Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Low text-HTML ratios
-
Are low text-HTML ratios still a negative SEO ranking factor?
Today I ran SEMRUSH site audit that showed 344 out of 345 pages on our website (www.nyc-officespace-leader.com) show an text-HTML ratio that ranges from 8% to 22%. This is characterized as a warning on SEMRUSH. This error did not exist in April when the last SEMRUSH audit was conducted.
Is it worthwhile to try to externalize code in order to improve this ratio? Or to add text (major project on a site of this size)? These pages generally have 200-400 words of text.
Certain URLs, for example www.nyc-officespace-leader.com/blog/nycofficespaceforlease more text, yet it still shows an text-HTML ratio of only 16%.
We recently upgraded to the WordPress 4.2.1. Could this have bloated the code (CSS etcetera) to the detriment of the text-HTML ratio?
If Google has become accustomed to more complex code, is this a ratio that I can ignore.
Thanks, Alan
-
Hi Cynthia,
A text-to-HTML ratio of between 15 and 70 percent is generally considered ideal.
Try this tool, http://tools.seochat.com/tools/code-to-text-ratio/
It is a pretty good tool, but like Andy stated, the best bet is to focus on improving the content on your site, followed by running these pages through https://validator.w3.org/ and follow whatever recommendations possible to reduce code bloat etc...
Cheers,
Kevin
-
We have the same issues on two websites, and I have had difficulty determining what is actually wrong or causing this? Is there another tool that may give more light to what SEMrush is "finding" as low text-html ratios? I am not sure what to address on some of the pages that SEMrush has flagged that as a warning.
Thanks, Cindy
-
Hi,
First of all, you should be aware that SEMRush changed their algorithm a week or so ago and a client of mine also saw the same issue. They have really set the bar low when it comes to showing this factor now, to the point I don't agree with it.
However, I would use this as a signal just to allow you to see if the content is lacking a little on the page, rather than worrying if it will affect SEO. Of course, if you have a page with no content, this is bad for both usability and SEO, but text / HTML ratio isn't a direct ranking signal. See it as more of an indicator to see if the code can be cleaned and to help increase page load times.
There is never any harm in trying to speed up your pages either. If you think that some of the code is slowing things down, then look at how this can be improved. You can always do more to better the user experience, and with that will come indirect SEO improvements.
Write amazing content for your pages (where possible) and don't worry too much about text / HTML ratio. I know which one Google will be paying more attention to
-Andy
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Probably basic, but how to use image Title and Alt Text - and confusing advice from Moz!
I've been doing SEO on my business's site for years and have got good results. I've always used image Titles and Alt Text text. Our blog posts are image-intensive, often with 100-200 pictures (not surprising since we're photographers). For any given blog post, I've tended to have a uniform image Title for each image and then a more specialised Alt Text tag giving a description. A typical image on one of our blog posts would be like this: Image filename: wedding-photography-at-so-and-so-venue-001.jpg .... 002, 003 etc Image Title Attribute: Wedding Photography at So-And-So-Venue by Our-Company-Name - this would be the same for every image in the blog post. Alternative Text: Bride and groom exchanging vows during wedding ceremony at so-and-so-venue - this would be tailed for each image. So my question is - is this right? The Moz help page for image SEO is actually incorrect in one aspect: https://outdoorsrank.com/ugc/10-tips-for-optimizing-your-images-for-search "Alt text (short for “alternative text”) is used to highlight the identity of an image when you hover over it with your mouse cursor. It also shows as text to all users when there are problems rendering the image." This is not the case. Hovering over the image in Firefox, Chrome, Edge and Opera ALL display the Image Title, NOT Alt Text. Thoughts?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | robandsarahgillespie0 -
Using CSS to hide anchor text
Hi all, In my website, I would like to use CSS to set the anchor text to "website design service"(my company provides web design service) but show the button text as "website", due to some artistic reasons. Therefore, the anchor text for the link is "website design service" but what users see is "websites". Does this sound spammy to Google? Is it a risky move that might hurt my SEO? Looking for some advises here. Thank you very much. Best,
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Raymondlee0 -
6 .htaccess Rewrites: Remove index.html, Remove .html, Force non-www, Force Trailing Slash
i've to give some information about my website Environment 1. i have static webpage in the root. 2. Wordpress installed in sub-dictionary www.domain.com/blog/ 3. I have two .htaccess , one in the root and one in the wordpress
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | NeatIT
folder. i want to www to non on all URLs Remove index.html from url Remove all .html extension / Re-direct 301 to url
