SEO for CSS ~ Can I have a title above h1 ?

seo for css. h1 tags and hidden tricks above them.

[avery123]

Hi folks,

I have done a search on this, and am struggling to find an answer.

I was wondering if it is possible to use special CSS tags above h1 in order to use as a kind of Master Header.

I am trying to make a Master header for my human visitors, but include the important keyword in the H1 tag underneath, to please GoogleBot.

Please see this link to view the 4 options.
[law-of-attraction.tv ]

You will see that the 4th one has an image above the h1 tag, though the image is hidden in the CSS file.

Thank you.

Avery

[kaled]

I do not follow your logic and I am not so sure that Google would either

But here's the thing, maybe you attributing too great an intelligence to Google. Most of the old hands here could fill a small book with dumb decisions and general cockups that Google executives and programmers have made. So why do you suppose that their programmers have a rigid interpretation of what is and what isn't a good heading structure, and even if they do have strong opinions, why do do you believe they are the same as yours and even if you believe they are the same, why do you believe they got the programming right and even if you believe all that, why do you believe it will all be the same next week or next month?

The structure of HTML headings is NOT hierarchical, i.e. a heading is not a container for anything other than it's own text. A heading does not contain the headings below it. Now, it is entirely reasonable to structure a document in a hierarchical manner, but if the content doesn't fit that structure then there is no merit in trying to force it.

I think most people would agree that for SEO purposes the Page title and the H1 should essentially be the same.

Stylistically, I tend to agree that the title and first heading should be similar, but from an SEO perpective, I suspect many would disagree with you.

Personally, I imagine that Google programmers are well aware that the order in which text is displayed on a page can be very different to the order in which it appears in the source code (thanks to CSS) so attempting to apply rigid rules to the interpretation of headings is pretty pointless. There are plenty of multi-column pages out there and I bet many of them have headings in more than one column - how exactly is a dumb robot supposed to sort that out - answer : don't bother trying.

Kaled.

[BeeDeeDubbleU]

Stylistically, I tend to agree that the title and first heading should be similar, but from an SEO perpective, I suspect many would disagree with you.

AFAIAC the first heading should be an H1. Most people would agree on that including W3C.

Matt Cutts on this.
[youtube.com...]

[kaled]

AFAIAC the first heading should be an H1.

Is that the first heading in the source code or the first heading that the user sees?

It is reasonable to use a heading in the navigation area and it is reasonable to place the navigation area first in the source code, ergo, search engines should not spit the dummy if an H1 follows an H3, etc.

It seems to me that people are thinking of web pages as if they are printed on paper and there is a line-by line correlation between source code and the displayed page when obviously neither of these is true.

Kaled.

[wallarookiller]

Just do things for the user. It's really that easy now. There really isn't much more to say.

[Hugene]

The best is to adjust your H1 header to be the Master Header you want.

However, if it really makes no sense, then just use <div class="">, this is perfectly OK.

Do not use any images or any hiding with CSS, no point and could penalize you.

[caffinated]

Mmmm. Beware of SEO "experts". The less they have communed with their god, the less they know about their god and the 1% who really do know their stuff ain't about to share that out. Best advice...do your own experimentation and don't take "expert" advice as holy. So much second guessing.

[avery123]

Thanks for all your feedback guys :)
I decided to play "fairly" safe in the end.

[edited by: tedster at 3:49 am (utc) on Nov 17, 2010]