Hope you guys have enjoyed reading my last post about how to do URL optimization. Now I am presenting “Writing Titles and Meta descriptions”, the 5th part of the series Summarized SEO World.
Title tag, Meta description and url combine to form the SERP preview of a web page. Hence you need to use your important keywords in the title, description and URL to perform better in SERPS.
Title, description and keywords collectively known as Meta tags. Title is the main important part of Meta tags. Description is relatively less important and meta keywords is no of use as most of the SEs stopped indexing it. Hence we should focus on title tag and Meta description.
Lets understand one by one:-
What is Title Tag?
This is a part of Meta tag which appears in title bar of the browser when a page loads. It tells the user and search engines what the page all about. So we should write relevant titles for the pages which help users to land on the pages of their interest.
Avoid misleading users by writing fake titles because that is not beneficial for your site. However you may attract few extra hits by writing misleading titles but they will end up in high bounce rate which is not good for a website’s SEO.
Titles can be seen in the SEARP also as I illustrated in the first image.
Few things you should remember while writing the Title tag for your web pages:-
- Title should not be more than 60-65 characters (including spaces) because most of the search engines’ indexing limit is not more than this. If you write more than this limit it will not be shown in SERP.
Have a look at this screenshot:-
In this image you may see “…” at the last which means that there are more characters in the title but they are trimmed by the search engines as it’s beyond the limit. Suppose if your main keyword goes here after the limit then you cannot get benefit because that would not be even being indexed by SEs.
So writing titles within the character limit is a good SEO Practices.
2. Always try to put your keyword at the start of Title.
3. You can use Pipe(|) or Commas (,)as the separator for keywords in the title if there is need.
4. Your company or blog name should be at the end of the title if its not an important keyword for your site.
How to write?
<title> your title</title>
title tag comes between the <head></head> tags.
What is Meta Description?
As the very first image of this post says that the text part below the url in SERP is called as meta description. However Google announced in 2009 that neither the meta keyword nor the meta description will be ranking factor in Google, description is useful for getting relevant clicks. As it is shown in the SERP, a user can see to it while surfing something and if it interests them then only they click to land on the page. Hence it becomes important to write a better meta description.
The length should not be more than 155-165 characters including spaces. If you cross the limit of characters then same “…” will show in the SERP as I described above for Title tag
How to write?
<Meta name=”Description” content=”your description here”/>
This tag also comes between <head> tag
Why shouldn’t you write meta description sometimes?
Sometimes it’s better not to write the Meta description because when you are targeting 3-4 long tails keywords in your content then its good idea not to write a meta description, just let the SEs form it according to user’s search query. If a user uses few keyphareses which matches your targeted keyword then Search Engines always take keywords from your content to form the description part in SERPs but if you write your description then SEs are bound show your written description in SERPs.
Thats all from my side. Would like to hear from your side too on this topic. 🙂
Interesting commentary on when *not* to write meta description. Hm, not sure if I would suggest this to a client – hard enough to get them to think about SEO.
Leora recently posted…Identifying a Painting with Google’s Search by Image
Yes, Client will not understand this easily. But its good sometimes. Thanks for stopping by Leora.
Atish – Good information about the meta tags, I wasnt aware of the meta description being ignored by the SEs these days. Good to know that!!!!
It always helps when SEO experts like you make things easy for us with such informative posts. Thanks once again.
Praveen Rajarao recently posted…How To Increase Twitter Followers
Thanks Praveen, Even I was in confusion about meta description but few readings over internet made it clear that Google ignore description too but still its valuable as it is needed to manipulate the SERP preview. Thanks for stopping by.
Hi Atish,
I use the All in One SEO and PushButton SEO plugins to help make sure I get this right – I always make sure I stay within the word limit and also try to make sure my keywords are near the beginning. I was taught not to worry about the meta keyword tag because, as you say, the search engines no longer take any notice of it.
Sue
Sue Neal recently posted…Are Disqus or Livefyre the Answer to our Blog Commenting Woes?
Ignore meta keywords. they are no of use. thanks for coming by.
(Title tag) You could say that is the most important SEO tag for any website. Google accepts about 60 characters in the title, while Yahoo allows up to 100 characters. It is important to focus on the most important keywords in the title. Each page should have a unique title.
Description Tag – These were once important but no longer are. Some search engines display the description if defined, while others do not. Some search engines if you read the description tag (description tag), and using the content found within the processes of positioning of pages. Google, MSN and Yahoo give little or no weight to these.
Ernesto recently posted…Primera regla SEO. El buen contenido.
Thanks Ernesto for your value add. Keep coming and sharing such good comments. 🙂
Nice and useful information Atish! thanks for it!
Hope it is an useful post for the newbies to learn about the Meta tags and it importance in search engines.
Will keep your points in mind while writing the meta tags for blog posts. Keep teaching the newbie bloggers!
Nirmala recently posted…Writing tips for the bloggers to write the blog posts
Thanks for coming by Nirmala. keep coming.
Hi Atish,
Title tags are really important. I was not aware that meta description also being ignored by google for ranking factor. good to know about it. So thanks Atish For giving me nice infomation.
Hi Atish,
This is my first visit to stoogles and I must say you are doing a great job! It is nice to read when “not” to use the meta tags. This happens to be the unique point of the article.
Thanks a lot for the nice information. 🙂
Rajesh Chaukwale recently posted…Update Facebook Status via Blackberry, Android, iPhone 5 or anything
Thanks For stopping by Rajesh. Hope you will have a pleasant stay at Stoogles.
Today I learn one of the important thing that is title must be lies in between 60-65 words no more than that.
Thank you sir. It’s very important because I write most of my blog post title near about 100-135 words. I understand my mistake.
Nikhil recently posted…Facebook Application, Apps you must have| Apps to have on Facebook Sunrise, Aherk, Octofeed, Pixable
Its good Nikhil. Thanks for stopping by.
Title and meta description are essential part of a post and it helps in getting good results through search engines. Meta keywords are of no use.
Prakash recently posted…Jetpack Joyride for PC or Computer, Android Download Online
Interesting and insightful post. This is true that Meta tags plays an important part in On page SEO. I have seen that many websites are ranking good in search engines due to good On page and Meta tags.
Thank you
Hi Ridddhi ,
i am totally agree with you and thats fact , meta tag is an part fo On page. which is most important for On page. and if you wanna get the ranking then your onpage site should be unique and good also. than its possible. Thanks.
Nice share. I usually don’t bother writing meta description.
Hey Atish bro , I read this whole article and even i am also doing this type of procedure to increase my website traffic but i want to ask some thing about “meta description” and “meta keywords”
As example :
Title of post : Free Download – Email Marketing Softwares
feedingblog.com / free-download-email-marketing-softwares
In HTML TEXT Widget i am inserting below meta-tag’s.
Also I am using SEO by Yosto Plugin And in that plugin i am also inserting different meta keyword like
_SEO Title : Free Download – Email Marketing Softwares – Feedingblog
_Focus Keyword : Email Marketing Softwares
_Meta Description : Email Marketing Softwares – If you are searching for “mail software” for sending your newsletters to your email list members then here i will give you some free marketing software
I want to ask i am doing both things in every post. Is it good for SEO or Not .. or Is it applicable for good Search engine optimization.
Jaykumar Trivedi recently posted…Free Download – Email Marketing Softwares
Meta keywords has no significance in Search engines so No need! Focus on Title, Description and Page content. Thats fine!