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Misspelling for Better Google Search Rank

In reviewing the top keywords that were bringing visitors to my site, I noticed something that seemed odd. After my name, one of the top keyword combinations bringing visitors to my site was, “freelance portfolio”. My first response “wow!”, was quickly followed by “how?”. Looking closer I noticed a misspelling. Instead of “portfolio” I had ” portoflio”. (I quickly fixed the misspelling.)

This does bring up the question though, is it ever worth placing carefully hidden common typos in your page for Google to index? In fact, is it worth running spell check at all? (Ok - if you read this in the first 15 minutes you’d know the answer - always run spell check.) I realize from a professional standpoint, text littered with misspellings is bad, however a few key typos here and there might actually help. You wouldn’t be the only one misspelling those words, right?

In the case of “freelance portoflio”, I rank 5 out of 33,000 results. For the correct spelling, “freelance portfolio” with 2,560,00 results, I gave up after realizing I wasn’t in the top 150.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 17th, 2007 at 10:12 am and is filed under Google, Search Optimization, Communications, Graphic Design. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

4 Responses to “Misspelling for Better Google Search Rank”

  1. Tara: Graphic Design Blog Says:
    July 20th, 2007 at 10:02 am

    I think I would stick with the mis-spelling :) . I have done something similar where I mean to say polished designs and put polish design. I was getting a few hits from people searching for Polish designers/design.

  2. Nate Sullivan Says:
    July 20th, 2007 at 10:47 am

    Thanks. I’ll probably worry less about the misspelling in the future, especially lower on the page. Don’t know if I’ve quite ready to make the leap and purposely mispell [sic] words though.

  3. House of Hancock Says:
    July 31st, 2007 at 2:39 am

    This is on the border of being a great thing and a bad. You want to present you or your company in a professional manner, this means no typos what so ever. But I think if you want to target certain key words and rank high just for the moment then it will benefit by far especially if the results are high. Your Success, www.houseofhancock.com

  4. Nate Sullivan Says:
    July 31st, 2007 at 2:50 am

    Thanks. I definitely agree. SEO seems like black magic at times. It makes me sometimes feel like ignoring it completely.

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