I was doing some research on local business this week. While following up on some tips I noticed some websites were harder to locate than others, even with very specific search terms. When I got curious and took a peek at their source code I quickly understood why.
Right under the <head> tag sat the two culprits:
<meta name="description" content="" />
<meta name="keywords" content="" />
Empty meta tags are a wasted search opportunity. Here’s a breakdown on what these tags are and what they can do for your website.
Meta description tag
The description tag is your page’s elevator pitch — explaining it’s topic and why the reader should care in 160 characters or less. If you don’t provide this information search engines will use page content and make their best guess — which can have mixed results (like crawling an unrelated reader comment). It’s better to take control and provide exactly what you want to display here.
By the page title, description and URL there’s little doubt to who and what this page is about. Somebody looking for another Michael Egan (unfortunately for me there are many) won’t be confusing me with my namesakes who are competing for results with the same search terms.
Meta keywords tag: down but not out
This tag used to be the primary method search engines used to index your page. It was too easy to abuse by pumping it full of unrelated keywords. The major search engines no longer pay any attention to it, preferring to analyze the content of the actual page to determine its context and search ranking.
I don’t want you to forget about the keywords tag entirely. There are other uses to meta keywords than getting Google to play nice.
If you have an internal site search you can use keywords to highlight page topics and common misspellings. If your product line has an cryptic name (a video card named FX9400M, perhaps) you can help your customers find what they’re looking for, even if they don’t get it exactly right. (Let’s try to work on those wonky product names later on, too.)
Sometimes directory websites (business listings, job boards, restaurant reviews, etc.) will use meta keywords to categorize your website. This isn’t always a good thing … but when it comes to search, sometimes every little link helps. If they’re going to list you either way, why not make it inside a relevant category of your choosing?
Where to learn more?
Even if you aren’t dealing directly with the code it’s good to be at aware of how SEO can expand your audience. The SEOmoz Blog is a great start. Their posts are easy to digest and regularly updated. It’s a solid resource if you want to learn about getting more search attention to your website.
Good luck and happy searching!