Multiple H1 Tags – Good Or Bad?

Will multiple H1 tags on a post or page help or hurt your site’s SEO?

The short answer is yes and no. The long answer is yes and no. SEO

I see the question of multiple h1 tags often discussed in forums and articles. The answer I think really comes down to intent. Is your intent to spam or inform?

What are H1 tags and why should you care?

First, a definition. From The Digital Marketing Glossary, H1 tags are defined as:

A H1 tag is a semantic HTML tag used to mark the importance of a heading text on a webpage. The H1 to H6 tags are used to define HTML headings. H1 defines the most important heading and H6 defines the least important one.

The use of H1 tag for a targeted keyword or query is recommended for search engine optimization among many other “on page” elements. For search engines like Google, the use of an H1 tag for a given keyword is a signal that the page is probably focused on the keyword.

The code simply looks like this: <h1>Your Focus Keyword Included Title Here </h1>. WordPress will handle this all very nicely for you.

The basic rule is one focus keyword per page. That is what I always read when I got serious about blogging and SEO, one per page. Any more and Google would do it’s virtual frown on me, a bad thing.

In other words, the H1 tag is the really important bit, or section, you want your readers and the search engines to place their focus. That’s why the focus keyword should be in an H1 tag. Everything that comes after should support and strengthen the really important bit.

So, from that, multiple H1 tags should be bad. Labeling several bits as important probably comes across as spammy. If everything is important then nothing is important, right? Well, no, not necessarily.

Why you should care.

When I began to get really serious about blogging I would come across instances in an article when using a second or third h1 tag some how felt appropriate to the format of the page.  Using a second or third H1 tag seemed the correct thing to do.

It is possible that a page can be structured with several important, but related, sections. The most obvious case is a one page website. One page sites are getting very popular right now. If a business uses a one page site and lists out it’s important and different (if related) services, each one is a really an important section.  They are related because this is what the business offers to it’s customers to make money. Nothing wrong or spammy with that.

Also, there is a widely used and useful plugin called Yoast SEO. I use this on every website I install. It helps anyone follow or do the things required for good on-page SEO.  It’s guiding me as I write this.

The plugin’s author, Joost de Valk, is an SEO authority, the kind of guy Google will consult.  The premium version of this plugin will support multiple focus keywords, or important bits, that can be used in an H1 tag.

One more little bit. Multiple H1 tags are allowed in HTML5. So what to do?

What does Google say about Multiple H1 tags?

As with all things SEO, it’s usually best to go to the source. Google seems to support the idea of yes and no. From the redoubtable Matt Cutts of Google answering this question:

So Google (and probably the other search engines) approves of multiple H1 tags if done appropriately and judiciously. If you have a good reason, if you have several important sections on your page, and you do it with a sense of thoughtfulness, multiple H1 tags are just fine. You are telling Google and the other search engine to note these important parts. It’s to your advantage that they are noted as important parts.

If you are not certain where the line really is, then just use one per page. You will never be on Google’s, or the other search engine’s, bad side. That’s good. But as you really develop your blog, and start to draw a crowd with it, you may begin to sense that two or more such tags work for your intent and limiting the number used to one is a straight jacket. So, go ahead and use it. Just don’t go nuts with it.  Then you are spamming.

Multiple H1 Tags – Good Or Bad? was last modified: April 24th, 2016 by Dave LeBlanc
Posted in SEO and tagged , , .

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