There are still some folks out there that think meta keywords are important. But, they’re not. I’ve been saying this for years and Google has confirmed it several times. SEO professionals from all over the world have confirmed it. Meta keywords are like the dinosaurs – mere fossils of an era long ago that still turn up from time to time.
I’ve heard this repeated, emphatically, year after year at search engine optimization conferences. As part of the SEO site audits I do for Business Bullpen, we include the following text in our review of client sites:
Search engines no longer place any value on this metric and it may even hurt you because you are essentially telling your competitors which keywords you believe are relevant. They can then bid on those keywords via Google Adwords and then their paid ads may display above your “organic” (non-paid) results for the keywords for which you want to be found.
Surprisingly, we still get asked, “Are meta keywords still relevant?” The answer is absolutely not. In fact, one could argue that your competitors could look at your meta keywords, discover what terms you deem important, and then run an Adwords campaign using your own keywords against you. Sure, the are ways to analyze any site for keyword density, but why make it easier for your competitors by giving them your list of keywords in your meta data, which anyone can see?
And if you still don’t believe me – never mind the fact I’ve been doing this for four years – here’s Google’s Matt Cutts to back me up.
