Did Yahoo Lie? Apparently Yahoo Still Supports the Meta Keyword Tag

[morestar]

So the writer at SearchEngineLand.com wrote a previous article telling us that Yahoo quietly dropped support for the meta keyword tag but he did a test: he placed the following text into the keyword meta tag of the home page for searchengineland.com - xcvteuflsowkldlslkslklsk - he did a search for that string on yahoo and found no results, but he searched the string again on yahoo, yesterday and his site came up #1. I just did the same search and indeed, searchengineland did come up on ca.search.yahoo.com.

I just did the same search on google.ca and nothing came up and again on google.com and nothing came up other than the post he wrote which can be viewed here:

searchengineland.com/sorry-yahoo-you-do-index-the-meta-keywords-tag-27743

[innominds]

xcvteuflsowkldlslkslklsk - Yahoo! Search Results

Is this the same result you are referring to?

May be Yahoo didn't implement it.

[morestar]

yes, if you notice the first result is for searchengineland. the owner only placed the string in the keywords meta tag. Maybe yahoo didn't implement NOT reading the tag but they did indicate last week that they stopped supporting it.

I love it, the string isn't even in the copy anywhere (obviously)...

[Ace]

Ohh that's strange

[lazworld]

We added the keyword to a blog tag this morning and it was in Google in less than 4 hours. ranked #8.....not yet in yahoo or bing though...

[morestar]

did you add the keywords to the meta keywords tag?

[lazworld]

no to a post tag but i just added it to an old page with frame set as a keywords...lets see

[morestar]

well i'd think google is quicker at indexing pages, but ya, let's see what happens with your page.

And as mentioned, the page in question - the page with that string in the keyword meta tag wasn't indexed, but the page which mentions the string in the body of the page does...I think we can be sure here that Google doesn't support the tag...but again, it's good to test...

[spthai]

I think Yahoo still grab the information inside the meta tag...

[The Leader]

It alway pays to use the meta keywords just in case any search engine uses it!

[morestar]

Yes exactly, it's not a bad idea to keep using it and even if google doesn't use it to determine rankings and so forth it may be used for something else and that may change in the future...

I have to admit though, sometimes it's cumbersome to write out all the keywords for that nifty little tag and i do feel a small sense of relief.

[kgun]

Originally Posted by morestar

yes, if you notice the first result is for searchengineland. the owner only placed the string in the keywords meta tag. Maybe yahoo didn't implement NOT reading the tag but they did indicate last week that they stopped supporting it.

I love it, the string isn't even in the copy anywhere (obviously)...

More precisley: If you view source on this Search Engine Land: Must Read News About Search Marketing & Search Engines page you find:
<meta name="keywords" content="xcvteuflsowkldlslkslklsk" />

Off topic:
As is natural, Google has already indexed this thread, hit number 3 here.

[Jlee350]

I wonder if that will change if the Bing/yahoo! deal goes through? Since Bing doesn't support that tag...

[cw1865]

Well, its of course a very unique term. The question is truly what is the relevant weight given to various on-page factors. At the end of the day that is all there is: on page factors, off-page factors. They will continually tweak the weight given to on-page factors to keep the search engine results from becoming stale and so that we can't simply zero in on a 'method'

[daveberk]

Regardless of whether or not the SEs index the words in keywords tag, I find that thinking about and listing them is a good way to help me focus on the keywords for the page and keep them in mind as I craft the page.

[Clint1]

This is all interesting, thanks for posting it.

The question is, why is Y putting jerseycam.com at the top of the search results page when searching for xcvteuflsowkldlslkslklsk ?

[Clint1]

Originally Posted by lazworld

We added the keyword to a blog tag this morning and it was in Google in less than 4 hours. ranked #8.....not yet in yahoo or bing though...

Details? Keyword, webpage...?

[Terry Van Horne]

Who cares supposedly because Google dropped PageRank info from WMC they aren't using PR anymore so... if you belive that I got a nice piece of land in Florida that has a little surface water that I'm selling at rock bottom prices.

Look in the spec KW tag has a function! you shouldn't give a shite about how Yahoo! uses it, all Search Engines do is tell us what they want us to believe... remeber nofollow and sculpting? robots.txt standards? robots meta that are flakier than a schitzaphrenic after a bottle o' Jack. List goes on if you give this shite much credence then you're an imbicile who can't figure out anything on your own to even care what Yahoo! supports in HTML is a complete and utter waste of your time.

[celiaonegirl]

Hi! I am new to this forum.Hope to learn and share. Thanks!

[Clint1]

Originally Posted by Terry Van Horne

Who cares supposedly because Google dropped PageRank info from WMC they aren't using PR anymore so...

