If, And, Or - But What About My Changing Rankings?

If, and, or, on, but - these are all conjunctions or prepositions that are commonly used in everyday English.

However, in some different queries, Google tells me that I don't need to type in some phrases that contain some of these words.

If I'm not mistaken, it seems like these unnecessary words actually are making a difference in the rankings of certain sites.

Try a search for [peanut butter and jelly] compared to a search for [peanut butter jelly].

These results are definitely different, and being ranked 2nd compared to 7th can mean thousands of visitors for different keyword searches (maybe not the case for [peanut butter and jelly], but you get my point).

My way of looking at it - when the top 10 results change for different (or in this case, similar) queries using 'and,' for instance, then it is important to use or not use them when optimizing the pages of a web site.

Whatever you do, pay close attention to the keywords you choose to optimize for, because one three letter word can make one huge difference... especially in Kansas City SEO.

MJK