Yahoo No Longer Uses Meta Keywords Tag

[morestar]

Apparently yahoo has stopped supporting the meta keywords tag months ago without announcing the news. Has anyone else heard this?

In the end I think it's a great idea if all the search engines didn't use the read the tag because it can be stuffed with so much spam and affect normal search results. I think the engines have evolved to the point where they are more capable of determining a sites keywords based on their own calculations instead of relying on the coder.

I found the news about yahoo not supporting the keywords tag here: searchengineland.com/yahoo-search-no-longer-uses-meta-keywords-tag-27303

[Canonical]

Yeah. I can't believe they every used it. The fact that they DID use it doesn't say a lot for their ranking algorithm. No self respecting search engine would be caught dead using such a worthless HTML/XHTML element as a ranking factor. I guess that's why they're getting out of search and letting Bing take over.

[kgun]

Hm, why no compare the content in that tag with the sites / pages content as an input to a quality metric of a site?

Insemantic vs semantic tags may be of value IMO.

On a low level it is simple string (class) manipulation, on a higher LSI and related ...

[morestar]

yes but i think the problem may lie in relying on that tag considering many people spam it. If they analyze the tag and there is too much spam then they may return results that aren't really in the searchers best interest.

[kgun]

If it was my SE, I could

1. Use the tag as a spam indicator with negative ranking effects.
2. To strengthen the content of the site if it fits with the site's / page's text (content).
3. Let the bot (software) figure out if the tag's semantic / relevance improves over time.

[morestar]

ok i see where you're coming from but here is where I would have a problem if I was an SE:

regarding the negative rankings for spam in the meta keyword tag, there might be that slight change that a business owner that figured out HTML a bit, reads somewhere to add tons of keywords and sort of 'spam' the tag BUT in the same breath provides good and relevant content as well. Now if I penalize them I may end up ranking a site that doesn't spam the tag but provides terrible content for the user/searcher.

your second statement has an 'if' in it so what about the other 'if else'?

third point: what if it doesn't improve over time? if not then we still fall into the chance of providing or not providing relevant content.

What do you think?

[seomagician]

We assumed long ago that the keyword tag wasn’t used in the major algos. We still tend to use it as a reminder of the major target of the page and the possibility of future algo changes.

I kind of agree with the use it as a spam indicator but there are so many unsuspecting site owners that have the tag full of garbage that have never spammed in their life.

[Canonical]

Why use an HTML/XHMTL element as a ranking factor that 1) it is controlled by the web developer and 2) is never displayed on the page? This is just a problem painfully to happen as was immediately obvious back in the day when it actually was used by most engines. It's simply too prone to abuse.

If you want an HTML/XHTML element where you can specify the keywords you'd like your page to rank for, you already have it! It's called the <title> element and it's the MOST important on-page ranking factor at most search engines already. And it is actually displayed so that the user can see it, not hidden like the meta keywords element. Why do we need another element where you can list keywords that you want to rank for AND hide them?

Not only is the meta keywords element prone to spam and abuse since it is hidden from view, it's redundant. Use <title> and forget about <meta name="keywords">. Honestly I wish they would erase it from all future HTML/XHTML standards by specifically saying that "keywords" is forbidden as a value for the name attribute of the meta element.

[kgun]

Originally Posted by morestar

What do you think?

Of course that content is King, but ...

[kgun]

Originally Posted by Canonical

If you want an HTML/XHTML element where you can specify the keywords you'd like your page to rank for, you already have it! It's called the <title> element and it's the MOST important on-page ranking factor at most search engines already. And it is actually displayed so that the user can see it, not hidden like the meta keywords element. Why do we need another element where you can list keywords that you want to rank for AND hide them?

1. What about the meta description tag? Can that give an exellent description of a site, better than a heading?
2. In my opinion the domain name is most important, then the title tag.
3. Everything can be used and misused.
4. I doubt there are many sites with exellent content and bad tags and I think they decrease over time.

[cg0404]

Google is not using it in their Ranking either, check out this video from Google themselves.

Official Google Webmaster Central Blog: Google does not use the keywords meta tag in web ranking


That tag is really just to tell the engine what keywords are on the page, has not been used for Ranking for years.

[Clint1]

Originally Posted by morestar

Apparently yahoo has stopped supporting the meta keywords tag months ago without announcing the news. Has anyone else heard this?

In the end I think it's a great idea if all the search engines didn't use the read the tag because it can be stuffed with so much spam and affect normal search results. I think the engines have evolved to the point where they are more capable of determining a sites keywords based on their own calculations instead of relying on the coder.

I found the news about yahoo not supporting the keywords tag here: searchengineland.com/yahoo-search-no-longer-uses-meta-keywords-tag-27303

I've been hearing that for years. The major SE's aren't supposed to be using them anymore, but some minor ones do. As you can expect, there's a lot of conflicting info out there on this. (Even though G is mentioned a lot, Y is also mentioned on the pages).

