Robert_Charlton - 8:05 am on Jan 6, 2003 (gmt 0)

>>If you are SEO’ing for a 2 word phrase use a 2 word title, if your SEO’ing a 3 word phrase use a 3 word title etc.<<

Yes, shorter is better, but I think this oversimplifies how you should consider page content in relation to your title. You also need to consider what your inbound link text is likely to be, and to look at your competition and why various phrases rank, and then figure out a title tag that will enable you to build longer phrases around the phrases your title contains.

Simplistically, a title of "big red widgets" might let you also optimize on the page for "big widgets," "big red gizmos," and "repairing red widgets," as well as for "big red widgets" and "red widgets."

Some interesting discussion in this thread about title length, word proximity, word repetitions, etc:

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