HTML meta tags are short snippets of information contained within the <HEAD></HEAD> portion of your website’s HTML. If you are unfamiliar with HTML, this was likely entered by your web developer when they created your website – that is if they implemented SEO. If you are unsure whether or not they entered this information, below we explain how you can tell.
There are different types of meta tags including title meta tags, description meta tags, and keywords meta tags. These are discussed below.
These tags are not visible to the user unless they look within the source code of a website. Here’s an example of what meta tags look like within the HTML portion of a website:
This may look a bit confusing at first but we’re going to explain what this means below. Now here’s what meta tags look to the user when they do a search within Google. The title tag is displayed on top and the meta description tag is the displayed beneath it.
Meta Title Tag - The HTML title tag is the title of your website’s page. In the images above the title of the web page is “Sacramento Website Design | Web Development | SEO | NeoVetta.com“. It tells search engines and Internet users what your web page is about. It should contain specific keywords that are found within the web page and it should be concise. Google displays 66 characters (including spaces) for the title of a web page so try and keep it around this number. Each page of your website should have a unique HTML title tag. When you visit the actual web page, the title of the page is also displayed at the very top of your browser window in blue. Here’s a HTML meta title tag:
<TITLE> This is the page Title </TITLE>
Meta Description Tag - The meta description tag is a short description of the web page. Each page of your website or blog should have a different concise description of it’s content. Again this should contain keywords found on the page. The meta description is only visible to users when they do a search within a search engine. The 2nd image above displays what users will see for a meta description. Google displays 150 characters for meta descriptions but you can have a description that is longer. The question of meta description length is answered at Google’s Webmaster help here: http://groups.google.com/group/Google_Webmaster_Help-Indexing/browse_thread/thread/7c5dc8cbb5f07dcd. You also want these descriptions to be in complete sentence form. Make it enticing and relevant to draw in more clicks. Here’s a HTML meta description tag:
<META NAME = “Description” CONTENT =”content”>
Meta Keywords Tag - The HTML meta keyword tag is where the keywords for your web page are entered. These are not visible to users unless they go specifically searching for them within the source code of your page. Keywords tell search engines what the web page is about and it is recommended that you only enter around 2-5 unique and relevant keywords per page. You can enter more but less is always better. You can then focus the keywords on your page around a limited number of words to keep it focused. Each keyword should be separated with a comma (keyword1, keyword2, keyword3). Here’s a HTML meta keywords tag:
<META NAME = “Keywords” CONTENT=”keyword1, keyword2″>
Keywords used to play a much more important role in search engine placement but due to webmasters abusing them, they are not used by many of the major search engines anymore.
Not sure whether or not your website has HTML meta tags? To tell whether or not your website has title tags, go to the page in question and simply look at the top of your browser. The very top of your browser will be highlighted in blue and this is the title of the page. You can also go to the website and type in “Ctrl” + “u” to look at the source code. You should see something that looks similar to the first image above with HTML contained within <HEAD></HEAD> tags.
Be sure that each page of your website has unique HTML meta descriptions. This does not guarantee you top search engine placement but it will definitely help users find your website. It will also increase the the likelihood of users clicking on your web page. If your website has a content management system (CMS) such as WordPress or Joomla, you will be able to easily modify your website’s HTML meta tags. Also, if your descriptions are well written, relevant, concise, and enticing, users will want to click through to your website and learn more.
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