Meta descriptions
-
Hi,
I have placed meta descriptions in a CMS for a client and afterwards checked with the SeoMoz tool "Page elements" that these are embedded correctly. However when checking the SERP for certain pages Google has "composed" the listing from other content than the meta description. What may be the reason, and how to avoid this?
-
True. I've even seem some instances of anchor text being used in descriptions.
-
Det kan hjelpe
But yeah, if it's a decent description (and you seem to be happy with it) I'd look elsewhere for problems first.
-
Hi, there is a DMOZ listing so I could check that, thanks!
-
hi, I'd have to check with the client, but anyway it is in Norwegian so it would probably not help you much! But, the pages in question are not thin on content and are decisively on-topic.
-
Hi Damien,
Not a double post just because I got there first
Would always encourage people to chime in with their own opinions even if it just confirms what was said.
It can help the asker know if an answer is good advice or not
-
Can you post us the URL or is it confidential? It'd be nice to have a look
-
The code I've suggested will only help if it's pulling the description from DMOZ or the Yahoo Directory. Do you have a listing in either? If so is it the same as what is showing?
Even if you do have a listing it doesn't necessarily mean that's where it's getting it from.
As I say, if you've just made the change, wait for a week or so and if your description is long then make it fit into a normal SERPs length snippet.
However it may be that you can't actually do anything to change Google's mind on what it shows for that search term (you may also find the snippet is different depending on what is searched for).
-
hi, thanks but the search to test this was with using the same keywords used for the title-tag and in the meta description and on-site content, so I'm ruling out lack of relevancy here.
-
hi, thanks! The meta description is based on kw research and on page content so relevancy cannot be the issue. Probably they are not using meta-robots and they need to place the code you suggested...?
-
Sorry for double-post! ha
-
Hey,
If you're description isn't as relevant to the keyword you've used to search for your site then search engines may decide to put something more relevant in the description that it has pulled off the page.
To remedy this try and rewrite your description to be more relevant to your targeted keyword.
Hope this helps
DD
-
First give it at least a week or so to update, it doesn't happen immediately.
But, yeah, Google does that sometimes if it finds a chunk of text it thinks is more relevant to the users' search. I've seen this mostly happen on pages with very little text content (image or video heavy pages say) but sometimes it's just because it doesn't think your description is relevant to your page.
I assume that it's from the page and not your DMOZ or YDIR description (if it is either of those add or to your pages). Very small possibility if you've added a different description to a lot of other directories it's being picked up there.
Not too much you can do about it if none of these. Make sure your description is accurate and if it's more than 150 characters try to bring it in under that.
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
-
Different title tags and meta descriptions for desktop and mobile?
Is it possible to use different title tags and meta descriptions for mobile users? For Example: In the SERP for desktop you'll see the desktop title tags and meta descriptions, but in the SERP for mobile you'll the mobile versions of the webpage.
On-Page Optimization | | alex19780 -
Moz showing 384 description duplicates on my ecommerce store.... when I download CSV, most pages are coming from my WordPress Blog, why?
Hi, I am trying to investigate why I am getting 384 description duplicates on my ecommerce store (www.doggie-diva.com)? When I download the CSV file from MOZ, the majority of the pages they refer to are pages from my Word Press blog, which is hosted on a different server (blog.doggie-diva.com). I do have a link from my website to my Word Press blog and vice versa. Can you please explain to me why this is happening when I don't have duplicate content? Example of a page flagged from www.doggie-diva.com with duplicate content (http://blog.doggie-diva.com/tag/dog-gymnastics. Thanks, Rachel <colgroup><col width="549"></colgroup>
On-Page Optimization | | doggiedivalicious
| |0 -
Moz shows page has no meta description but it does
Hi We recently worked on optimising one of our product pages, we created a new meta description, new unique content and a ensured it was optimised for our keyword. Despite all of this its ranking is still significantly lower than competitors eventhough the page authority is as good as theirs. I have just noticed that Moz crawl diagnostics is showing it up as having no meta description - but it does! when you check the source you see:http-equiv="description" content="Buy the robust and reliable Canon imageRUNNER 2525 from Copyfaxes. Learn more about the Canon 2525 before you buy." /> The page is: http://copyfaxes.com/product/2552/Canon-ImageRunner-2525-Digital-Copier I would appreciate any ideas.
On-Page Optimization | | copyfaxes10 -
Is there a tool out there I could use to help me compose unique meta tags in bulk?
We have a website that has hundreds of crawl errors due to duplicate meta tags. I could do with a tool to help compose unique ones in bulk so we don't exceed the recommended character limit and follow any other best practices.
On-Page Optimization | | WebDesignBirmingham0 -
Any SEO effect(s) / impact of Meta No Cache?
Hi SEOMoz Guys, Hope you guys are doing well. I've been searching online and bumped into this archived page (http://www.seomoz.org/qa/view/34982/meta-nocache-affect-ranking). I would like to get an updated take on this issue whether or not the meta no cache code on a page bears negative/positive or no SEO impact / effect. <meta http-equiv="Pragma" content="no-cache" /> <meta http-equiv="Cache-Control" content="no-cache"/> Thanks! Steve
On-Page Optimization | | sjcbayona-412182 -
Meta refresh - nojavascript url
seomox is telling me that I am getting a page that is not being indexed or crawled and since the crawl status code is 200 and there are no robots the meta-refresh url must be the problem. the meta refresh url is different than the on page report card url as it's the nojavascript url which my developer says should be ok. see his comments below. The is redirecting to http://mastermindtoys.com/store/nojavascript.html only in case if the JavaScript is disabled in the client browser. This is the right way to do it, I don’t understand why this might be a problem, otherwise MM has to implement Noscript pages that have a real content. I didn’t get what’s wrong about accessibility. The code 200 means it is accessible, and yes there is nothing to access if JavaScript is disabled on browser. I think there are no modern retail sites that would do any sensible business with the scripting disabled in browsers.The H1 is really present 2 times and second occurrence can be removed, though I highly doubt about importance of this change.Regarding duplicates – what URLs are considered duplicates? Can you please send me examples?I am not aware of canonical URL problem for MM site unless we consider old .asp links as duplicate links of the canonical product pages. I would appreciate if SEOMoz gave us an example what they mean.I suspect that the page is not getting indexed as a result of this or I'm just not getting a good score. Which is it?
On-Page Optimization | | mastermindtoys0 -
How unique do product descriptions need to be?
I'm rewriting approximately 10,000 product descriptions, but for feasability it's useful to sometimes reuse some of the phrases that are there (and on other websites as they come straight from the manufacturer -eg. key features), how unique does the content have to be - are we talking 100%, 75%, 50% for it to be effective in google? Same question goes for the product title! Many thanks.
On-Page Optimization | | ewanr0