Forum Moderators: Robert Charlton & goodroi
For keywords does that ring true as well? or can i kind of mingle the keywords around on each page, drop a few, add a few..mix it up a bit?
Also, in my description tags, i am usually using a very good descriptive statement from the page itself..ususally an introduction paragraph...is that ok?
Descriptions, I often use text from the main content. I don't know whether it is ideal, but so far I have not faced any problems with it. If you want to play completely safe, maybe you should edit them a bit.
Anyone with any experience in this?
Title: Should be the main subject of page
Description: Should be quick decription of that page (not a descrition of website or other pages)
Keywords: Words that would help users find the content OF THIS PAGE (not other pages of your site, if the page is about dogs and fleas keywords should be "dogs, fleas" not "cats, golfclubs, fleas"
even if you have other fabulous pages about cats and golfclubs, they shouldnt be mentioned in meta data of your dogs and flea page.
META DATA IS>>> a description of the one page it resides on.
Vanessa Fox wrote the following...
"Make good use of page titles This is true of the main heading on the page itself, but is also true of the title that appears in the browser's title bar.
Whenever possible, ensure each page has a unique title that describes the page well. For instance, if your site is for your store "Buffy's House of Sofas", a visitor may want to bookmark your home page and the order page for your red, fluffy sofa. If all of your pages have the same title: "Wecome to my site!", then a visitor will have trouble finding your site again in the bookmarks. However, if your home page has the title "Buffy's House of Sofas" and your red sofa page has the title "Buffy's red fluffy sofa", then visitors can glance at the title to see what it's about and can easily find it in the bookmarks later. And if your visitors are anything like me, they may have several browser tabs open and appreciate descriptive titles for easier navigation."
more at [googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com...]
I took a page that normally ranks pretty well for its chosen keywords in the title and description tags, and for which Google seems to keep the index updated pretty closely.
I added a meta keywords tag with a couple of made-up words like "norflin".
I also added a deliberate typo to the text on the page at the same time.
After I was positive that googlebot had spidered and indexed the updated page, a search for the made up words in the keywords tag did not come up with ANY results.
A search for the deliberate typo that I added at the same time came up just fine.
After a few weeks with no change, I removed the meta keywords tag and moved one of the made-up words to the meta description tag.
The made up word came up in a search three days later.
YMMV.
I knew the Title tag was a biggie, but didnt think the content tag played that big of a role....
interesting.
im revamping all of my meta tags as we speak, so ill keep that in mind.
thanks
I'm getting confused whether you mean keywords in your content or the keyword tag?
Google does seem to ignore the keyword tag, yet keywords in your content play a very important role in how Google ranks your pages in its SERPs.
i still keep my keywords in the content of the page, but recently have been spending too much time trying to optimize that tag....
maybe just leave it alone...
thanks
If you use adsense, I've seen comments on WebmasterWorld that the keyword tag helps to Google target ads. Not sure about that one myself, but you never know.
Cheers JB
Might as well spend the extra minute on each page as it is designed.
as for meta description, if you can't create a good one (especially for dynamic pages) and your HTML code written good with content at the beginning don't use it.
Google knows how to take a good snaps from your body/upper content. so if you have a good, unique content don't use your meta description.
it's better not to use meta description then using a bad one.
Hi, what about using the content of the metaname in both the keywords and description tags on dynamic pages, I have too many to do them individually and this is my only option?
It probably won't matter in Google, since Google does not appear to be using the keyword tags (although if that changes in the future it could possibly toss all your pages into filtered results) What you don't want to do is have all your pages have the same text in the title and the description tags, or the same text in every description tag, because that'll also toss you into filtered results.
and the first paragraph on that page starts with "this page is really cool becuase we sell software....etc."
how does google see that? is that bad practice to use the leading sentence on your page as your description tag?
The real value to having a meta description is that it will be used in place of a snippet if google is not satisfied with the snippet. Write your description for the user, not to push keywords. The description might have a roll in ranking, but if it does, it is very minor.
Meta keywords haven't had much value at all since the 90s. There has been some suggestion that it is helpful to AdSense, but I have yet to see such a statement from Google.
Get your title right. Do the others if you have time, but don't waste time trying to "optimize" them.
is that bad practice to use the leading sentence on your page as your description tag?
It's not ideal, but I know of sites that do this -- especially large dynamic sites without current control of their meta tags. I haven't seen any evidence of a problem so far with those sites.
