Keyword stuffing (also called keyword spamming) refers to the practice of overusing keywords in content in an attempt to increase a website’s visibility in search engine results (SERPs).
This “keyword spamming” can lead to negative consequences for a website’s ranking. As grandma would say: “The dose makes the poison.”
In the early days of SEO (Search Engine Optimization), it was believed that the frequent repetition of certain keywords on a website would improve its ranking in search results.
And it worked! With a bit of skill and luck, the motto “more is better” could land a site on the first page of search results. This led many website owners and agencies to oversaturate their sites with keywords in an attempt to improve their rankings. But we’re no longer in the early days of SEO.
To counteract keyword stuffing, Google long ago adjusted its algorithms.
For Google crawlers, meta keywords have become irrelevant.
Today, all search engines have advanced algorithms capable of detecting and flagging keyword stuffing. If a website is oversaturated with keywords, it may be demoted in search results (SERPs) or, in the worst case, completely excluded from search altogether. However, for the latter to happen, you’d need to really go overboard.
Another downside of stuffing is the readability of the text, which negatively impacts the user experience on the website. And what’s important to crawlers nowadays? That’s right!
The Google Search Console even has its own menu tab dedicated to website usability.
What can you do instead to improve your on-page SEO?
A good SEO strategy always aims to create natural and relevant content.
The content of your website is for the users, not for search engines.
- Make sure to use your keywords sparingly and strategically, and don’t overlook LSI keywords. This ensures your website content remains informative, readable, and – importantly – trustworthy.
- Another important aspect is generating backlinks:
Backlinks are links from other websites that point to your homepage. Sounds pretty simple, but:
The more high-quality backlinks a website has, the higher it will appear in search results. - Also, make sure your site is technically well-structured and meets all search engine guidelines. This includes using clean HTML code, providing user-friendly navigation, and incorporating metadata such as title and description tags.
- Focusing on user experience, ensuring your website loads quickly, is easy to navigate, and works perfectly across all devices, is also a crucial factor.