Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Why isn't our complete meta title showing up in the Google SERPS? (cut off half way)
-
We carry a product line, cutless bearings (for use on boats).
For instance, we have one, called the Able, that has the following meta title (and searched by View Page Source to confirm): BOOT 1-3/8" x 2-3/8" x 5-1/2" Johnson Cutless Bearing | BOOT Cutlass
However, if I search for it on on Google by part number or name (boot cutless bearing, boot cutlass bearing), the meta title comes back with whole first part chopped off, only showing this : "x 5-1/2" Johnson Cutless Bearing | BOOT Cutlass - Citimarine ..."
Any idea why?
Here's the url if it will hopefully help: https://citimarinestore.com/en/metallic-inches/156-boot-johnson-cutless-bearing-870352103.html
All the products in the category are doing the same.
Thanks!
-
sometimes people write a meta title on meta description so its too long, there are free plug-ins, if you have a WordPress website where you can write the meta title and the meta description and often it shows if it's red, amber or if it's green, in terms of whether you have written a long enough or too long Meta title meta description
-
sometimes the meta title might be too long, we had this problem with a Bristol company we had to rewrite the meta titles using yoast SEO, to improve the organic seo.
-
Three methods using modules on your existing CMS of implementing the fixes. I use labels A, B & C three different configurations C is the least expensive I think all three of them would add a lot of value however you would be very safe using A or C
A)
**1) all-in-one with canonical **
2) JSON-LD
B)
1) Add a canonical tag to your site
https://addons.prestashop.com/en/url-redirects/22526-canonical-seo.html
2) open graph
3) JSON-LD
or
C )
1) Add a canonical tag to your site
https://addons.prestashop.com/en/url-redirects/22526-canonical-seo.html
2) This module offers structured data/JSON-LD Facebook and Twitter open graph tag redirects Site maps etc. a base SEO suite without a canonical tag found above.
This video is of the all-in-one module without the canonical tag unfortunately but it's the least expensive of the two.
I hope this wasn't confusing I would choose A or C it will really help your site.
All the best,
Tom
-
Very complete information. Thank you very much! I will first try simplifying the meta title, might be a bit too long now. See other competitors with the same meta title, just cutting out some of the later stuff we have.
Will go through this answer more in detail when back in the office tomorrow and see the other suggestions. Thank you once again.
-
I don't know how much it will help but if you remove the MFG prior to the part number it may help a little bit. It's a 30% chance but the reason I bring it up is when I google "MFG#: 870352103." exactly what you have on the page shows me the highlight what I have typed in however the part number is shown in addition but it is not highlighted.
I strongly believe this was done intentionally by Google for a better user experience.
Google tunicates and rewrites descriptions all the time. I don't think to have the part number in the SERPS is considered important to Google
Your meta description is a suggestion to Google. There’s no guarantee that it’ll actually be shown. So, if you don’t see your description, that means Google probably made something up for you. Perhaps it felt the meta description you created didn’t represent the content of the page, or is a duplicate, for instance. Here you’ll find all the possible reasons why your meta description doesn’t show.
very long part numbers are unlikely to give a clear idea of the content of the page, therefore, less likely to be displayed.
- Good descriptions are human-readable and diverse. Page-specific data is a good candidate for programmatic generation. Keep in mind that meta descriptions comprised of long strings of keywords don't give users a clear idea of the page's content, and are less likely to be displayed in place of a regular snippet.
- Use quality descriptions. Finally, make sure your descriptions are truly descriptive. Because the meta descriptions aren't displayed in the pages the user sees, it's easy to let this content slide. But high-quality descriptions can be displayed in Google's search results, and can go a long way to improving the quality and quantity of your search traffic.
- See https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/35624?hl=en
- https://moz.com/blog/how-to-write-meta-descriptions-in-a-changing-world
- https://www.authoritylabs.com/title-tags/
- https://moz.com/learn/seo/meta-description
- https://kb.yoast.com/kb/my-meta-descriptions-arent-showing-up-in-the-search-result-pages/
I would look into implementing JSON-LD /schema on the page so you can edit your product number you can do this with the Screaming Frog it will show you the pixel with because character length is not always the same as the letter "I" use less space than the letter "H"
It is free for up to 500 URLs https://www.screamingfrog.co.uk/seo-spider/
In addition, I have posted your page URL, description and it is still lacking a canonical tag I would add one.
the part number if search for will show up because that's what the user intends on looking for. In addition you do not want Google taking clicks from your website you want people to click on your site in order to find the part number you may want to change your content to make the part numbers a bigger part of the actual page content.
