Too many words on homepage?

[Chard]

Hi,
I wonder if anyone can settle an argument. I was wondering if having too much info text on the homepage (or any page I suppose) is detrimental to a sites position in the Serps. I suspect that my homepage has way too much informative text and I should be putting a lot of it onto a new page. Having said that, I rank quite well in Google (touch wood) but rather indifferently in Yahoo (page 2) and hopelessly badly in new MSN (page 7 or 8)for my main keyword phrase. Because of my Google rankings, I have been reluctant to change anything, but I feel that I must try and do something about MSN, as I don't like having too many eggs in the Google basket, for obvious reasons!
One of the effects of having so much text is that it has diluted the keyword density for that phrase down to 1 or 2% on the homepage.
Any feedback or thoughts on this would be greatly appreciated

[jschmitz]

I would say:
1) don't mess with good GR
2) try overture for yahoo/msn

I have only see text dense pages rank better, not worse. Im not talking key-stuffed, but real info.

Good luck, I wish I had that google prob!

judy

[caveman]

>diluted the keyword density for that phrase down to 1 or 2% on the homepage

Try to increase the kw density of this phrase on the page, without changing much else.

The SE's where you are performing less well rely more heavily on kw density and other on-page factors.

[Chard]

Thanks Judy and Caveman, your feedback is appreciated.
What started me worrying is that a colleague ran the site through some software programme (don't know which one), one of these things that is supposed to tell you how to optimize your site in 10 seconds flat. Whichever search engine that was selected to "check" the site for, it came up with more or less the same - Warning, warning - stand by your beds - Too many words in body, too low k/w density - the end is nigh. You know the kind of thing. I did see in one of Brett's postings, that he recommends between 200-500 words per page - I've got over 1200 on the homepage! Whilst Google doesn't seem to mind, I'm wondering if that is why I perform so badly in MSN

[Collieman]

Hello Chard,

About 4 months or so ago one of the SEO Co's published comparisons for G,Yahoo and MSN for the number of words on high ranking non comp KW pages.
800 to 1200 is definitely the range you need to be in.
The trends were very strong and worth seeing.
Not sure is i can post the URL here, so you are welcome to email me directly

Colin

[steveb]

None of the engines care a meaningful amount about keyword density. As long as it isn't absurdly high, forget about it.

"how to optimize your site in 10 seconds flat"

You get what you pay for there...

[danny]

It's been suggested that I have too FEW words on my home page... I think you can worry about this too much - there's an extraordinary variety of sites out there and no simple rule will ever apply to all of them.

[JudgeJeffries]

WPG analyses about 650 words for the top 5 positions on most keyword searches at the moment.

[soapystar]

trend seems to be for a larger amount of blocks of text onpage in top results on all engines.