Headings help both your site’s human visitors and search engines to read and understand text. Just like the headlines in newspaper and magazine articles, page headings make it easier for your readers to figure out what your writing is about.
When people read content online, there’s a greater tendency for them to scan pages. Looking at screens is harder on the eyes than looking at text on paper, so skimming is a more common technique for website visitors. Headings are helpful because they physically separate the text structure of the page, giving people a short, mental break when reading.
Moreover, when headings are descriptive, they allow the reader to prepare for what will be discussed in the upcoming paragraphs, and this is extremely helpful for people scanning the page.
The significance of your content can be defined within the chosen heading, as there are six different levels of priority, from Heading 1 (H1) to Heading 6 (H6). Within the HTML code of the page, these headings are converted into heading tags: <h1>, <h2>, <h3>, <h4>, <h5>, and <h6>.
By default on a WordPress site, the page/post title is reserved to be an H1 heading. Although there is some debate, it is generally considered best practice for SEO. Techniques you can use to help improve your search engine rankings. purposes to limit the H1 tag to just the title, and not use it for any other content on the page or post. However, it’s your content; you can do what you like. Within the rest of the content on the page, H2 and H3 subheadings can be used to introduce different sections. Using the analogy of a book, an H1 heading would be the book’s title, H2 headings would be the chapters, and then sections within a chapter would be H3 headings.
Ideally, you want at least one instance of your primary key phrase for a piece of content included as an H2 tag. But don’t overdo it either. Clarity and organization of content, for easy reading and consumption, is equally important. Your SEO efforts will be wasted if readers don’t stick around to actually read it once they find it.
Unless the content on the page is deep in its hierarchical structure, it’s rare to have H4, H5, or H6 headings.
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