Well, that's beside the point of this thread, BUT, very interesting. Where did you hear that Terry? Or.....

if you belive that I got a nice piece of land in Florida that has a little surface water that I'm selling at rock bottom prices.

...are you kidding? From that comment above it obviously sounds like you are. Hard to tell because G WMT has dropped the PR area*, so that is true. If they aren't using PR anymore that would be the greatest news since penicillin......hell, since FIRE! (*I just noticed G WMT added a new area, "Labs". "Fetch" looks pretty useful).

Look in the spec KW tag has a function! you shouldn't give a shite about how Yahoo! uses it, all Search Engines do is tell us what they want us to believe... remeber nofollow and sculpting? robots.txt standards? robots meta that are flakier than a schitzaphrenic after a bottle o' Jack. List goes on if you give this shite much credence then you're an imbicile who can't figure out anything on your own to even care what Yahoo! supports in HTML is a complete and utter waste of your time.

ROTFLMAO. So true, they're leading site owners around by a freakin' leash.

[Clint1]

Terry are you still around?

[seopo]

It's quite possible that since releasing the information someone linked to them with that term. That would then null and void the test.

[Clint1]

Terry apparently did not subscribe to this thread, or "has left the building". Can anyone comment on what he said? Was it fact or joking? (#20 above).

[Clint1]

Originally Posted by seopo

It's quite possible that since releasing the information someone linked to them with that term. That would then null and void the test.

That's not what happened here. Read again and you'll see the target "word" (that otherwise meaningless letter string xcvteuflsowkldlslkslklsk), was only placed in a test page's keyword tag. That test page showed up in the results when searching for xcvteuflsowkldlslkslklsk. See kgun's post #12 above.

[seopo]

I know it didn't start that way and in the beginning the test proved meta keywords wasn't indexed, however, as soon as it was announced there is a chance someone would link to the page with the term as a point of discussion. This would spoil the test.

I'm not saying this did happen but it definately could have.

[Clint1]

Originally Posted by seopo

I know it didn't start that way and in the beginning the test proved meta keywords wasn't indexed, however, as soon as it was announced there is a chance someone would link to the page with the term as a point of discussion. This would spoil the test.

I'm not saying this did happen but it definately could have.

No, the test proved that Y is still using the keywords meta tag. I don't think you're following what's going on here.

The text xcvteuflsowkldlslkslklsk appeared no where. It was made up to prove the point. That text was only placed on a test page's keywords tag, it was originally found nowhere else. That test page eventually showed up for a search for xcvteuflsowkldlslkslklsk. How else could the test page show up for that text search if it's not anywhere else on the page? It could not, in this example.

Other's linking to it now are irrelevant. Sure those pages will show in a search for that text, but that's irrelevant, they have the actual text on them. And others now may also be linking to the test page using that link text (xcvteuflsowkldlslkslklsk), but that too is irrelevant for the test now, because at first that did not happen. So the test could be spoiled now, but it was not originally. Read the original article again, closely. And also, all we're talking about here is Y, not any other SE's. Now in Y there are several pages showing up in that search. (And I'm still totally confused as to how and why jerseycam.com is showing up). But look at the 2nd result, that's the test page, no "xcvteuflsowkldlslkslklsk" anywhere in the snip nor the page. The other results show up of course because they are talking about the test and have that text on them. And also by now those pages might also be linking to the test page with that link text. But that is now, not what happened at the time of the test (as he indicated in the article: "(And to be clear, I looked before writing this article.......").

[Faglork]

Yahoo explicitely advises to use META KEYWORDS:

How to Improve the Position of Your Website in Yahoo! Search Results

Maybe this helps:
Yahoo's Senior Director of Search Got It Wrong, Yahoo Uses Meta Keywords Still
The article quotes a "Senior Director of Search at Yahoo ", the interesting part (IMO) is this:

"However, when no other ranking signal is present, unique words that only appear in the meta keyword tag section of documents can still be used to recall these documents."

This suggests to use it for keywords NOT appearing in the text - so will this spawn a new round of keyword stuffing?

Cheers,
Alex

[kgun]

Originally Posted by Clint1

Other's linking to it now are irrelevant. Sure those pages will show in a search for that text, but that's irrelevant, they have the actual text on them.

There is always an opportunity to get traffic.

[Clint1]

Originally Posted by kgun

There is always an opportunity to get traffic.

Of course, no one was disputing that. But that's irrelevant in the context of the post. "Other's linking to it now are irrelevant" [in the context of his post and subject of this thread]." But I thought that would go without saying. Apparently not. So I just did.

[soultang]

I'm looking for someone to design a new website since I feel like my wordpress one is kind of dull. Maybe make it a forum based website or something, but jazzed up a bit. Our current forums isn't very spruced up and seems pretty plain.