Creating the proper meta information for a web page is very important if that page is going to get ranked in the search results. In this post, we will touch on the 3 major types of meta elements: Title
Tags, Meta Descriptions and Meta Keywords.
Title Tags are the single most important part of the meta element family. They carry the most weight in the algorithm and should be kept within 70 characters. A typical, well constructed title tag will look like this: “primary keyword | secondary keyword | your company” Larger companies with well known brands may lead with their company name as the first keyword, but this practice is not normally used for small businesses and organizations. You want to avoid having multiple pages with the same title tags and finally… always match the page content (and keywords) to your title tag.
Meta Descriptions are not used in SEO rankings, but help in user conversion because they can entice someone to click on your listing in the search engine results page. Keep the length around 150-170 characters, mention the main keyword phrase once and have some form of a call to action. Basically, the meta description is a unique ‘marketing style’ written message that describes your web page. A well constructed one can dramatically increase your click through rate. One more thing(s): Always write a unique description for each page– and stay away from automated tools that ‘auto generate’ them.
Meta Keywords are for the most part, no longer a ranking factor within SEO. In September 2009, Google for example, publicly stated they are no longer considering the attributes for ranking web pages. Yahoo/Bing have made similar statements and they still do consider the meta keyword tag, although it has the lowest value weight in the ranking algorithm. If you feel the need to add this tag to your page do this: Scan the page copy, then choose around 10 of the most important key phrases, and add them to the tag.
About the Author: Rhett DeMille, the owner of PalmettoSoft, is a leading search engine optimization consultant located in the Charlotte NC and Charleston SC areas.
