WP SEO plugin
-
When working with WP sites I generally use Michael Torbert's All in One SEO Pack. I've encountered a few examples where when the homepage shows up on a Google search results page the title/title tag shows up as {Business Name:} | {Keyword/Description}. In the 'General Settings' of the plugin in the 'Home Title' field, I have it listed as {Keyword/Description} | {Business Name}
I'm not sure why the order is getting switched and where the ':' comes from. I'm not sure if this even has any adverse effect. If anyone has had experience with this, your input would be appreciated.
Note - I'm not seeing this issue reflected on Bing.
-
I have seen this as well, and have experience with both SEO plugins mentioned in this thread. Yoast is very good, as is All in one seo pack. Not many people are aware of the different rules of robots for a page.
The page title switching is controlled by Google, as mentioned above. The effects can be mitigated by adding a special meta tag on that page, which is ODP = no. ODP (stand for open directory project) will allow Google to switch around the titles to better suit the users search query. Another tag you should add is archive = no. Below is a complete example:
name="robots" content="index,follow,noarchive,snippet,noodp" />
This states to the search engine, index this page, follow all links, do not show archived pages, (old, cached) allow snippets and markup, and do not customize displayed titles from open directory project. Want proof?
http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/google-supports-meta-noodp-tag/
"In some circumstances, Google uses descriptions from the Open Directory Project as the title and snippet for a web result; this tag lets you opt out of the ODP title and description."
I have used this on my site, and on clients sites with great success. If you add this tag, it will take a while to reindex, but give it a try and see if they display the real page title after you submit and wait a bit. This should help you out quite a bit.
-
I'm actually about to write about this lol. This happened to my site as well. Google can switch that for you. If you look at the source, it is usually what you want to be, but Google shows otherwise.
It does happen and it's pretty common. Change it to something else, something better and try to let it get indexed again. It normally shows up correctly the next time around.
-
I have also been experiencing this with a few of my clients. As Spencer said it is Google choosing to re-arrange the tag with business name first.
-
Hi Steve,
First, I would suggest looking at Yoast's SEO plugin. This offers much more in terms of customisation and function.
Do you mind listing the URL so I can take a look at the homepage? It might be Google (probably is) but just need to be sure.
-Andy
-
This is definitely Google choosing to put the business name at the beginning of the title. This is extremely common and in my experience it will only do this for homepages. This doesn't always happen though and I'm not sure exactly what makes Google decide to rearrange it.
-
Look at the source of the page and make sure the <title>content is as you want it to read. If it is, than Google is choosing to change the way it displays your title in SERPs. Unfortunately, there isn't much you can do. Just make sure your title length is short enough to be displayed fully in search results.</p></title>
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
-
Affect of ™ and ® in title for SEO
I am looking at adding the trademark and rights reserved symbols to some of my titles. I think this might help with click through rate. From what I have found, this shouldn't have an affect on SEO unless it makes the title too long. Is this correct? Stephen
On-Page Optimization | | stephen.volker1 -
Favicons - favicon.ico having any SEO Benefits?
Hi all, I was wondering about favicon.ico and it's presence on the website. Is it important to have favicon.ico and there any SEO benefit of it? Thanks in advance!
On-Page Optimization | | vendrocks0 -
Left Nav / SEO
We are in the middle of a redesign and would love to get rid of our left navigation. It's currently full of SEO rich categories and has been the same for 10+ years. Our programmers think removing the left navigation will have no impact on our SEO. As SEO's, do you agree with this?
On-Page Optimization | | EileenCleary0 -
SEO for Online Auto Parts Store
I'm currently doing an audit for an online auto parts store and am having a hard time wrapping my head around their duplicate content issue. The current set up is this: The catalogue starts with the user selecting their year of vehicle They then choose their brand (so each of the year pages have listed every single brand of car, creating duplicate content) They then choose their model of car and then the engine And then this takes them to a page listing every type/category of product they sell (so each and every model type/engine size has the exact same content!) This is amounting to literally thousands of pages being seen as duplicates It's a giant mess. Is using rel=canonical the best thing to do? I'm having a hard time seeing a logical way of structuring the site to avoid this issue. Anyone have any ideas?
On-Page Optimization | | ATMOSMarketing560 -
Two Word Company Name (Combined to One) & SEO
Hi All, I'm dealing with a company that has a two word name like "GreatCompany". They rank #1 for that but not for "Great Company". The phrase is not super competitive, but obviously they are not writing the company name with two words anywhere on their site. Has anyone had to deal with something like this? Thinking about creative solutions but I'm fairly sure we're going to need to use the name both ways to have an effect here (or use PPC to augment) but I don't really love the idea of doing that... will feel very odd and inconsistent for visitors. Thanks!
On-Page Optimization | | ketanmv0 -
Problem with Plugin: Wordpress SEO by Yoast
Hi Hi, I'm using the Plugin "Wordpress SEO by Yoast". Unfortunatelly, this plugin generates a sourcecode looking like this: name='description' content='XXXXXX.'/> Seomoz can't read this and tells me, that my pages have no description. Google doesn't matter and reads it correct. Is there anything I can do about this? Many greetings André
On-Page Optimization | | waynestock0 -
HAVING A POPUP WINDOW ON HOMEPAGE AFFECTS SEO?
Good evening, I currently have a blog that uses a popup window after 15 seconds that is used to add visitor to my newsletter. My question is : Does it have a negative effect in SEO? Thanks in advance Maria Jesus
On-Page Optimization | | goperformancelabs0 -
Are you SEO master? What would you change on my page?
Take a look at this page and tell me what would you change from SEO perspective. It's always to easy to criticise so here is your chance. Good Luck. http://www.traxnyc.com/mens_jewelry.html
On-Page Optimization | | DiamondJewelryEmpire0