be more specific... abbreviations are considered as normal words (as far as i think) as we do get our site in rankings even on mis spelt keywords...
For me abbreviations I use depends on the likelyhood of how a user searches for something related to my web site company. When it comes to 'states' and 'cities' I tend to lean towards the full spelling. Example: Search phrase optimized for: Website Design Virginia -- not Website design 'VA' (or) Website design Virginia Beach -- not Website design 'VA' Beach. At least thats my take on it.
My thoughts are that G doesn't really know that an abbreviated word is the same word as the full word, and treats them as separate words. So I would go with the most searched phrase. VA or Virginia. I would research which KW phrase is more searched Example SEO VA 108 SEO Virginia 172 So I would definitely go with SEO Virginia Or if you really want it both ways, use one KW phrase IE: SEO VA on one page and one other pages (with different content) refer to SEO Virginia
That was my thought as well that google isnt able to indentify the full word. Means I will have to find text with less abbreviated words . Thanks for the replies though.