Online Business Junction

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Meta Tags

What are Meta Tags?

The primary meta tags are made up of a Title, Description, and Keywords. They are HTML tags that are found in your website’s header and are used by Search Engines to find and describe your site. And since people use Search Engines to find websites, you need to make your site is rich in meta tags.

There is always much debate as to the importance of meta tags, which ones you need and which ones you don’t; and how much value is assigned to them by the search engines. Though they aren’t the main factors that the search engines use for ranking websites, they are an important part of the process, so I feel they are very necessary.

The Title Tag

The Title tag appears like this:

Many people simply put their website name within the title tag, and that is OK. But it’s not really meant just for that purpose. The text within the title tag will also be seen in the top left of your browser, and also appears when people add a site to their bookmarks or favorites. More importantly, the title helps the search engines decide how to rank your site, so you want to have the most effective title you possibly can.

When the search engines index one of your web pages, the text within the title tag is what they use as the title for your listing in the SERP’s (Search Engine Results Pages). So the most effective title would also include some of your most important keywords from your website; and those keywords should be placed at the beginning of the title. So, for example, if you sell Country Candles and Gifts and your website name is Carrie’s Candles, then your title tag could be this:

<title>Country Candles and Gifts at Carrie’s Candles</title>

That puts your primary keywords at the beginning of the title, and still includes your website name. Some other title tag guidelines to follow:

Don’t use too many keywords
Don’t repeat keywords
Never use all CAPS
Limit the title to 100 characters (not words)
Always try to make it into a sentence, if you can

The Description Tag

The Description Tag appears like this:

Your description should explain what your website is about and who it was created for–your target audience. It should be simple, direct, and should include keywords. Note also that the search engines will usually cut off your description in their search results after the 150th character (which includes spaces!), so don’t make your description any longer than 150 characters. Your description is also your means of luring customers to your website, so make it something that will do just that.

So, using Carrie’s Candles as our example again, here is a description that meets the basic guidelines of a good meta description:

Obviously, there could be many other choices for a description here, but at least that gives you an idea. It’s inviting, it’s under 150 characters, and it includes keywords, as it should.

Keywords

The keyword tag looks like this:

Keywords are what the search engines use to categorize your page/site. and must be relevant to your site’s content. They should also be written from the Internet user’s point of view, not your own. Think of it like this: if you are looking for a product online, what terms do you use in the search engines to find that product? Now look at the products or services you are selling and ask yourself, what terms would your customers most likely use to find your products? These are going to be your keywords. Here are some basic guidelines for creating keywords.

Your most relevant and important keywords should be written first, and the character count should not exceed 1000.

Separate your keywords by commas.

Don’t use the same word too many times or it will be viewed as spam by the web spiders and bots that crawl the sites for the SE’s. If you must repeat a keyword, have at least 3 other words between the repeated words.

Your keyword terms should also be in the plural form whenever possible–and if you list a word in the plural form, don’t list it in the singular form as well.

Your keywords should be in all lowercase letters.

Your keywords must appear in the content of your web page. So don’t put random words in your keywords that don’t appear anywhere else in your website. That can have a negative effect on your site with the SE’s.