-
Page Url
-
https://citimarinestore.com/en/metallic-inches/156-boot-johnson-cutless-bearing-870352103.html
-
Title
-
BOOT 1-3/8" x 2-3/8" x 5-1/2" Johnson Cutlass Bearing [Length:53]
-
Meta Description
-
DURAMAX BOOT Cutlass Johnson Bearing, Naval Brass. Shaft Diameter: 1 3/8", Outside Diameter: 2 3/8", Length: 5 1/2", Thickness: 1/8". Weight: 1.8 lbs. 870352103 [Length:160]
-
Canonical
-
None
Google "boot cutless bearing, boot cutlass bearing"
https://citimarinestore.com/en/metallic-inches/156-boot-johnson-cutless-bearing-870352103.html
Google "cutless bearing"
https://citimarinestore.com/citiguide/johnson-cutless-bearings-your-complete-guide/
https://citimarinestore.com/en/136-johnson-duramax-cutless-bearings
Googling "870352103"
It could be that it's over 550 pixels
Try using https://metatags.io/ to add Open Graph tags to your products or Facebook twitter and other social media platforms
-
Page Url
-
https://citimarinestore.com/en/metallic-inches/156-boot-johnson-cutless-bearing-870352103.html
-
<title>BOOT 1-3/8" x 2-3/8" x 5-1/2" Johnson Cutlass Bearing</title>
To add JSON-LD
With
https://www.rankranger.com/schema-markup-generator (I used a Image from your page for the photo) https://citimarinestore.com/429-large/boot-johnson-cutless-bearing-870352103.jpg
Tested in https://search.google.com/test/rich-results?id=qjE-Sbw4lhzWGpK4hmYHqA
Add the MPN in JSON-LD****SKU is a retailer's own Stock Keeping Unit, which they use to keep track of inventory. This would be unique to each retailer. MPN is the Manufacturer's Part Number, which in the case of the DURAMAX BOOT Cutlass Johnson Bearing you mention would be 870352103
Hope this helps,
Tom
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
-
Looking for opinions on structuring meta title tags/page title/menu title/H1
Hi everyone I am hoping a few of you can share your opinions. I have been having conversations (okay, healthy debates) about how to write/structure meta title tag and how to compliment them with the H1, page title, menu name. To help explain the thought processes I will use a pretend keyword. How about "screwdriver". Case: (I made this up) we are redesigning a website for a construction tools manufacturing company (pretend name: ABC Tools) targeting OEMs who are interested in purchasing large quantities of tools. The product categories (to become main menu items) are Screwdrivers, Nails, Drills, and Hammers. (bear with me .... this is just an example I am making up on the fly) K. Circling back to screwdrivers - let's say we have one landing page (a primary category page and in the main menu) listing products and great details about screwdrivers. Focus keywords are screwdriver manufacturer, screwdriver supplier, construction screwdrivers Below are questions being debated. If you are willing ... how would you address these questions? And, can you explain WHY? QUESTION ONE: How would you structure the meta title tag (feel free to write one of your own) Screwdriver Manufacturer - Construction Screwdriver | ABC Tools ABC Tools - US-based Screwdriver Manufacturer Supplier Near You High-Quality Screwdrivers for Construction with ABC Tools QUESTION TWO: how would you write the H1 on the page? Would it match the meta tag? OR, would you write something different using the primary keyword? QUESTION THREE Remembering this is not a blog post ... it is a primary landing page linked to the main navigation. What would the menu title be? (remember the product categories above are how the main menu items are bucketed) Screwdrivers Screwdriver Manufacturer Typically in WordPress, the H1 and the menu title is auto-populated using the page title (not the title tag)... So, if we use Screwdrivers as the page title but we want the H1 to match the meta title tag, would we manually change the H1? Or, have the page title and title tag match, but manually change the menu item?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Brenda.Haines1 -
Subdomain replaced domain in Google SERP
Good morning, This is my first post. I found many Q&As here that mostly answer my question, but just to be sure we do this right I'm hoping the community can take a peak at my thinking below: Problem: We are relevant rank #1 for "custom poker chips" for example. We have this development website on a subdomain (http://dev.chiplab.com). On Saturday our live 'chiplab.com' main domain was replaced by 'dev.chiplab.com' in the SERP. Expected Cause: We did not add NOFOLLOW to the header tag. We also did not DISALLOW the subdomain in the robots.txt. We could have also put the 'dev.chiplab.com' subdomain behind a password wall. Solution: Add NOFOLLOW header, update robots.txt on subdomain and disallow crawl/index. Question: If we remove the subdomain from Google using WMT, will this drop us completely from the SERP? In other words, we would ideally like our root chiplab.com domain to replace the subdomain to get us back to where we were before Saturday. If the removal tool in WMT just removes the link completely, then is the only solution to wait until the site is recrawled and reindexed and hope the root chiplab.com domain ranks in place of the subdomain again? Thank you for your time, Chase
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | chiplab0 -
Pagination duplicate title and meta description
Hello, Getting a lot of duplicate title and meta description errors via google webmaster tools. For best SEO practices, do i no-index the page/2's, page/3's...? More importantly, i see how MOZ did it by adding "page 3" to their titles such as http://moz.com/blog?page=3. Is that a better way of doing it? If so, how do i do that on Yoast SEO? Thank you so much!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Shawn1240 -
Is there a way to get a list of Total Indexed pages from Google Webmaster Tools?
