Page Title restructuring
-
Hey Mozers!
Surely you have noticed Google has been randomly restructuring our Page Titles to emphasize branding by placing the company/brand first, as opposed to after the "|" - a convention we had been accustomed to.
I am wondering if the aforementioned warrants restructuring our client's (where branding is important) Page Titles as per Google's lead, or simply staying on the sidelines for now and letting Google do it?
Anyone care to share their take on this?
Thanks!
Dino
-
First, Google doesn't do this for an entire site, at any given time, so it's best you take the time to work on client sites/pages and optimize the TITLES and DESCRIPTION you want to use. If Google uses /or changes anything for pages you have written descriptions, titles or page content, they won't advise you either.
Google's updates of these page titles, is very common when they feel the title they use for the SERP index to be more useful or accurate of the page's content. Watch for very long titles, as they are more prone to being identified by them, and rewritten
Yes, it can be quite frustrating, but it's not a total loss when working on sites.
Even if Google does change something, you can still make changes to the client site pages that might have been rewritten by Google, and hope that your new updated page info is taken over the Google TITLE rewrite..
This was a good post on BLOG. SEOmofo had a really good posting as well about this very topic.
Barry had a small but good to the point post on Google Title Rewrites at SE Round Table too
Hope some of this helps point you in the right direction!
Cheers,
-
Dino,
I would check out this QA string as it covers exactly what you are concerned about:http://moz.com/community/q/page-title-structure
I would definitely check out the SEO cheat sheet they references in the string.
Ron
-
I haven't noticed this on the sites that I manage. The only time I've had Google construct a title has been when the title we wrote was too long. I have seen many instances where Google is extracting an excerpt from the "description" as market up with Structured Data instead of using the meta description we have written. I find this frustrating because we have recently spent a good amount of time optimizing our meta descriptions and now, the majority of the time, Google seems to be favoring what we've marked up with structured data.
Have you examined your titles to see if perhaps there is a reason that Google is doing this? Could it be an idosyncracy of your CMS perhaps, or if not, could it be that something was programmed internally to insert the brand at the front of the tag programmatically? Just some thoughts!
Dana
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
In Google SERPs some companies / government agencies have a Google-generated card for their organization and it references their Wikipedia page. It does not show for all companies /orgs that have a Wikipedia page. What is the criteria to have it shown?
Does Google have specific criteria to show a large card in the top right of SERPs that links to a national organization's Wikipedia-referenced info? These do not appear to be the Google Business Card created by individual organizations. Example having the card and org is on wikipedia: https://www.google.com/?ion=1&espv=2#q=u.s. department of labor Example no card shown and org is on wikipedia: https://www.google.com/?ion=1&espv=2#q=Occupational+Information+network
Branding | | Shirley.Fenlason0 -
Why my website did not gets Google page ranking Yet.. Any Suggestions about Moz DA or PA
Hello Mozer, my Website url is :- http://www.blackbowchauffeur.com.au/ is any suggestions regarding Google Page Ranking or MOZ DA or PA...
Branding | | blackbowchauffeur0 -
Pages with High Priority Issues 404 Errors
Hi there, I need some help on how to go about fixing the many 404 errors that i have on the site http://goo.gl/arwlON Many of the 404 errors are images that were on the CDN and now i have not joking 6k 404 errors and a good percentage are the cdn images that I deleted of 3 years work as I did not need them. Would you guys/gals be able to help me on best solution to fixing them? Thank you for your help in advance.
Branding | | blinky510 -
Getting Google Plus Page to Appear
I've recently been making changes and updates to my company's verified local Google + page--my question is when and/or how do I configure it to appear in the search results? When I type my business into Google (Exchange Capital Management), it's not even within the results displayed. The page isn't accessible unless someone were to Google "Exchange Capital Management Google Plus." As mentioned, the page has been verified, updated, and has about 8,000+ views. Any advice or feedback is appreciated! All best, Lauren McLaughlin
Branding | | LMcLaughlin0 -
How to Merge Existing Google Local and Google Business pages?
Hey everyone, I'm getting a wee bit frustrated. I have looked at every blog post I can about merging Google Local and Google Business Pages and I can't figure it out. I already have a verified Google Local page here https://plus.google.com/107404063103285095864/about?gl=CA&hl=en-CA and a Google Business Page here https://plus.google.com/b/100116630212547145177/100116630212547145177/posts . Both are already verified. How do I merge these existing profiles which are already verified?
Branding | | jhinchcliffe0 -
What vanity Url should I use for Google+ business page?
I recently been given the option to choose between my brand and my most important keyword for my Google+ business page. the site is a touristic site for a popular location. The keyword is the name of that location. Which one is better for Seo purposes? Thanks.
Branding | | ceci27101 -
Link local online newspaper ad to newspaper's spash page or my site?
We just started advertising on the web version of our local newspaper. They suggest our ads go to a "splash page" they created for us on their site. The page haslinks , images and text taken from each of our main categories,. Plus links and feeds from our twitter and facebook pages. And a google map. This page shows a page authority 1 with 0 links. Is there any reason to link our ad to a page like this rather than going direct to our website page? Thank you Handcrafter
Branding | | stephenfishman0 -
Should we have customers like our URL or our Facebook brand page?
(Note: main question in bold) I know this post basically establishes that Facebook shares are not a strong cause of increased rankings. But what about likes? I've searched and read through the forum and YouMoz blog but haven't really found this question answered. We just redesigned our site and we're implementing sharing options in the booking and order completion processes - should we point the Facebook Like button to like our URL or our Facebook brand page (currently with 3,800+ likes)? Seems that a like of the URL would be more direct ranking value (what we're going for), but according to that same post mentioned above, Google doesn't crawl or index FB wall pages... so is all Facebook activity - shares, url likes, brand page likes - for naught? (at least for now, till Google starts using that info)
Branding | | DanielH0