without .html extension Add trailing slash to the static webpages / Re-direct 301 from non-trailing slash Force trailing slash to the Wordpress Webpages / Re-direct 301 from non-trailing slash Some examples domain.tld/index.html >> domain.tld/ domain.tld/file.html >> domain.tld/file/ domain.tld/file.html/ >> domain.tld/file/ domain.tld/wordpress/post-name >> domain.tld/wordpress/post-name/ My code in ROOT htaccess is <ifmodule mod_rewrite.c="">Options +FollowSymLinks -MultiViews RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase / #removing trailing slash
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule ^(.*)/$ $1 [R=301,L] #www to non
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^www.(([a-z0-9_]+.)?domain.com)$ [NC]
RewriteRule .? http://%1%{REQUEST_URI} [R=301,L] #html
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule ^([^.]+)$ $1.html [NC,L] #index redirect
RewriteCond %{THE_REQUEST} ^[A-Z]{3,9}\ /index.html\ HTTP/
RewriteRule ^index.html$ http://domain.com/ [R=301,L]
RewriteCond %{THE_REQUEST} .html
RewriteRule ^(.*).html$ /$1 [R=301,L]</ifmodule> The above code do 1. redirect www to non-www
2. Remove trailing slash at the end (if exists)
3. Remove index.html
4. Remove all .html
5. Redirect 301 to filename but doesn't add trailing slash at the end0 -
Best Practices for Converting PDFs to HTML
We're working with a client who gets about 80% of their organic, inbound search traffic from links to PDF files on their site. Obviously, this isn't ideal, because someone who just downloads a PDF file directly from a Google query is unlikely to interact with the site in any other way. I'm looking to develop a plan to convert those PDF files to HTML content, and try to get at least some of those visitors to convert into subscribers. What's the best way to go about this? My plan so far is: Develop HTML landing pages for each of the popular PDFs, with the content from the PDF, as well as the option to download the PDF with an email signup. Gradually implement 301 redirects for the existing PDFs, and see what that does to our inbound SEO traffic. I don't want to create a dip in traffic, although our current "direct to inbound" traffic is largely useless. Are their things I should watch out for? Will I get penalized by Google for redirecting a PDF to HTML content? Other things I should be aware of?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | atourgates0 -
Removing .html from URLs - impact of rankings?
Good evening Mozzers. Couple of questions which I hope you can help with. Here's the first. I am wondering, are we likely to see ranking changes if we remove the .html from the sites URLs. For example website.com/category/sub-category.html Change to: website.com/category/sub-category/ We will of course make sure we 301 redirect to the new, user friendly URLs, but I am wondering if anyone has had previous experience of implementing this change and how it has effected rankings. By having the .html in the URLs, does this stop link juice being flowed back to the root category? Second question: If one page can be loaded with and without a forward slash "/" at the end, is this a duplicate page, or would Google consider this as the same page? Would like to eliminate duplicate content issues if this is the case. For example: website.com/category/ and website.com/category Duplicate content/pages?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Jseddon920 -
Anyways to pull anchor text?
Hi guys, So basically i have a list of URLs/Domains and there backlinks (example: http://s29.postimg.org/ujxm0c4lj/screenshot_677.jpg) but i'm missing anchor text. Can anyone recommend any tools which can scan a backlink, locate the URL/Domain on the page and then pull the anchor text? Cheers, Chris <colgroup><col width="548"><col width="884"></colgroup>
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | jayoliverwright
| | |1 -
Is white text on a white background an issue when...?
Hi guys, This question was loosely answered here (http://www.seomoz.org/q/will-google-index-a-site-with-white-text-will-it-give-it-bad-ratings), but I wanted to elaborate on the concern. The issue I have is this, http://www.searchenginexperts.com.au/preview/white-text-white-background-issue Of the four div elements on the page, which; is best practice for SEO? and which of them would not be penalized by google on the grounds of hidden text? The reason I ask is that I have a site that is currently implementing the first div styling, but if you either remove the image OR uncheck the repeat-x (in inspect element) the text is left as white on white. I have added the transparent image on green to prove that having a background colour to back up the tiled image is not always going to work. What can be done in this scenario? Thanks in advance, Dan (From my managers account)
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | RuchirP0 -
How many time should a keyword be used in the body of text?
We employee an outside agency to write content for our website as we do not have the ability in house to write unique and good quality content. They have just sent an article which is around 300 words. I told them the keyword phrases to use. When I got the document there is only 1 instance of the keyword phrase(s) in it. Now there seems to be a conflict here amongst posts I have read and general SEO advise as to how many times it should be present (SEOmoz indicates 4 times for instance), our outside agency says it doesn't matter. Now if I have a page optimised for 2 keywords this starts making things tricky and probably looks keyword stuffed to the reader. Assuming the keywords are present once in meta tags, H1, meta descriptions and alt text, what do people think is best practice taking into account recent panda updates? Thoughts appreciated. Thanks Craig
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Towelsrus0