Does an H1 need to be the first heading on a page?

Hi, I have a client that wants a heading to be very large at the top of a page and underneath it have an h1 with the keywords.

So the big heading is "Blog" and underneath can be the h1, but very much smaller, saying "Keyword keyword keyword blog".

I could make the larger heading at p span or could I make it an h3?

Does an H1 need to be the first heading on a page?

Does an H1 need to be the biggest test on a page?

I hope this makes sense.

 

Generally I think that the h1 should be in a way the 'title of the page'.. in other words it should be the first thing to grab the reader's attention or one of the first things. The h1 does not need to be the biggest thing on the page, but as I said it should be the first thing the visitor see's. Also be careful with keyword stuffing on the h1, and keep it user friendly. Good luck.

 

It's up to you. Normally yes it would be the top of the page. You can adjust the style settings for an h1 tag in CSS, so it can be any size you would like. As the default, yes, it is the largest and it makes the most sense to keep it that way.
Hope that helps.

 

Also consider how your rest of the design is looking so that you can match sizes.

Regards

 

As long as there is only one H1 on the page you're fine. Sprinkle it wherever you can!

 

Thanks everyone for clarifying this for me

 

I used to have a left column which had less important info (h3 headings and illustrations) and my right column with my more eyecatching h1 and h2 - as far as Google was concerned, the h3 was read first as it was int he left column but the site did ok in the serps.

I believe, however, that the h1 should really be the largest or most prominent heading - otherwise it's not really your page heading as far as humans are concerned and you're probably just trying to fool the search engines.

 

you do like you planned... span that large p at the top and below make that important h1 smaller... it is not 100% seo friendly but no worries, that has less than 1% of influence... so, it is good just to assure that only one H1 is on the page and to be closer to the top but no need first thing in the code... google knows programmers are messy so will not punish you because of that

 

your CSS style sheet, and H1 should be the first tag on a page otherwise your onpage optimization looks scrambled to the googlebot draconians when they show up in their spaceship and sya = "what the *** is this?! ....this is crap, the H1 underneath a larger p size made in CSS .. I wont have it I just wont have it" <whirr whirr whirr) they fly away

 

You should definitely have an H1 tag with your keywords in it, but you also want to have your keywords in the other tags, such as H2, H3, etc. Underline or bold your keywords, just make sure there is diversity and set your keywords apart from the rest of your content. As for being the 1st heading on a page, it doesn't need to be, but it always helps to let Google know first about what's important with your site.