For instance, if I have a keyword like: "different treatments for acne" Will that also cover searches like "treatments for acne", "acne" and so on or would I have to add specifics keywords for this phrases as well, like: different treatments for acne, treatments for acne, acne ??? Or just: different treatments for acne ? I also wonder about, if you have a text like this one the page: different treatments for acne! Do I have to include the '!' in the keyword "different treatments for acne!" or can I just have: "different treatments for acne" ?
I have found that you can often rank for the shorter keywords which can be part of your long tail keyword. Especially in Google Search. Hope this helps. P.S. Yes it's a good idea to include the options in your tags
I can answer this in this way. firstly forget about optimizing for acne (the primary one word keyword). You will never be able to do that. Now say you want to optimize ultimately for that two word keyword acne treatment, forget about optimizing for it for a while. now take one even more specific keyword like best natural acne treatment It would be much easier to optimize for it. Keep on optimizing for other ones like: all natural acne treatment natural acne treatment system natural acne treatment products the best natural acne treatment After you do all this, you will be optimized for natural acne treatment. You need to optimize one page each for separate sub-keyword and link all of them to a parent page. now in a similar fasion, optimize more parent pages for keywords like: skin acne treatment natural acne treatment acne treatment reviews acne treatment gel new acne treatment acne treatment system best acne treatments exposed acne treatment clear acne treatment acne treatment cream facial acne treatment back acne treatment the best acne treatment body acne treatment severe acne treatment rosacea acne treatment and link all of them to the grand parent page which you want to optimize for the keyword Acne treatment. If you can afford it, you can also try many grand parent pages to each achieve optimization for the keyword acne. In each and every step use Google Keyword Tool to find highly searched keywords which have low competition so that you can gain a lot of traffic from them out of least efforts. Hope I am very clear.
You don't have to include all the keywords for your search term, just add it like "different treatments for acne" it will cover the other short keywords for you, But don't forget to use your keywords in description and URL structures.
OK, thanks for the help, I don't have to do double work then, which I realize I have done in the past. You may now also have answered my next question which is: I know I'm only allowed to have keywords that occur in the text. But what about the domain name? Let say we have a domain name like "elite-weight-loss-package.com" and let's say it does not occur in the text on the page, but only occurs in the domain name. Am I then allowed to have this also as a keyword (excluding dashes)? Or is it even necessary? Will a search on "elite weight loss package" pick up the page anyway (I believe "-" equals "space"). But, looking at your answer, the keyword is already used in the URL so I assume it won't be necessary to also have it among the meta keywords!?
Keywords in the domain is a plus point of SEO for your site, But it will not pickup in search queries if the keyword is only in domain name, The title tag is which enables the page to occurs in queries, but again keyword in domain name can rank your page up in queries. As far as keyword meta tags is concern i believe if one have some extra time then he should add the meta keyword tags in Codes, but if you don't add keyword tags Search engines will automatically investigate your keywords and will add your site for the keywords that is found in your page. for more check my article on it http://bloggerchamps.blogspot.com/2010/03/how-to-optimize-single-blog-post-for.html