Question:

I keep hearing people talk about Meta Tags, but it sounds like a phrase from a foreign language to me.  Can you please explain what on earth these Meta Tags are and whether I should be worrying about them or not?

Thanks

Jenny, Leeds

Hi Jenny,

I can understand why you might feel as if it is a foreign language – in fact in some ways it is!  Meta Tags are part of what we in the office have affectionately termed ‘gobbledegook’.  If you’re on a page of your website, right click with the mouse and select ‘view source.’  The page that will then appear will show you all the HTML which makes up your site, and to me it does indeed look quite intimidating!

Somewhere amongst the script on the page you will see spaces for a Meta title, a Meta description and Meta keywords, looking something like this:

<title>Online marketing solutions by digital marketing agency LeadGenerators</title>

<meta name=”description” content=”LeadGenerators - a digital marketing agency with vast experience in the online travel industry providing online marketing solutions.” />

<meta name=”keywords” content=”online marketing strategy, online marketing solution, digital marketing agency, internet marketing agency, internet marketing specialists” />

These Meta tags act as signposts for Search Engines, letting them know exactly what your page is about, so that they can include your site in all searches for which you and your key phrases are relevant.  Without them, it is hard for the Search Engine spiders to identify what each page of your site relates to, and therefore it is less likely that you will rank successfully for your important key phrases.  However, these Meta tags are important for more than just rankings, but also for those people performing the searches.  What many people fail to realise is that when the Google search results appear, what you are actually seeing on the results page are the Meta title and Description tags.

As such, it’s important not only that these Meta tags read well, but also that they use the key phrases for which you want to be relevant so that potential customers see your entry in the search results and think – ah! That’s exactly what I was looking for!

So, to sum up – yes Meta tags are very important, both for people and for Search Engines.  Each page should have its own individual set of Meta tags, using the key phrases that have been selected for that page, so that both your audiences (people AND search engines) can tell exactly what it is you’re all about.

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