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How to use H1-H6 headings with benefit for SEO

Volodimir Aksyonov , ex. head of SEO

04.01.2023

How to use H1-H6 headings with benefit for SEO

Content

If you blog on the site not only for image purposes but also for promotion on the Internet, you need to pay due attention to the structure of the text and headings.

What are H1-H6 tags

Headings allow you to structure the text and break it into logical blocks. And HTML tags H1-H6 are a tool for structuring text when placing it on a site. Headings come in different levels, from the main H1 to the lowest level, H6, and they use the appropriate tags for the level.How tags are formatted (examples):

<H1>Main heading</H1>;
<H2>Second level heading</H2>.

Here <H1> and <H2> are opening tags, and </H1> and </H2> are closing tags. All other headers are marked in the same way.H1-H3 HTML headings are usually used for medium-sized articles, and H5-H6 lower-level headings are used already for long articles with a deep disclosure of the topic.

For people

Headings in the text help the user quickly understand what the text is about, and it saves him time.

For robots

Title tags make it easier for search robots to analyze the structure of content, match text to titles, check its quality and relevance to a search query. Thus, competent HTML markup of the text helps the site to rank higher in the search results and indirectly increases search traffic.

Heading rules

SEO of the text provides for the design of headings in a certain way. Use the guidelines below to mark up articles on your site.

Heading hierarchy

Each lower-level heading is a constituent part of a higher-level heading. The H1 tag is used only for the main heading, that is, the title of the article, and the H2 tag is already part of the H1, and so on. Therefore, when marking up the text, follow its logic, highlighting topics with headings of higher levels and subtopics with headings of lower levels.

Heading length

There are no clear length requirements, but SEO experts recommend making them shorter – up to 7 words (50-60 characters) so that the title text fits on one line. Such headlines are better perceived visually.

Keywords in titles

If possible, use keywords in titles. In the H1 heading, use a relevant search term and place keywords at the beginning of the sentence if it is long. The rest of the headings are not so important, and you can embed diluted keywords in them.

Readability

Headings help you navigate the content of the page, so their font should match their level. The largest font should be at H1 and the smallest at H6. Then the user will understand the logic of the article and its semantic load.

Uniqueness

It is a very important parameter. All H1 headers must be unique with respect to each other, that is, not repeated on the site, and include a key query for the page.

No extra tags in titles

According to the goals of SEO, extra tags in titles are undesirable because they make it difficult for search robots to analyze the text. And also increase the risk of errors with the removal of technical information in the title.

H1 headline optimization

Particular attention should be paid to the H1 tag because its content, when the page is opened, acts as the site title and is displayed in the browser tab. We list the optimization parameters for this header:

frequency of use on the page – only once;
the content of the tag is textual, relevant to the content of the page;
content – with a key phrase, preferably at the beginning of a sentence;
length – up to 7 words or 50 characters;
uniqueness – absolute within site, without copying the title and other tags on the page;
location – above all headings, should be in a prominent font.

H2 header optimization

Parameters to pay attention to:

location – below H1;
content – keywords; additional keys to use in a very diluted entry.

Requirements for length, content and relevance to content – similar to H1.

H3-H6 heading optimization

What to pay attention to:

don’t spam keywords;
place the title according to the tag hierarchy;
control the relevance of the title to the content of the section;
put it on a new line;
choose a font specific to each heading size.

What not to do

To successfully drive traffic to your site, avoid these:

do not stuff keywords into every headline;
do not embed more than one H1 tag on a page;
do not duplicate the same H1 on different pages;
don’t use headings as hidden text;
do not use styles in heading tags;
do not tag subheadings outside of the structure of the text, for example, in feedback forms.

H1-H6 heading tools

To check the correctness of the headings on the page, there are special online services.

Desktop programs

Programs that are installed on a PC have wide functionality and are used by SEO professionals for a number of other tasks as well. Most popular: Screaming Frog, SiteAnalyzer.

Online Services

Often, they allow you to check the titles on one page and the meta tags on the entire site. Of these, we recommend Netpeak Spider.

Browser extensions

Extensions usually allow you to work with a specific page. Of the extensions, we recommend SEO META in 1 CLICK, which displays titles, meta tags, and alts.