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My website at last appears in Google. How to control what appears below the link?

6

66217

Guest
Original poster
Jan 30, 2006
1,604
0
localoid

localoid

macrumors 68020
Feb 20, 2007
2,447
1,739
America's Third World
Quoting Google's Improve snippets with a meta description makeover article:

"The quality of your snippet — the short text preview we display for each web result — can have a direct impact on the chances of your site being clicked (i.e. the amount of traffic Google sends your way). We use a number of strategies for selecting snippets, and you can control one of them by writing an informative meta description for each URL."

Code: 
<META NAME="Description" CONTENT="informative description here">
 
SrWebDeveloper

SrWebDeveloper

macrumors 68000
Dec 7, 2007
1,871
3
Alexandria, VA, USA
TEG, in terms of content you're right - but there are certain types of controls the developer has with respect to listings in most search engines.

I looked at the HTML source for the OP's page linked in Google:

<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8" />
<title>Photography & Technology</title>
<link href="style_main.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" />
</head>
Click to expand...

I suggest to to the OP that they also consider adding in the following two meta tags in the head section:

<meta name="keywords" content="keyword1,keyword2..." />
<meta name="description" content="...site description..." />
Click to expand...

* The first are keywords related to the content of the site, best practice is limit it to 255 characters, separate each with a comma and no space, put most important words first and include plural variants.
* The second is a short description, longer than the title, that summarizes the overall purpose and content of the web site - best practice is to limit it to 255 chars but suggest no more than 150, a complete sentence or two in formal english.

Others reading this might comment about RSS links, author, DC links, and so on - but the two above are traditionally considered the most important for a majority of search engines in terms of indexing and optimization so might as well add 'em. You gave the right answer for the direct question asked, but this is also important stuff worth mention, if you don't mind.

-jim
 
angelwatt

angelwatt

Moderator emeritus
Aug 16, 2005
7,852
9
USA
Just a small addition about the keywords and description meta tags. I've read a little about search engine spidering and the description is viewed as being much more usable than the keywords. I'm not saying don't include the keywords, just spend more time on the description, and like SrWebDeveloper mentioned, use complete sentences (or said another way, meaningful text).
 
6

66217

Guest
Original poster
Jan 30, 2006
1,604
0
Thanks to all for the help. I had not any META TAGS so far, I hope this helps. Tho I'll have to wait another good weeks for Google to pass by again.

SrWebDeveloper said:
* The first are keywords related to the content of the site, best practice is limit it to 255 characters, separate each with a comma and no space, put most important words first and include plural variants.
* The second is a short description, longer than the title, that summarizes the overall purpose and content of the web site - best practice is to limit it to 255 chars but suggest no more than 150, a complete sentence or two in formal english.
-jim
Click to expand...

One question: do you normally change the keywords and description of each page? Would including, for example, "photo gallery" in the keywords in every page, tho only a few of them are photo galleries, affect my ranking negatively?

Also, how do you include two word keywords: photo,camera,"photo tips". Or just: photo,camera,tips.

Thanks.:)
 
SrWebDeveloper

SrWebDeveloper

macrumors 68000
Dec 7, 2007
1,871
3
Alexandria, VA, USA
AdWords

@Roco - use the format "photo,camera,tip,photos,cameras,tips" for example, avoid phrases in keywords due to bolean AND rules and redundancy. If users use a CMS and add content, it's nice to include keyword fields for them which not only would tie into the meta stuff but also any internal search engine you might add. If each page has product sku numbers and such, it's wise to include them and the manufacturer via templating your HTML so the head area is populated dynamically. Get the idea?

@Angelwatt - Yep, because alot of porn sites or kiddie scripting sites exploit the keywords with unrelated or obnoxious amount (i.e. hundreds) of keywords so many spiders actually ignore that field.

On an unrelated note, check this out: Due to the E-Commerce explosion it's worth mentioning that Google has a new buzzword these days:

"AdWords"

Google has a free page devoted to sales and advertisement related keywords that help direct visitors to your E-commerce site, once it is uniquely identified as such. Developers even have access to a special API if they wish to broker searches on their own site.

But what caught my eye is this disclaimer:

While we can't guarantee any specific results (!), the potential benefits can include better return on investment, targeting more qualified customers, and improved effectiveness of your ad campaign.
Click to expand...

But if it's free and you're into E-Commerce, just like standard keywords -- it likely can't hurt either!

-jim
 
angelwatt

angelwatt

Moderator emeritus
Aug 16, 2005
7,852
9
USA
Roco said:
One question: do you normally change the keywords and description of each page? Would including, for example, "photo gallery" in the keywords in every page, tho only a few of them are photo galleries, affect my ranking negatively?

Also, how do you include two word keywords: photo,camera,"photo tips". Or just: photo,camera,tips.

Thanks.:)
Click to expand...

Yes, keywords and description should be customized per page. Google checks if the keywords and description match up with the actual content. When it doesn't it will some times penalize the site in terms of search result ranking. As for those keywords, I've asked myself the same question, but as I mentioned before, search engines are paying less attention to it. I'd break them up per word, or if they "need" to be together you may want to hyphenate them. Search engines likely parse out the commas anyways so it won't matter how you divvy it up in the end.
 
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