Strange Non Meta Snippet in Google Search

[bid4abook]

Hi I am wondering if anyone else has noticed some strange rendering of their site when searched in Google. My site has always shown the title and description as per the meta tags and site body when you input the name of the site and search for it in Google. However today it is only showing the H6 tag and what preceeds the footer. I thought it may have just been a temporary blip however, it has remained constant for the past 12 hours. Is there anything which would cause this?

[Receptional Andy]

Is it both the title and snippet of text that are affected?

Remember that the snippet is context-sensitive - so it may not show the same thing depending on what is searched for, and the user doing the searching.

Site name searches are an odd thing, since it's difficult to determine relevance - usually an appropriate meta description element would be displayed.

If the behaviour for your site has changed recently, remember that there are many external factors that only have to change slightly for the display if your own URL in results to change, including:

- A changed interpretation of the search query
- A change in what is deemed most relevant to that query
- Adjustments to the criteria for selecting text snippets - for instance how the most relevant selection is chosen

12 hours is not all that long, and you could easily be hitting a data centre that is not showing widespread results but if, for instance, your meta description no longer shows consistently, it might be worth a look at how it is formulated and consider adjusting it.

[bid4abook]

RAndy,
No it is only the snippet, the title remains as it was! If I enter the site name without the .co.uk then it renders as it always has. If I add on the .co.uk then it does the h6 post tag content thing. I also noticed that over the same time period it went from 7500 links and dropped to 2500 links then back up and rested at 4600, it was at this point that I noticed the snippet change. I take your point on site name searches, but the h6 content is do with design and not the site's main content or is this what is causing it?

[bid4abook]

Hi to anyone who has read this, the strange thing is it has reverted back to normal! Perhaps they were trialing something. Thanks Receptional Andy for taking time out to answer my concerns. Regards John.