I'm doing a detailed analysis of how Google sees and indexes our website and we have found that there are 240,256 pages in the index which is way too many. It's an e-commerce site that needs some tidying up. I'm working with an SEO specialist to set up URL parameters and put information in to the robots.txt file so the excess pages aren't indexed (we shouldn't have any more than around 3,00 - 4,000 pages) but we're struggling to find a way to get a list of these 240,256 pages as it would be helpful information in deciding what to put in the robots.txt file and which URL's we should ask Google to remove. Is there a way to get a list of the URL's indexed? We can't find it in the Google Webmaster Tools.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | sparrowdog0 -
Other domains hosted on same server showing up in SERP for 1st site's keywords
For the website in question, the first domain alphabetically on the shared hosting space, strange search results are appearing on the SERP for keywords associated with the site. Here is an example: A search for "unique company name" shows the results: www.uniquecompanyname.com as the top result. But on pages 2 and 3, we are getting results for the same content but for domains hosted on the same server. Here are some examples with the domain name replaced: UNIQUE DOMAIN NAME PAGE TITLE
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Motava
ftp.DOMAIN2.com/?action=news&id=63
META DESCRIPTION TEXT UNIQUE DOMAIN NAME PAGE TITLE 2
www.DOMAIN3.com/?action=news&id=120
META DESCRIPTION TEXT2 UNIQUE DOMAIN NAME PAGE TITLE 2
www.DOMAIN4.com/?action=news&id=120
META DESCRIPTION TEXT2 UNIQUE DOMAIN NAME PAGE TITLE 3
mail.DOMAIN5.com/?action=category&id=17
META DESCRIPTION TEXT3 ns5.DOMAIN6.com/?action=article&id=27 There are more but those are just some examples. These other domain names being listed are other customer domains on the same VPS shared server. When clicking the result the browser URL still shows the other customer domain name B but the content is usually the 404 page. The page title and meta description on that page is not displayed the same as on the SERP.As far as we can tell, this is the only domain this is occurring for.So far, no crawl errors detected in Webmaster Tools and moz crawl not completed yet.0 -
Pipe ("|") in my website's title is being replaced with ":" in Google results
Hi , One of the websites I'm promoting and working on is www.pau-brasil.co.il.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Kadel
It's wordpress-based website and as you can see the html's Title is "PauBrasil | some hebrew slogan".
(Screenshot: http://i.imgur.com/2f80EEY.gif)
When I'm searching for "PauBrasil" (Which is the brand's name) , one of the results google shows is "PauBrasil: Some Hebrew Slogan" (Screenshot: http://i.imgur.com/eJxNHrO.gif ) Why does the pipe is being replaced with ":" ?
And not just that , as you can see there's a "blank space" missing between the the ":" to the slogan.
(note: the websites has been indexed by google crawler at least 4 times so I find it hard to believe it can be the reason) I've keep on looking and found out that there's another page in that website with the exact same title
but when I'm looking for it in google , it shows the title as it really is , with pipe. ("|").
(Screenshot: http://i.imgur.com/dtsbZV2.gif) Have you ever encountered something like that?
Can it be that the duplicated title cause that weird "replacement"? Thanks in advance,
Kadel0 -
Best way to permanently remove URLs from the Google index?
We have several subdomains we use for testing applications. Even if we block with robots.txt, these subdomains still appear to get indexed (though they show as blocked by robots.txt. I've claimed these subdomains and requested permanent removal, but it appears that after a certain time period (6 months)? Google will re-index (and mark them as blocked by robots.txt). What is the best way to permanently remove these from the index? We can't use login to block because our clients want to be able to view these applications without needing to login. What is the next best solution?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | nicole.healthline0 -
Best way to de-index content from Google and not Bing?
We have a large quantity of URLs that we would like to de-index from Google (we are affected b Panda), but not Bing. What is the best way to go about doing this?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | nicole.healthline0