Search engines like Google use search engine spiders to rebuild or index websites, and these spiders pay particular attention to content within H1 header tags.

In order to structure content for SEO and UX, header tags continue to play a crucial role. The use of heading tags is essential to the usability and the search engine optimization of your website. For search engines, keywords are derived primarily from content, heading tags, and titles of web pages. It is important that heading tags are readable. A search engine should be able to understand the header on your page if your visitors do.

In terms of on-page search engine optimization, this isn’t going to make or break you. But Brian Dean’s tests have shown that wrapping your target keyword in an H2 tag can have some effect.

Therefore, you should include your target keyword at least once in a subheading…and wrap it in an H2 tag.

Google has stated that its algorithm gives more weight to the first 3-5 words in a URL. Recent research from Brian Dean found that short URLs may give you an edge in the search results.

Make your URLs short and sweet if you want them to rank well in the search engines. Make sure your URLs contain your target keyword.

On-page SEO factors such as your title tag are important. As a general rule, the closer the keyword is to the beginning of the title tag, the more weight it has with search engines.  In the words of the infamous Brian Dean:

“You don’t always need to start your title tag with your target keyword. But if there’s a keyword that you’re gunning for, try to put it towards the beginning of your title.”

There you have it!

Absolutely! You can rank for long-tail versions of your target keyword by using modifiers like “2019”, “best”, “guide”, “checklist”, “fast” and “review”.