How to Add Keywords to Your Website: 9 Places to Put Them in 2026

Quick quiz

How should you find the right keywords?

Question 1 of 425%

Where are you today?

I am starting and don't know what people searchI have ideas but need numbersI have keywords but no time to write

Most guides on how to add keywords to your website stop at a list of HTML tags. The harder part comes before: deciding which page should rank for which search, so that your pages do not compete with each other. This guide covers both, with an example keyword map, a placement table, where the fields sit in the main website builders, and how to check the result in Search Console. Every rule below matches the official Google SEO Starter Guide (checked October 2026).

What does adding keywords to a website mean?

A keyword is the phrase a person types into Google or asks an AI assistant: "how to brew green tea", "plumber Bristol", "organic sencha 100g". Adding keywords means making sure each of your pages uses the words its future visitors use, in the places search engines read first. Google's starter guide puts it simply: think about the words a user might search for to find your content, and remember that an expert and a beginner often describe the same thing differently.

Google's language systems understand synonyms and related phrases, so you do not need every variant word for word. What you need is one clear topic per page, named explicitly in its main elements, and a body that answers the question behind the search. Keywords are the label on the page; the content is what Google and the AIs judge.

Which keywords should your website target?

Start from a short list of seed keywords: your products, services, the problems you solve and, for a local business, your city. Then expand that list with four free sources:

1. Search Console: the queries that already bring you impressions, including those where you sit on page 2.
2. Google suggestions: autocomplete, "People also ask" and related searches at the bottom of the results.
3. Your customers: the words they use in emails, calls, reviews and support tickets.
4. Competitors: the pages that rank in the top 10 for your main topics, and the terms they share.

For each keyword, note its monthly volume, its difficulty and above all its search intent: does the person want to learn, compare or buy? Intent decides which type of page can rank. A buying query needs a product or service page, and a "how to" query needs an article. If you need a full method to prioritize, our guide to building a keyword strategy walks through it.

How do you decide which keyword goes on which page?

Build a keyword map: a simple spreadsheet with one row per page, its primary keyword, two to five secondary keywords and its intent. The rule is one primary keyword per page, and one page per primary keyword. When two pages target the same search, Google has to choose between them and often ranks neither well, a problem known as keyword cannibalization.

Here is a keyword map for a small online tea shop:

Two consequences appear immediately. First, some keywords have no page yet: that is your content plan, and new pages are the most reliable way to add keywords to a site. Second, informational keywords ("how to brew green tea") belong on articles, while commercial keywords belong on category and product pages.

Where do you put keywords on a page?

Once a page has its keyword, place it in these nine spots. The table uses the article "how to brew green tea" from the map above.

The title tag and the H1

The title tag is the strongest on-page signal and the text people see as the blue link. Google's documentation on title links asks for descriptive, concise titles without repeated words or boilerplate, and explains that Google may rewrite the title using the H1, other headings or the anchors of links pointing to the page. Keep the title tag and H1 consistent so whatever Google displays still contains your keyword. Our guide to writing an H1 covers the details.

The URL and the opening paragraph

Google recommends words in URLs that are useful for users rather than random identifiers. Set the slug once, before publishing: changing it later requires a 301 redirect. In the first paragraph, state the keyword and answer the question in one or two sentences. This opening is what readers check first and what AI assistants most often quote.

Images and internal links

Google's image SEO guidelines call alt text the most important attribute for describing an image, and give "Dalmatian puppy playing fetch" as a better alt than "puppy". Describe the image, and include the keyword only when it fits that description. See our full guide to image SEO. Then add the keyword where other pages link to this one: internal links with descriptive anchors tell Google what the target page is about, and Google lists link text among the sources it uses for title links.

How do you add keywords in WordPress, Shopify, Wix, Squarespace and Webflow?

Website builders do not have a single "keywords" field. You add keywords by editing the same elements in each page's SEO settings. Field names can move between product updates, but the locations below have been stable for years.

On all of them, the H1 and the body are edited in the page itself, and the theme decides whether the page name becomes the H1. Check it once by viewing the page source or with a free browser extension.

Which keyword practices are useless or risky?

Some advice still circulating comes from the early 2000s. These five practices waste time or hurt rankings:

• The meta keywords tag. Google's starter guide states that Google Search does not use it. Filling it in has no effect, and it shows competitors your targets. More in our definition of meta keywords.
• Keyword stuffing. Google's spam policies define it as filling a page with keywords to manipulate rankings, with examples such as blocks of text listing every city a page wants to rank for. Our article on keyword stuffing shows how to spot it.
• A target density. Google publishes no ideal percentage. A keyword density calculator is useful to detect an abnormally repeated phrase, never to aim for a number.
• The same keyword on every page. A site-wide keyword in every title creates cannibalization and generic titles.
• Hidden text or footer keyword lists. Both violate the same spam policies.

How do you check that your keywords are working?

Open the Search Console Performance report, filter on the page, and look at the Queries tab. It lists the searches that triggered your page, with impressions, clicks and average position. Allow a few weeks after publishing or editing, since Google needs to crawl the page again.

Three situations call for action:

• Impressions but almost no clicks: the title or meta description does not match the query well enough. Rewrite them.
• Position 8 to 20 on your target keyword: the page is relevant but thinner than the top results. Add the missing subtopics and the variants you see in the report.
• The page ranks for another keyword: Google understood a different topic. Either adapt your keyword map, or rewrite the title, H1 and opening.

For a step-by-step method on an existing page, read our guide to keyword optimization.

Do keywords still matter for AI answers (GEO)?

Yes, but differently. ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity break a question into several searches, then quote the passages that answer them best. A page gets cited when its headings match those sub-questions and the text under each one answers directly, with names, numbers and definitions an AI can lift. The placements above serve both channels: a keyword in the H1, a question as H2, and an answer in the first sentence below it.

The slowest part of the work is the research and the map. Sorank's keyword research module analyzes your site, finds the keywords you can win and groups them by silo with intent, volume and difficulty, so each keyword is assigned to one page.

Sorank is our product: an SEO and GEO software that runs on autopilot. Its article generator then writes and publishes the missing pages with the keywords already placed in the title, H1, URL, headings and alt text, plus internal links.

What to do next

Adding keywords to a website is a mapping job first and an editing job second. Give each page one primary keyword, place it in the title, H1, URL and opening, and let the rest of the text read naturally. Then create the pages your map shows are missing, and check Search Console every month. To find your keywords and fill those gaps automatically, start with Sorank's keyword research.