Meta Tags - Search Engine Optimization Meta Keyword Tag for SEO
Google: Stop Suing Over The Meta Keywords Tag, We Don’t Use It
The Importance of Keywords Meta Tag in SEO | Search Engine Journal
Official Google Webmaster Central Blog: Google does not use the keywords meta tag in web ranking
How to Use Meta Tags In Search Engine Promotion (thesitewizard.com)
Death Of A Meta Tag - Search Engine Watch (SEW) (you have scroll way down)

But the link you gave is recent, so that may be the end-all.

[scot184]

I agree that you should always fill in the meta keywords field just in case...even if Yahoo dropped it, another engine may use it. Any help you can get is worth a few extra seconds.

Obviously I wouldn't spend much time on it, but as another mentioned, an algo change that reincorporated it could make life difficult for those that failed to fill it on over time.

[TechEvangelist]

I've been doing SEO work for over 10 years. None of the major search engines have used the keywords meta tag for many years. The last major search engine that used the keywords meta tag was AltaVista.

The tag was widely abused in the 1990s, which caused the search engines to stop using it and instead focus on dissecting the page content. Google was one of the first to abandon it. Yahoo abandoned it prior to purchasing AltaVista (through the Overture purchase) in 2003. After they purchased AltaVista, there were rumors that they were going to once again start using the keywords meta tag, but those rumors were never substantiated.

[morestar]

Well I think I'm going to continue using it too. Even though the major SEs state they don't read the tag or use it for rankings we don't know for sure if they read the tag for other reasons. As kgun mentioned, if he was an SE he would use it to check for spam (or something to that effect) and maybe there is a tiny part of the algo that does check for that - we don't know...

then there's the question of other SEs or bots that crawl our sites for whatever purposes - could they still be checking the keywords tag? if they are then the tag should still matter.

and then of course there's the possibility of the major SEs changing their algo in the future and start reading it again. we all wouldn't want to have to go back and add the tag.

nice comments everyone

[deepsand]

Originally Posted by Canonical

Yeah. I can't believe they every used it. The fact that they DID use it doesn't say a lot for their ranking algorithm. No self respecting search engine would be caught dead using such a worthless HTML/XHTML element as a ranking factor. I guess that's why they're getting out of search and letting Bing take over.

What is the difference between data that is "spam" and meta-data that is "spam"?

[deepsand]

Originally Posted by morestar

regarding the negative rankings for spam in the meta keyword tag, there might be that slight change that a business owner that figured out HTML a bit, reads somewhere to add tons of keywords and sort of 'spam' the tag BUT in the same breath provides good and relevant content as well. Now if I penalize them I may end up ranking a site that doesn't spam the tag but provides terrible content for the user/searcher.

What difference does it make whether "good/bad" values are data or meta-data?

If "good" can be differentiated from "bad," then of what relevance the location of that being evaluated?

[kgun]

Regarding Google, these subjects have been discussed extensively here:

Here Googles use of the Description Metatag is another monster thread.

1. Meta Tags Are Not Dead
2. Matt Cutts - No Importance To keywords Meta Tags
3. Google doesn’t use the keywords meta tag in web search?

Generally you can not rank because of coding / markup, but as Deepsand indicates, data can be "bad" or "good". So from an information theoretic point of view, such data contain:

1. Good information: Semantic markup
2. Irrelevant random information. No value.
3. Fuzzy information: Fuzzy logic can be used to extract scores.
4. Spam, in a sense the same as 2.

Algorithms should now be so advanced that information and scores can be extracted from tags based on a comparison with the text of the page (site). Even if those tags are not used in the SERP rankings, they carry information. Who can give a better description of a page than the content provider? Personally I would be sceptical to a site with clearly identified tag spamming.

So personally, I would

1. Advice you to describe your pages (site) as good as you can in your description meta tag. (Link collecters like me often pull out that desciption to use in the anchor tag of semantic links).
2. Give a few good focused Kw's of your page.
3. Don't assume it will have any direct effect of ranking on the major SE's.

Assume your are selling houses or cars. Would you risk missing the 10 customers that found you from Niche Se's based on semantic markup? But the OP was about Yahoo, not Google and other SE's

[Clint1]

Originally Posted by TechEvangelist

Look at alkalkicy's post count. This is a first time poster, aka spammer.

Yeah I noticed that. What's hilarious is what they did is totally useless for any bots or spiders since it's not a valid link, it's not a link at all! (I wonder if they didn't realize they misspelled "Halloween" until after the account was created then it was too late to correct it. ? ROTFLMAO ).

Originally Posted by morestar

Well I think I'm going to continue using it too. Even though the major SEs state they don't read the tag or use it for rankings we don't know for sure if they read the tag for other reasons. As kgun mentioned, if he was an SE he would use it to check for spam (or something to that effect) and maybe there is a tiny part of the algo that does check for that - we don't know...

then there's the question of other SEs or bots that crawl our sites for whatever purposes - could they still be checking the keywords tag? if they are then the tag should still matter.

Yes, I think if one chooses to use it, and it's spammy, it might hurt you. So if you use it be sure it's used responsibly and sensibly keeping the typical keywords tag rules in mind.

[innominds]

Day-by-day search engines are becoming clever and modifying their algorithms.
So, it would be a real challenge to SEO engineers.

