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Meta Tag Optimization
By Dawn Rowlett
Search Engine Positioning Specialist
Meta tags are not nearly as important as they used
to be in "Old School" SEO, but they do still deserve and
need proper attention.
Meta tags are contained within the <head></head> area
of your pages.
The most important Meta tags will include your title, description
and keywords. These should be the first tags on the pages.
Irrelevant tags such as meta author and meta generator, can confuse
engines and make other areas of your meta tags appear to be less
relevant. Eliminate any irrelevant meta tags.
Title Tag
<title>Your Sites Title Here</title>
Your title tag should be the first META Tag shown within the <head>
of your page.
Your title tag is going to be one of the most important areas of
your page that your keywords should be placed in.
Your title tag should contain your most important keyword phrases
for the specific page that the title is on.
In most cases, its best not to repeat words in your title.
Titles should contain approximately 15-65 characters. The search
engine and the competing market will play an important role as to
exactly how many characters are going to help boost your rankings.
Stop words such as "A", "The", "And",
"With", etc. Should be avoided in titles.
Punctuation should be used sparingly -- only when they are needed
to make a title appear to make more sense or appear more professional.
Good marketing sense says that the first letter of each word of
the title should be capitalized.
Description Tag
<meta name="description" content="An informative
description about your site should be included here in about twenty-five
words, depending on the engine. Be sure to use your targeted keyword
phrase.">
Your description should only describe the content of the page that
the tag is on.
Not all search engines will use your description for ranking purposes.
Some will use it as the description of your site -- others wont
consider it for any purpose at all.
People should be enticed to click on your site by reading your description,
but marketing hype and biased words should be avoided.
Depending on the engine you are targeting, consider adding your
keyword phrase toward the middle of your description instead of
the beginning. This seems to be especially helpful when trying
to get a page ranked for a competitive keyword.
Descriptions should be approximately twenty-five words depending
on the search engine that will use this description and the reason
they are using it.
Proper grammar should always be used in your description tag.
Only begin each sentence or proper nouns with capital letters and
use proper punctuation.
Keyword Tag
<META Name=“keywords” CONTENT=“keyword phrase here, another
following, followed by more”>
Most engines no longer put much relevancy on this tag. However,
it does help to use it for those that do.
Only list keywords here that are relevant to the page this meta
tag is on.
Do not repeat a word more than three times within a keyword tag.
In most cases a keyword meta tag should contain no more than four
or five phrases.
Do not use words such as "A", "The", "And",
"By", "With", etc.
Commas can be used to separate words from one another such as...
search engine optimization, web site marketing, website ranking
Not using commas can sometimes increase the chances of being picked
up under variations of phrases. This is normally only useful
if your string of keywords can produce multiple important phrases
to use such as...
internet marketing website online promotion services
Do you see how a much wider variation of words can be used here?
The keywords that this page might get listed under would be:
Internet Marketing
Marketing Website
Marketing Website Online
Website Online Promotion
Online Promotion
Online Promotion Services
So, instead of listing all of these words separated by commas, space
can be conserved and additional options are available by listing
them as a string of words.
Robots Meta Tag
<meta name="robots" content="index,follow">
<meta name="robots" content="noindex,follow">
<meta name="robots" content="index,nofollow">
<meta name="robots" content="noindex,nofollow">
The robots meta tag is used as a command to the spiders so that
they know what to do when encountering a specific page on your web
site.
If the command instructs the robot to "index", then your
page will be spidered.
If the command instructs the robot to "follow", then the
spider will follow the links from this page.
If the command instructs the robot to not index a page, "noindex",
the spider will NOT spider this page.
If the command instructs the robot to not follow, "nofollow",
then links on this page will not be followed.
Only one set of commands should be given to the robot.
Decide which commands to give and place that tag on the corresponding
page of your web site.
Each page of your site should contain a robots tag.
If it does not, there is no need to worry as long as you want the
pages to be indexed. The robots tag is simply a prompt so
that the spiders know what YOU want them to do. If you don't
have the tag at all, your pages and links will still get indexed
and followed.
Ending...
While meta tags certainly are not the most important aspect of search
engine optimization, they do still offer useful information to the
spiders and should be crafted properly.
If you are using a "meta tag generator" to create your
tags, be sure to proof them thoroughly before placing them on your
page. Some automated generators have a tendency to leave room
for error.
This article, entitled "Meta
Tag Optimization" was written by Dawn Rowlett of Web Submission
Services to inform web site owners of the proper use and structure
of meta tags. Please visit Web Submission Services
Search Engine Marketing service and information center for more
information on the proper steps to take when preparing your web
site for
Search Engine Advertising with ethical
search engine optimization practices.
A NOTE TO WEBMASTERS:
FREE CONTENT FOR YOUR WEB SITE:
This article is intended to
inform web site owners of the importance of proper meta tag optimization
when preparing for a successful search engine marketing campaign.
Special permissions may be granted to use the content of this page
in it's entirety for a variety of intentions. If you would
like re-print rights on this article, you MUST send Dawn
Rowlett an e-mail requesting special permission.
You MUST include your web site URL.
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