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Search Engine
Optimisation -
TITLE and META TAGS
Contents:
The Title Tag
and Meta Tags are HTML tags giving information about a web page. They
are inserted within the code and the content of the Title Tag is what
you see at the top of your browser.
The two meta
tags that some search engines read are the meta keywords
tag and the meta description tag.
Visitors don't
see these tags unless they view the source code of the page.
TITLE
TAG
< TITLE>
Writing & Editing Online - Guide for Marketers, Copywriters &
Editors< /TITLE>
Try to use
up to 10 words but, if necessary, use up to 15. NB: the first 60 characters
(including punctuation and spaces) are the most crucial.
Not only does
the Title Tag appear at the top of the web pages, it's the link people
see in search results. For example:
france
maps, books, regional touring guides - france travel
Maps and guidebooks
on France. Plan touring holidays with France maps, travel guides, cycling
guides, hotel accommodation guides - tourism guides. ...
www.france-travel.co.uk/
So, well-written
Title Tags will result in more clicks.
<
NOTE>
The Title Tag
is a key influencer of search engine positioning. Therefore, during search
engine optimisation, it should be varied on each page to reflect the specific
content it heads.
<
/NOTE>
DESCRIPTION
TAG
(Important
to use as the content can be presented as the summary of your page within
some search engine results. For example, often in Google - See Fig 7.1).
< META name="
description" content=" Writing & Editing Online. Guide for
Marketers, Copywriters & Editors. Includes copywriting, sub-editing,
websites, email, search engines, ezines, newsletters, online ads, banners,
pay per click ads ." >
The description
tag should include targeted search phrases but keep the important keywords
at the beginning and try not to use more than 200 characters (including
punctuation and spaces).
KEYWORDS
TAG
(Less important at this moment in time for search engine optimisation
as often ignored by the major search engines).
< META name="
keywords" content=" writing and editing online, guide, book,
writing, editing, online, internet, marketer, copywriting, sub-editing,
editor, websites, website, email, search engines, ezines, newsletters,
ezine, newsletter, online ads, banners, pay per click ads, business to
business, business to consumer, david mill, advertisement, banner"
>
During search
engine optimisation, use the most important key phrases first and use
each keyword no more than three times, include plurals. The keywords tag
should be less than 1000 characters (including punctuation and spacing)
although no gain will be achieved if a keyword or phrase
is not also used within the body text of the page.
<
NOTE>
Deeper
search engine optimisation.
If you do venture deeper into search engine territory, you will encounter
commentary about keyword density, relevance, stemming and so on. And,
by then, you will most probably either retreat back to your writing zone
or plunge on into the inner depths of search engine optimisation.
Either way,
you will realise what matters most for search engine optimisation is the
relevance of your content. And, if it's not relevant
(to readers or searchers), it simply isn't working in any case!
And, for those
who may suggest the contents of Keyword and Description Tags are like
magic bullets, stop! This is simply not the case. I say
again, it's the visible words that matter most from a search engine optimisation
perspective.
<
/NOTE>
Contents:
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