How To Write A Good Meta Description
The meta description is a special tag placed within the source code of your webpages. It's used by search engines and directories to help understand what your page is about. Sometimes. they're also used as your "snippet" on the search engine results page.
The tag, placed between the <head> and </head> section, looks like this:
<meta name="description" content="your content here">
As suggested by Google's Webmaster Central Blog, here are the best practices about using meta descriptions:
- Each page of your website should have a unique meta description
- It should contain a factual statement about the content on the page, not already mentioned in the page title
- The description should be easy to read
Take a look at this page's meta description, which supports the promise made in the page's title:
<title>How To Write A Good Meta Description</title>
<meta name="description" content="Short article on how to write this important HTML code, and why writing good meta descriptions are worth the extra effort.">
Well-written meta descriptions are preferred because they give users a clear idea of the page's content. It's important to note that while good meta descriptions can improve click through on the search engine results page, they don't affect your natural rankings.
Your meta descriptions do not have to be solely in sentence format - it's OK to follow a clearly defined formula listing data about the page. For example, a website about books could include the title of the book as the page title, and a description about the content of the book:
<title>Playing For Pizza: A Novel</title>
<meta name="description" content="Author: John Grisham, Publisher: Doubleday, Category: Fiction, Price: $21.95, Pages: 272">
Conclusion
Your meta descriptions need to be descriptive. Even though they're not displayed to a user when viewing your webpage, they're important enough to spend a few extra minutes on. They could help improve the quality of your snippet -- leading to more and better user traffic to your webpage.
About the Author
Brian J. Farrell – Marketing Consultant, helps small business owners find new customers and make more sales in 30 days or less — guaranteed! Call or contact Brian today for a confidential analysis of your business marketing plan and he'll uncover assets you can capitalize on right now, without spending more money on advertising.
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