What is Keyword Density?

Keyword density is the percentage of times a keyword or phrase appears on a web page compared to the total number of words on the page. In the context of search engine optimization keyword density can be used as a factor in determining whether a web page is relevant to a specified keyword or keyword phrase.

For example, if you have a Web page with exactly 100 words on it including all headlines, captions, alt text, and advertising, and you have a keyword phrase that is on the page 3 times, your keyword density is 3%:

Keyword Density = Number of repeats of the keyword / total number of words on the page * 100

When you're evaluating keyword density, you need to decide on your keyword phrase and then write your page. Once you've chosen a keyword phrase for your Web page, you need to start using it. As you probably already know, you should use your keyword phrase in:

• the meta title
• meta keywords
• meta description
• h1, h2, and h3 headlines (and h4-h6, if you have them)
• the first paragraph of text in the HTML
• in link text
• in alternate text for images
• scattered throughout the rest of the text on the page

But if there isn't a lot of text on the page, repeating your keyword phrase that many times could end up with a page that is too keyword heavy. In other words, your keyword density is too high.

Strive for a Keyword Density of Around 5% or Less

This means that out of the entire Web page content, your keyword phrase should be no more than 5% of the total words. If it is more than that, you risk appearing like a keyword spammer to search engines or annoying your customers with hard-to-read pages.

Don't let keyword density rule your Web writing. I aim for a keyword density of 3-4% for my target phrases. I've found that this works to get the keyword phrase into the mind of my readers.