Keys word Significance

[Mike Cole]

I tried this little experiment the other day:
1.  Typed in 'hickory home inspector' in google and www.hickoryhomeinspector.com (my site) came up in the top two organic spots. 
2.  Typed in 'hickory home inspection' in google and www.hickoryhomeinspector.com (my site) came up in the top two organic spots.
3.  Typed in 'hickory home inspections in google and I fell about two spots from the top and a relatively new site was in second place.  So are key words that sensitive or is someone paying to have those exact key words ranked better?

[Michael Merino]

I tried this little experiment the other day:
1.  Typed in 'hickory home inspector' in google and www.hickoryhomeinspector.com (my site) came up in the top two organic spots. 
2.  Typed in 'hickory home inspection' in google and www.hickoryhomeinspector.com (my site) came up in the top two organic spots.
3.  Typed in 'hickory home inspections in google and I fell about two spots from the top and a relatively new site was in second place.  So are key words that sensitive or is someone paying to have those exact key words ranked better?

Some people may be paying for that, but I also think the exact keyword matches are used by the SE. Try to work in both keywords, with and without the 's', into your meta tags and content.

I have noticed similar results with my sites and I know some say it should not make a difference, and the root of the word is the key, but my experience has been different. I don't see how it can hurt to have both forms of the word as long as you write your content properly.

[Dominic Maricic]

Yeah alternate it throughout your site. Google used to say it didn't matter but it looks like over time they give a slight edge to an exact phrase match.