[crankydave]

Well, several of us tested both the description and keywords tags shortly after the BD rollout. At that time, Google used neither as a ranking metric and Yahoo only used the description as a ranking metric.

Dave

[Ravenhawk]

As many here commented the loss of that really is no surprise the real surprise is that Yahoo used it as a factor in ranking. Yes, almost any part of a website can be manipulated for rank manipulation but before long as soon as a flaw by the spammers is discovered most major search engines adapt since as always the spammers overindulge like the kid who get sick after eating too much Halloween candy.

[deepsand]

Originally Posted by Ravenhawk

... the real surprise is that Yahoo used it as a factor in ranking.

Such implies that Y! is/was unable to discern what there was and was not of value, and chose to ignore that fact.

If it is possible to distinguish "good" from "bad" elsewhere, why not so in meta data?

And, if such is there possible, for what reason should such "good" there be ignored?

[hotbizsol]

Meta Keywords is handy when a webpage has a lot of graphical illustrations or media content or text in images. In addition to alt or title tags, a meta keywords tag can be useful for the search engines. ofcourse, there is a problem with spammers. its the responsibility of search engines to separate a respectable business site from a spam site. This move could discourage rich media and encourage the verbose that search engines love.

[jgand]

I think most search engines don't use the keyword tag for exactly that reason, keyword stuffing. I only include it in the event a search engine does take it into account.

[weegillis]

In a sense it has come down to "For Internal Use Only" implementation of keywords. A well crafted keyword list on each document can serve a relational database very well when all the terms, say seven in total, are used as database keys. When this list is actually used with strong internal search in mind, not web search, it can be targeted directly, and a master index constructed for local search purposes.

This not only helps internal search, it could be used to generate 'related topic' or 'related pages' links in other internal pages to keep link juice flowing through the site.

As far as usefulness on the web, well, that did go out a long while ago. It's no surprise that news of none of the big three consider them should surface, has surfaced before and will surface again.

[kgun]

Originally Posted by hotbizsol

Meta Keywords is handy when a webpage has a lot of graphical illustrations or media content or text in images. In addition to alt or title tags, a meta keywords tag can be useful for the search engines. ofcourse, there is a problem with spammers. its the responsibility of search engines to separate a respectable business site from a spam site. This move could discourage rich media and encourage the verbose that search engines love.

Good post.

Originally Posted by weegillis

In a sense it has come down to "For Internal Use Only" implementation of keywords. A well crafted keyword list on each document can serve a relational database very well when all the terms, say seven in total, are used as database keys. When this list is actually used with strong internal search in mind, not web search, it can be targeted directly, and a master index constructed for local search purposes.

This not only helps internal search, it could be used to generate 'related topic' or 'related pages' links in other internal pages to keep link juice flowing through the site.

As far as usefulness on the web, well, that did go out a long while ago. It's no surprise that news of none of the big three consider them should surface, has surfaced before and will surface again.

What about KW's picked out as tags for (Social Media) SE's?

[digitalseo]

Originally Posted by morestar

Apparently yahoo has stopped supporting the meta keywords tag months ago without announcing the news. Has anyone else heard this?

In the end I think it's a great idea if all the search engines didn't use the read the tag because it can be stuffed with so much spam and affect normal search results. I think the engines have evolved to the point where they are more capable of determining a sites keywords based on their own calculations instead of relying on the coder.

I found the news about yahoo not supporting the keywords tag here: searchengineland.com/yahoo-search-no-longer-uses-meta-keywords-tag-27303

i've read about this one...but this is false..i've read the test they've done whether this is true or not..well whatever..

[morestar]

Originally Posted by digitalseo

i've read about this one...but this is false.

I'm not sure what you are saying is false?

[digitalseo]

Originally Posted by morestar

I'm not sure what you are saying is false?

** that yahoo doesn't support meta tags..

[cw1865]

Originally Posted by weegillis

In a sense it has come down to "For Internal Use Only" implementation of keywords. A well crafted keyword list on each document can serve a relational database very well when all the terms, say seven in total, are used as database keys. When this list is actually used with strong internal search in mind, not web search, it can be targeted directly, and a master index constructed for local search purposes.

This not only helps internal search, it could be used to generate 'related topic' or 'related pages' links in other internal pages to keep link juice flowing through the site.

As far as usefulness on the web, well, that did go out a long while ago. It's no surprise that news of none of the big three consider them should surface, has surfaced before and will surface again.

You're absolutely correct, internal search and having customers find products that they are looking for is critical to converting. Many people overlook this. Unless we have some evidence that keywords are actually hurting you, I don't see this as something not to implement on your website. In the future, the keywords could be weighed slightly more heavily than they are now and they serve a purpose for internal search.

[deepsand]

1) No two SEs function identically.

2) No SE functions identically for all time.

3) Whether or not a particular SE appears to use, or not use, a particular data element is irrelevant to the intended use of such element.

4) Whether or not a particular SE appears to use, or not use, a particular data element is speculative. Absence of evidence does not constitute evidence of absence.