How Can A Site Rank For Keywords That Do Not Exist Anywhere On Its Pages?

“…If a tree falls in the middle of the woods and no one is there to hear it…did it make a sound?…”

In the blogosphere, that answer is a resounding NO! Whether a reader’s response is favorable…or not, we want to be read. An article is only as great as from the attention it receives. The right article or the right series of articles can be the difference between respect, notoriety, and influence in a chosen category/niche/industry…or complete anonymity.

You will never reach your goals without the exposure that search engine visibility can provide. Organic traffic is probably the only “free lunch” we have as bloggers. So why not make the most of it?

Keywords, Keywords, Keywords

No discussion of search engine optimization is complete without addressing the importance of keywords.

The reality is, as bloggers, we can never truly write solely for people. How Google evaluates your content compared to the casual blog reader, are two different styles. Now, many bloggers will claim this is how they write, but do not put too much weight into the statement – it is a great marketing ploy tool! With new blogs continuing to saturate the market and intensive SEO campaigns created to either bump you from page 1 of Google Search or keep you from appearing there, we have to write with GoogleBot in mind. There’s no way to avoid it.

There are specific keywords and keyword phrases that I try to target. But, how much control do we really have when your site is ranking for keywords that do not exist on your site?

How Can A Site Rank for Keywords That Do Not Exist On Its Pages?

Yesterday, i cam across this recent video by Matt Cutts of Google that addressed this question.

For those that perhaps do not know, Matt Cutts is the very visible face of Google Search Quality. In the past, he has been involved in factors such as ‘NoFollow,” Spam Links, and Paid Links.

I’m OK with anchor text that appears on other sites that increases my visibility to Google . I was pleased to hear that Google’s algorithms were intended to be more intuitive. Just as long as when I am using terms like “link love” and “spam,” they are aware I am not referring to meat! LOL

How do you feel about your site ranking for keywords that do not exist on your pages? Were you aware of this concept? If you discovered anchor text from another blog that was driving traffic to you either directly or through Google, yet not keyword optimized, would you ask the site owner to change the anchor text?