With the exception of a few, almost every web page on your site can essentially be constructed to target a different keyword group or theme. It’s tempting (especially if you’re paying an SEO on a per-page basis) to try and load too many keywords per page. Most SEOs who really know what they are doing will not allow you to target any more than two or three keywords per page. Going after too many keywords per page dilutes the ability to be effective for any of the keywords.
If your themes are built right you can target up to 5 to 10 keywords on any one page effectively, though I don’t recommend targeting any more than five per page. On each page you should target a single primary phrase and then a few selected, and tightly themed, supporting phrases. The primary phrases are generally the more competitive phases that also poduce a good amount of targeted traffic. All the other supporting keyword phrases should produce a measurable amount of traffic but are largely used as a means to help build out the page theme properly and improve results for the primary phrase.
There are times when you can go after multiple primary themes on a single page, but do so selectively and only if it won’t inhibit your ability to rank well for all targeted phrases for that page. Often the home page will and should target multiple primary phrases (with no supporting) in order to provide adequate representation of the whole site. These primary phrases should again be targeted on additional pages within the site.
This post is part of a continuing series on the topic of:
Optimizing for Maximum Search Engine Performance
Sub-Topic: Research Your Targeted Keywords.