Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Does Bolding Text Have Any Impact on SEO?
-
Someone told me it does but I thought that was old school way of thinking. Any thoughts?
-
Far as I know - no value at all for serps....but for searchers perhaps...depends on whether it might be a transactional query or a instructional one etc etc....
-
There are some pretty good resources right here on Moz Christopher:
- http://a-moz.groupbuyseo.org/blog/topic-modeling-semantic-connectivity-whiteboard-friday (whiteboard Friday)
- http://a-moz.groupbuyseo.org/blog/semantic-seo-questions (blog)
- http://a-moz.groupbuyseo.org/webinars/semantic-seo-for-the-people (webinar)
- http://www.slideshare.net/MatthewBrownPDX/strings-to-things-the-move-to-semantic-seo-mozcon-2013 (Mozcon slide presentation)
-
Hello Christopher,
Bolding in and of itself confers no technical SEO advantage. However, it does have a "soft" SEO impact in that it can make content more accessible and readable from a user perspective. This might make it more likely to be shared, linked to, or otherwise cited, improving your potential reach and therefore helping with positive ranking signals to Google.
Dry, basic text can make a reader bored and increase Bounce Rate.
However, well-cited, original content with proper emphasis on relevant topics and words can make all the difference when it comes to user reception.
See the difference? Google will too, over time.
Hope this helps!
Rob
-
I doubt it has direct impact on SEO but I have seen Amazon use all capitals in their product headers for the keywords. I don't know if this is dynamically generated but to give you an example it can be something like:
16oz. boxing 134895tp BOXING GLOVES for GIRLS
My guess is the reason they do this is to make the keywords stand out on the SERP and increase their CTR but if it had direct impact to SEO everyone would be bolding and caps-locking.
-
Good response Jamie. Any places to learn about the advanced topic modelling and semantic markup that you to refer to?
-
Hi
If it benefits the reader go for it!
If it doesn't i wouldn't bother!
-
I would not say it has massive impact, plus bolding keywords is a bit of an old school practice, but there is still some benefit / value I believe to using it, although does make content look unsightly if over used.
It's also worth mentioning that this tag **is redundant and has been for many years, you would need to use the following tag Keyword. Be careful to how much you use it and how perfect you make the SEO you do not want to get penalized for over optimisation. **
**Its best to think about this when writing content anyway
Focus content beyond basic keyword density and take into consideration advanced topic modelling - synonyms and close variants; keyword usage and intent; and semantic mark-up
Regards,**
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Seeking SEO contractor
I would like to hire an SEO contractor to assist with some technical/SEO issues on our site (Schema, etc). Can anyone make a recommendation? I am looking to work with a small company. Thank you in advance for any referrals!
On-Page Optimization | | JulieALS1 -
Will shortening down the amount of text on my pages affect it's SEO performance?
My website has several pages with a lot of text that becomes pretty boring. I'm looking at shortening down the amount of copy on each page but then within the updated, shortened copy, integrating more target keywords naturally. Will shortening down the current copy have a negative effect on my SEO performance?
On-Page Optimization | | Liquid20150 -
ECommerce Filtering Affect on SEO
I'm building an eCommerce website which has an advanced filter on the left hand side of the category pages. It allows users to tick boxes for colours, sizes, materials, and so on. When they've made their choices they submit (this will likely be an AJAX thing in a future release, but isn't at time of writing). The new filtered page has a new URL, which is made up of the IDs of the filter's they've ticked - it's a bit like /department/2/17-7-4/10/ My concern is that the filtered pages are, on the most part, going to be the same as the parent. Which may lead to duplicate content. My other concern is that these two URLs would lead to the exact same page (although the system would never generate the 'wrong' URL) /department/2/17-7-4/10/ /department/2/**10/**17-7-4/ But I can't think of a way of canonicalising that automatically. Tricky. So the meat of the question is this: should I worry about this causing issues with the SEO - or can I have trust in Google to work it out?
On-Page Optimization | | AndieF0 -
Do Parent Categories Hurt SEO?
I have parent categories and subcategories. Will it be harder for the subcategories to rank well because they have a parent category? The URL is longer, for one. I am just wondering if I should not have parent categories. I have one category page doing really well and I am trying to boost the others (most of which are subcategories) and this is a concern for me. Thanks! Edit: I also have a category that has 2 parent categories. I want it automatically in those 2 categories and one of its own. By itself it is very important keyword. Is this ok or should I have it be a parent category?
On-Page Optimization | | 2bloggers0 -
Does the link title attribute benefit seo?
Hello, Anyone could tell me the benefit SEO of link title attribute. Is **Link Title **ranking factor? Thanks
On-Page Optimization | | JohnHuynh0 -
Is .PW domain is good for SEO?
I want to register .PW domain which has recently got live to register. I am in doubt should it is good for SEO or not.
On-Page Optimization | | semmediapvtltd0 -
Does keyword at the very front of meta description have impact?
I know that it is important to have your primary keyword target as the first word or two words of your title tag. But what about your meta description tag? does it matter where they keyword is in the description tag? I see a lot of other sites stuffing their keywords right at the front of the description tag and it looks somewhat unnatural. What's your take? do you put the primary keyword as the first word or two words of your description tag?
On-Page Optimization | | A Former User0 -
How do Maximize WordPress with 2 SEO Plugins
I have 2 WordPress SEO Plugins, Yoast and All-in-One SEO. I have tried like heck to make them work together, but every time I crawl my site here, I get multiple error messages. My question is, how can I tweak the title settings to avoid having multiple meta desctiptions, titles etc.
On-Page Optimization | | TheSportsDaddy0
