO efforts.

The labor and time to do this is so minimal that to omit this part of the on-page effort seem senseless. Your goal is to address the needs of Google, Bing & Yahoo satisfying any and all requirements they have stated they want.

Margene
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bigarsenalbear
Posts: 61
Joined: 08 May 11
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23 Oct 11 9:29 am

 Thanks for that Margene. I think what's been confusing me is this "post" / "page" thing. But I get what you're saying about optimizing both and covering all bases.

May I ask what is actually ranking in the search engines, though?

If you have 11 posts on a page and Google is looking for the most relevant results for keyword, does Google rank one of your posts (assuming it's relevant) or the whole page?

Thank you for your time and input!
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newstart
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23 Oct 11 10:36 am

 Static pages are just that static. A static page can be edited. Static pages are singular covering one subject.

A blog page changes each time a new post is created. Most blogs have ten or less posts on one page. Each post can cover a different subject or they may be a continuation of a conversation with their reader. Usually the latest post will show up as the top post on the overall page. The oldest post at the bottom of the page.

Backlinks
People who COMMENTon your blog posts are irrelevant to your standing with Google, Bing or Yahoo. Comments on blogs, forums etcetera create backlinks for the person who has made the comment. The backlink is a link pointing to their website.

Google judges these links deciding whether they are relevant or not based on what niche their website is optimized for and whether the backlink created is from a similar or related niche. Example a DOG website with a backlink to a Dog TRAINING website are related and would be relevant.

Secondary EXAMPLE: A backlink created from a weight loss blog to a DOG TRAINING website is most likely an irrelevant backlink. With the one extreme exception that the first website would be based around overweight dogs. IF THAT WERE THE CASE, it too would be relevant. However, I have not seen any such websites.


If you want to create relevant links you need to make comments on blogs, forums that are in the same general niche category as your website. In this way the backlinks you create pointing at your site are relevant because it is from a website of the same or related niche.

I highly recommend you invest a few hours listening to the videos created by Affilorama about search engine optimization, web2.0 social sites, backlinking etcetera. Affilorama has hours of videos to view and listen to that should help clarify everything for you.

Also, the best way to learn is to jump in and begin. Only through the action of doing will you discover the answers to all your questions. Worrying about a problem only creates hesitation and confusion.

Margene
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bigarsenalbear
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23 Oct 11 10:50 am

 Much appreciated - I certainly will go through all the affilorama videos and resources, which are great!
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michellerana
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25 Oct 11 9:06 pm

 If you are using Wordpress, the title bar is automatically put in H1 tags. That is a default setting inside Wordpress itself, regardless of the theme that you are using.

When proper heading structure is implemented it adds to the readability of the web page. Your site visitors might become confused if you do not use heading tags in descending order as they were intended. The first heading of the page is heading 1 and the subsequent headings should be in decending order.

Heading 1: Title of the page
Heading 2: First section title
Heading 3: Sub section title

Heading structure also plays an important part of search engine optimization. The search engine spider checks for heading tags as it looks at your web page. Each search engine spider will prioritize the importance of the headings in a different way.

The heading structure of a web page is important to the readability for your visitors and search engines. A properly structured heading system is one of those things you have to spend time thinking about when designing your web page.

There are themes that don't include h3 and h4 headings. In some Themes, h3 tags are used within the comments. You can easily check in your style.css with a search for h3 and h4. If it isn't used, you can create your own.

To use them, manually type in the tags around the section titles with double spaces before and after. This way, WordPress will know to automatically add the paragraph tags when generating the post.
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Michelle
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bigarsenalbear
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26 Oct 11 7:59 am

 Thanks for posting Michelle.

I was also told that wordpress automatically makes my blog title an H1 tag on my home page.

But then I was told that it also makes every post title an H2 - i..e if I have ten posts on my homepage, wordpress automatically wraps them all in H2 tags, so I have ten H2 tags.

Does that correspond with your understanding?
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covenantguy
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27 Dec 11 2:13 am

 In this web page:http://cureyeast-infection.com/yeast-infection-no-more-review/
the title has been automatically put into H1 tag, Linda allen yeast review has been put in H2 tag since it is at the top of the post and "Who is L. allen?" has been made H3. Is that correct?
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