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.
Meta Description for ALL my Posts is Being Overwritten!
-
Every single one of my posts meta descriptions are being overritten with the same meta description!
I use Yoast and have proper meta descriptions in my posts, but something seems to be overriding them.
Any idea what could be causing this?
Thank you!!!
- Mike
-
Hey Mike. Not to fret, this is actually a common silly mistake in theme development. The meta description shouldn't be set in WordPress theme because that is handled in the wp_head function. This function is where Yoast, and other plugins, hook into to deliver all the SEO optimized meta and header tags.
-
This is wrong, but right. This is a theme problem. The blog description is a description for the blog website as a whole, and not a description for the page. In Wordpress, you should not set a meta description explicitly in the theme file. That's the job of the wp_head, especially if you are using an SEO plugin to manage your descriptions. It's a common mistake that is easily remedied as evidenced by his reply.
-
The string 'get_bloginfo('description')' spawns the blog description stored in wordpress under settings. But that shoud'nt cause issues with different setup descriptions per page while using a SEO plugin on wordpress. It's more of a theme issue i think because normally that shoud'nt happen.
I woud'nt worry alot about it either; google tends to ignore the description sometimes too and focusses on the actual content on page.
-
Thanks for all the responses!
I did remove the code and it seems to have solved the problem. Now I just don't know if any other different issues could have popped up from removing that code. So the problem seems to be fixed - I'm just sitting a bit in the unknown in terms of if the change had any other unwanted repurcussions.
- Mike
-
Yes and by removing that shortcode you completely remove the description from the blog. But a description is'nt something google takes into account alot now these days. It can actively read the content on your website or page, and align that within search. I mean i have sites that are completely ignored due to the description tag.
It's like meta name keywords all over again.
@Naturalsociety, if you switch the theme to something temporarily, does it appear back again? If so; you have a theme issue.
-
Sounds like a WordPress issue. I suspect there is a meta description defined in your theme file. Check that isn't the case.
It will look like this or very similar:
get_bloginfo('description')
Get rid of the whole meta tag that contains this php code.
If you are unsure how to find this, it will most likely be in your theme's header file. You can find this by going to the theme's folder and look for header.php.
You can also do this through the WordPress Dashboard > Appearance > Theme Editor. On the right hand side select the "Theme Header".
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
-
Site Hack In Meta Description
Hey MOZ Community, I am looking for some help in identifying where the following meta description is coming from on this home page - https://www.apins.com. I have scrubbed through the page source without being able to locate where the content is being pulled from. The website is built on WordPress and metas were updated using Yoast, but I am wondering if an installed plugin could be the culprit. On top of this, I have had a developer take a look for the "hack" and they have assured that the issue has been removed. I have submitted the URL in GSC a couple of times to be re-indexed but have not had much luck. Any thoughts would be much appreciated, the displayed description is below. The health screening plays http://buyviagraonlineccm.com/ a significant and key role in detecting potentially life-threatening illnesses such as cancer, heart ...
Technical SEO | Apr 12, 2019, 5:31 AM | jordankremer0 -
Alt text and itemprop description
I want to optimise the logo on our site. Our developers have presently got the site logo code like this: 601 character description, no keywords 1. How best to use the alt text and description? 2. Do I concentrate on alt text? Isn't the 601 character description:
Technical SEO | Sep 25, 2016, 2:44 PM | abisti2
a) too long, and
b) an opportunity to add relevant keywords again, like the alt text?0 -
Meta Titles and Meta Descriptions are not Indexing in Google
Hello Every one, I have a Wordpress website in which i installed All in SEO plugin and wrote meta titles and descriptions for each and every page and posts and submitted website to index. But after Google crawl the Meta Titles and Descriptions shown by Google are something different that are not found in Content. Even i verified the Cached version of the website and gone through Source code that crawled at that moment. the meta title which i have written is present there. Apart from this, the same URL's are displaying perfect meta titles and descriptions which i wrote in Yahoo and Bing Search Engines. Can anyone explain me how to resolve this issue. Website URL: thenewyou (dot) in Regards,
Technical SEO | Dec 12, 2015, 8:53 AM | SatishSEOSiren0 -
Product meta tags are not updating in my Magneto website!
I need some help! For some reason, each time I update the product meta tags in my Magento website, it doesn't change on the current website? Could someone help me understand why that is?
Technical SEO | Sep 9, 2015, 11:26 AM | One2OneDigital0 -
What punctuation can you use in meta tags? Are there any Google does not like?
So I know you can use dashes and | in meta tags, but can anyone tell me what other punctuation you can use? Also, it'd be great to know what punctuation you can't use. Thanks!
Technical SEO | Aug 24, 2015, 9:04 PM | Trevorneo1 -
Two META Robots tags on a page - which will win?
Hi, Does anybody know which meta-robots tag will "win" if there is more than one on a page? The situation:
Technical SEO | Jun 5, 2013, 11:25 AM | jmueller
our CMS is not very flexible and so we have segments of META-Tags on the page that originate from templates.
Now any author can add any meta-tag from within his article-editor.
The logic delivering the pages does not care if there might be more than one meta-robots tag present (one from template, one from within the article). Now we could end up with something like this: Which one will be regarded by google & co?
First?
Last?
None? Thanks a lot,
Jan0 -
Empty Meta Robots Directive - Harmful?
Hi, We had a coding update and a side-effect of that was that our directive was emptied, in other words it now reads as: on all of the site. I've since noticed that Google's cache date on all of the pages - at least, the ones I tested - have a Cached date of no later than 17 December '12 - that's the Monday after the directive was removed on mass. So, A, does anyone have solid evidence of an empty directive causing problems? Past experience, Matt Cutts, Fishkin quote, etc. And then B - It seems fairly well correlated but, does my entire site's homogenous Cached date point to this tag removal? Or is it fairly normal to have a particular cache date across a large site (we're a large ecommerce site). Our site: http://www.zando.co.za/ I'm having the directive reinstated as soon as Dev permitting. And then, for extra credit, is there a way with Google's API, or perhaps some other tool, to run an arbitrary list and retrieve Cached dates? I'd want to do this for diagnosis purposes and preferably in a way that OK with Google. I'd avoid CURLing for the cached URL and scraping out that dates with BASH, or any such kind of thing. Cheers,
Technical SEO | Dec 27, 2012, 8:30 AM | RocketZando0 -
Why has Google removed meta descriptions from SERPS?
One of my clients' sites has just been redesigned with lots of new URLs added. So the 301 redirections have been put in place and most of the new URLs have now been indexed. BUT Google is still showing all the old URLs in the SERPS and even worse it only displays the title tag. The meta description is not shown, no rich snippet, no text, nothing below the title. This is proving disastrous as visitors are not clicking on a result with no description. I have to assume its got something to do with the redirection, but why is it not showing the descriptions? I've checked the old URLs and he meta description is definitely still in the code, but Google is choosing not to show it. I've never seen this before so I'm struggling for an answer. I'd like to know why or how this is happening, and if it can be resolved. I realise that this may be resolved when Google stops showing all the old URLs but there's no telling how long that will take (can it be speeded up?)
Technical SEO | Feb 6, 2012, 3:56 PM | Websensejim0