When you create a website your main goal is to attract many users and rank as high in search results as possible. You can have a professional-looking website, and make unique content that still does not appear in search results. You may think that featuring on popular platforms like the Google marketplace shopping platform will give you this opportunity. But it won’t give you great results if your website is not properly optimized. The best way to achieve it is by boosting your SEO optimization and website ranking. This is why metadata management is extremely important.
But what is metadata and how can you improve it?
What Is Metadata
Metadata or Meta tags are pieces of text included in your website’s code. It’s like a highlight or trailer to your website’s content that helps to stand out for search algorithms. The right metadata management will help improve your SEO performance. Without proper metadata search engines can’t understand what value you offer to users, so they won’t show your website in the top search results. Metadata isn’t mentioned on the page itself, it’s in your website’s code but it is shown in the search results.
Meta tags serve two main purposes:
- They let Google know what your page is about and are they appropriate for the user’s inquiry
- They let people know that your website has the information they’ve searched for
Metadata consists of three important elements.
The Main Metadata Elements
Metadata isn’t just one bit of text that’ll magically improve your SEO optimization. It consists of three main elements that can only work if done well together:
- Meta Title is the name of the page and it’s shown as the title in search results
- The meta description is a summary of your page content
- Headings and subheadings are the main and topic titles of your page
Let’s break down this element a little more.
What is a Meta Title?
The meta title is the name of the page that appears in search results. Think about it as a title of a book or magazine headline. It’s the first thing that catches users’ attention.
When choosing a good meta title you need to make it clear and descriptive, it also has to be unique and not have the same title as another page on your website. There is also a vague character limit to titles because they can be displayed differently on different screens. But the recommended title length is between 50 and 60 characters.
What is Meta Description?
A meta description is shown as a smaller text below the title. A good meta description should have a summary of the page with some details and context. It should be descriptive enough so the user would want to visit the page. Oftentimes, Google may show not the text you’ve written as your meta description, but a fragment of your page’s body that matches the user’s inquiry best.
The meta description shouldn’t be very long, as Google displays not more than 155-160 characters.
What are Headings and Subheadings?
Headings and subheadings help to improve your page’s readability. Most people don’t read the text entirely and scan the page for the interesting part instead.
When choosing your headings and subheadings try to involve the right keywords in them. This will raise your chances of appearing in the top search results.
As you can see, metadata management is a definite way of improving your SEO optimization and website rankings. The easier you make it for algorithms to understand your page content, the more users you will get. With the right metadata this task becomes easier to achieve.
