When is a key word not a word?

[Gorgon]

The Xara Web Designer 11 manual mentions the importance of using key words in the appropriate 'page properties' box to improve the chances of the page being picked up by search engines. This is also mentioned in a number of threads on the forums and in tutorials.

My question is: can a phrase be a keyword, and if so, does it need to be enclosed in double quotes? For example, if I have a site on the plays of Shakespeare and I discuss The Merchant of Venice, can I have "Merchant of Venice" as a key word or do I need Merchant and Venice, (separated by a comma) as separate key words?

If there is a competition for the daftest question ever asked on this forum, have I just reached the finals?

Thanks in advance

[nazf355]

Yes a keywords can be a phrase no need to split it up.
Having said that the major search engines do not rely on meta keywords for their rankings so it is a purely procedural task done just for completeness.

[gwpriester]

But you can add a significant phrase to a page title and page description. I read somewhere that about 12 words max for each area.

[nazf355]

But you can add a significant phrase to a page title and page description. I read somewhere that about 12 words max for each area.

Page Title (Meta Title) and Page Description (Meta Description) are of critical SEO importance, the Page Description especially so as it is the snippet used in the search results by the like of Google et al.
50 Characters is the recommend max I have read for Page Title but I haven't come across a consistent max for Page Title.

[mwenz]

BTW, welcome Naz.

I don't visit the web sections or threads much and so didn't see you posting here. I see that in addition to the WP templates you now have the Xara web templates too. They look nicely done as usual.

Take care, Mike

[nazf355]

BTW, welcome Naz.

I don't visit the web sections or threads much and so didn't see you posting here. I see that in addition to the WP templates you now have the Xara web templates too. They look nicely done as usual.

Take care, Mike

Hi Mike,

Good to see a familiar face here.
I've been meaning to do some Xara stuff for a while (more like a couple of years) but never got round to it, many half finished projects have I, ;-)