SEO and Metatags

 

There are still a surprising number of search engine optimization "experts" who will tell you that optimizing your meta tags and submitting your site to the search engines is all you have to do for top rankings. Hopefully, most of you are saying "poppycock" to that old yarn. A full bodied SEO campaign is multi faceted, involving many complex and not-so-complex techniques for attracting search engine traffic.

But don't underestimate the importance of meta tags to your search engine optimization plan, either. Let's clear up some questions about them.

First of all, what are meta tags?

• Meta tags are information inserted into the "head" portion of your web page code. Unlike the Title Tag (which is not a meta tag), SEO meta tags are invisible to your site visitors but lurk behind the scenes, where they share their information with search engine robots and anyone else who goes poking around your HTML code.

Which tags are considered SEO meta tags?

• There are many meta tags but only a few that have relevance in search engine optimization: the description tag, the robots tag, and the keyword tag. And these days, the keyword tag is ignored by the engines so you can too.

What is the Description Tag?

• This SEO meta tag is often the one that appears, either in full or in part, in certain search engines' results pages. It's a concise summary (about 200 to 250 characters) of that page's contents. Not all engines treat this meta tag equally but it's important to write it well and optimize it with the top keywords for each given page.

What is the Robots Tag?

• Not as commonly used as other SEO meta tags, the robots tag simply tells search engine robots which pages not to index. If you want all your pages indexed, the robots meta tag isn't needed.

So in summary, DO concern yourself with the description tag but DO NOT be overly concerned about the keyword and robots meta tags.

If you're in the market for a search engine optimization company, DO ensure they have a healthy respect for SEO meta tags and all the other important elements of a robust SEO strategy, from keyword selection to link building to content writing and beyond - with the goal of creating an online presence that attracts relevant traffic and sells to it.