Geron Corp (GERN), a biotechnology company based in Menlo, CA, has FDA approval for the first Embryonic Stem-Cell Research Trial in the US. This approval represents a new era in medical therapeutics.

California has always been on the forefront of Stem-Cell research in the US. However, for the last 10 years, Stem-Cell research has received endless opposition. One of the reasons for this is due to the fact that embryonic stem-cells can only be cultivated from embryos, which some consider to have the same affect as having an abortion.

I’ve always been interested in keeping up to date with Stem-Cell research ever since I was fortunate to attend a Stem-Cell research conference in San Francisco 5 years ago.

So lets get down to a quick SEO Analysis of Geron Corp’s website (www.geron.com):

Title Tag: human embryonic stem cell-based therapeutics | biopharmaceuticals | cancer | telomerase | human embryonic stem cell | vaccine | Geron

I did several searches in Google (www.google.ca) to see if Geron Corp’s website came up for any keywords in its title tag… nope:

“human embryonic stem cell” – Try It
“embryonic stem cell therapeutics” – Try It
“embryonic stem cell” – Try It
“stem cell therapeutics” – Try It

Based on my results, their website didn’t show up in the first 3 pages; meaning didnt rank in the Top 30 for those keywords.

Unfortunately for Geron Corp, its obvious that although their title tag may appear to have been optimized; that is all it does; appears that it may do something.

One of Geron Corp’s website SEO issues is their content on their homepage lacks the connection with its title tag (see below):

Geron is developing first-in-class biopharmaceuticals for the treatment of cancer and chronic degenerative diseases, including spinal cord injury, heart failure and diabetes. The company is advancing an anti-cancer drug and a cancer vaccine that target the enzyme telomerase through multiple clinical trials. Geron is also the world leader in the development of human embryonic stem cell (hESC)-based therapeutics. The company has received FDA clearance to begin the world’s first human clinical trial of a hESC-based therapy: GRNOPC1 for acute spinal cord injury.

I’ve bolded any keywords in the homepage copy that ties in with their Title Tag. It appears that their first keyword, “biopharmaceuticals” is position with a higher priority than “human embryonic stem cell” within the copy, but is actually oppositely positioned in the Title Tag – that should be corrected.

If I was Geron Corp, I would optimize their Title Tag like this: Human Embryonic Stem Cell Therapy, Stem Cell Research, Cancer Vaccine | Geron Corp Biopharmaceuticals (Please note, I am emphasizing the capitalization of the words. The Title Tag is the first thing people see after they perform their search; lowercased words don’t appear as important and look like paragraph text (almost takes away from Geron Corp’s great accomplishment). This title tag emphasizes on Stem Cell keyword searches, such as “Stem Cell Research” and “Stem Cell Cancer Vaccine“, where Biopharmaceuticals is positioned last. The reason for this is to take advantage of the higher keyword search volumes they have compared to, “biopharmaceuticals”.

In addition, their homepage copy lacks important Stem Cell based keywords that many search for such as, “stem cell research”, “stem cell clinical trials”, etc. The homepage does a great job of using technical jargon; which is great for people that actually search for, “(hESC)-based”. But, as I’ve found with medical health industry websites, too technical, means less organic traffic. My recommendation is to add some long-tail keywords that your audience is searching for as I’ve suggested above.

There are still many points that I could touch on with their website; such as their image-based navigation system (bad), their few back-links, how far down their copy is from the top of the page or the fact that none of their important keywords are bolded. But, I will leave those for other posts and for other websites. For now, its important to know that your website’s Title Tag and Copy should connect with each other; your Title Tag is important, but always remember Content is King.

If you have any questions about this post or optimizing your website feel free to contact me.