I saw an article today on SearchEngineJournal.com that made me run to the computer so I could add to the discussion. The title of the article is Google Says Title Tags “Maybe” Impact Rankings.
A controversial enough headline to entice me to read the article, I had to know what this “Maybe” was all about. Especially since my trust level for what John Mueller says went from 100% before the antitrust trial to about 50% after.
Before I dive in, let me say that I unequivocally believe Title tags affect rankings (stay tuned for proof). But, like everything with SEO, your mileage may vary.
If you already have title tags and H1s on your site that are reasonably descriptive of the page’s content, no, tweaking your titles and H1s is probably not the most impactful thing you can do for your SEO.
But if, like my client’s site, almost all of your title tags and H1s are identical… well, that’s a different story. That should be your #1 priority!
Now, in total fairness to the statement from Google (John Mueller), the Title tags didn’t do much for the ranking (orange line) across the board, but the traffic jumps (blue line) indicate there was definite lift for pages that could drive traffic. Here are some of my favorite examples:
