Lee J Ballard, your internet wilderness guide

How to Write Solid Meta Tags

Meta Tags are pieces of text embedded into HTML files that search engines and other indexing platforms use to categorize your pages. They tell robots and spiders what your page is about. Always remember that these should be the terms that most searchers will be using to find your site so make them count.

Choose Your Words Wisely

Meta Tag information should reflect the content of your Web page. Start by brainstorming a list of words and phrases that describe your site. Start with the most general (for my site, I started with the words "web", "web design" and "web development") and move on to the most specific (for my site: "HTML" and "Javascript" might fit into that category). As you do this, prioritize the words and phrases so that the most important are at the front of the list and the least important is at the end.

Keywords

The Keywords Meta Tag is a short list of about 20 words and phrases and should be between 800-900 characters in length. (More Keywords can be added but many search engines will truncate the list to 900 characters.) Each page should have a separate, customized list. While this is not necessary, it certainly helps to make any one of your pages into an entry page. You are contending with countless other Web sites, so be sure in emphasize what is unique on your page. Also remember to use synonyms and other words which a searcher may use to find your site. These words SHOULD show up in the body of the site; you are, after all, describing your site, not just making huge list of unrelated words. (Some search engines will penalize or even exclude your page/site if contains "keyword spamming".)

Description

The Description Meta Tag should be a complete (or semi-complete) English sentence no more than 200 character in length. Only use words that truly describe your page/site. If you wander too far afield, you may just miss your audience. Spelling errors though might be a useful addition to your tags. How many times have you misspelled a search term? The fact of the matter, those spelling errors can be helpful in locating your site IF you have included misspelled items in your Meta Tags. For example, "disigner" might be typed into Google, when they meant "designer". Space permitting, include any common misspellings for your Meta Tags to increase the likelihood that your site can be found even if those searching make a mistake.

Keyword Density

To avoid keyword spamming, a punishable offense by most search engines, you should take care not to over-use your keywords on your page. In general, you should not purposefully repeat words on your page. Write normally about your subject, being sure to include your keywords without mindlessly repeating them. Keyword Density.

Lee J Ballard home page example:

Advanced Keywords

For the absolute best results, Keywords should be polished to a high sheen. When starting out, have several people you know and who are familiar with your site, write their own list of keywords. Compare the lists, putting a check mark next to words that are duplicated. Give these words more weight as they may represent more likely search terms.

Once you've worked on your list a while (after your site is up for 2-3 months), go to the sites of your competitors or sites that are similar to yours. Find the sites that rank on the first few pages of your search results. Next, click "View" in your browser's tool bar and select either "Source" or "Page Source". You will now be looking at the source code for the page. More often than not the first few lines will after the <head> tag, you should see a <title> and then <meta name = "keywords". In the content portion of the tag, you will see the key words that were chosen for that page. If the page is ranked higher than yours, it may contain keywords that you missed. If appropriate, copy those words into your keyword list and/or mention them on your page.

Every few months, you may wish to revisit your keyword list. Experiment with variations, adding and subtracting from your list. Search engines may just respond to your tinkering within a week or two.