Meta tag - Inclusion

Search Engine Ranking

[T Suresh Babu]

Currently, I am designing a s/w company
web site having nearly 40 pages which falls under 6 categories.

Does all the 40 pages require meta tags (keywords/description)?

How should I promote the site?
What are steps I have to follow?

[Jane_B]

Some SEs don't read metatags but better to include them. Each page should have a unique title which includes the major keywords for that page (about 50 characters max) The description, again unique to the page, you provide should include your major keywords which your users are likely to use for that page. The keywords (no more than 1000 characters but I find this too much generally) should include all the keywords for that page and include some common mis-spellings. This format applies in the amin to your homepage and top pages of each section.

[agerhart]

How should I promote the site?

You can start here: Successful Site in 12 Months [webmasterworld.com]

What are steps I have to follow?

See above link.

[seofan]

Little known fact that human-based directory folks will check to see if "proper" seo methods have been applied to sites. That means taking the time to administer sites and meta information properly. It is just good form to fully service a website anyway.

When meta tags do apply, I have found that it is not very effective to group every kind of related keyword into one string of keywords that may cover many topics and try to apply that one section of code to every page. It isn't optimizing your web real estate.

[pageoneresults]

Little known fact that human-based directory folks will check to see if "proper" seo methods have been applied to sites. That means taking the time to administer sites and meta information properly. It is just good form to fully service a website anyway.

I like that kind of thinking. I've been following that rule of thumb for years. I make sure that my title, description and keywords are relative to each page. I also make sure that on page content is in sync with the metas. I treat each page as its own entity with a strong push toward establishing theme. The metas are still important in the overall optimization strategy. Not real sure about the keywords tag, but hey, its been a standard for years and I'll continue to follow it until otherwise instructed.

I've been keeping my titles at 5-7 words at the most. Descriptions at 160 to 180 characters and keywords at no more than 10.

[seofan]

Right on PageOne....each page an island unto itself ;-)

[Russ Dollinger]

Inktomi does not seem to pay attention to Metatags, and Inktomi feeds Overture which feeds everything. Looksmart says it does not.
Lycos does. I believe DirectHit does.

I am having a major problem with that and Inktomi. It is not reading my Metatags. For my page Inktomi (and then HotBot, MSN, etc.) list my contact information and the contents of my NavBar. I sent them an email asking about it--they answered my other questions and ignored the one about tags. They are so important that I am going to have to redo things a bit so that they see text first.

[wangdy]

Cool Pageone... but does that mean each page unto it's own IP address? I've know sites that are different, but reside on the same IP.. I wonder if that negatively effects ranking...

[pageoneresults]

Hello wangdy! No, that does not mean each page unto its own IP address, that would be spamming!

Cannot give you much input on the shared IP issue. From what I understand, many web hosting companies have switched to this type of hosting due to the shortage of IP addresses. There could be hundreds of sites that share the same IP and all of that is controlled through software at the server level.

I would never host a site on a shared IP. Mainly because the cost of hosting your own IP is fairly inexpensive and I don't want to take any chances!

P.S. You might want to do a search here at the forums for Shared IP's. There are many threads floating around here that discuss that issue.

[rzfree]

>Inktomi does not seem to pay attention to Metatags

Just the opposite. Page optimized for keyword1 is #2 on MSN for "keyword1 keyword2" search, and the only occurence of keyword2 is in meta description.
R

[keywordbuys]

Inktomi is great with meta tags, and meta tags should be used regardless, just don't get carried away and stick to relevant keywords.

[seofan]

Yes - even though all search engines do not recognize meta tags, it is best to include them for the ones that do. A well-rounded approach is always good.