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.
Difference in using dividers in TITLE TAG
-
Hi everyone, i know that dividers in title or even title tag doesnt have much of an impact on better rankings. I had great rankings for many keywords, not using dividers or using only one divider. However for better reading comprehension and usability, and also aesthetics i started to use the pipe as my main divider and other secondary dividers. I saw many pages drop in rankings vs other less competent and with less content pages. My format was as follows:
Product Brand | Product description - Additional info or local info
ie. Fiber Glass MBI | Insulation Batts for Home and Commercial use - Acoustic and Thermal Insulation
I changed the format for a handful of pages, and saw immediate results on rankings and traffic on those pages.
Product Brand with Product Description - Additional Info
ie. Fiber Glass MBI Insulation Batts for Commercial use - Acoustic and Thermal Insulation.
Does it sound like something i should implement page wide. I personally like the aesthetics of the pipe as it gives a cleaner look, but the better rankings on the changed pages with using only one divider makes me think. Does it sound familiar, or its just a coincidence,
Regards,
-
Thanks for the response and follow up. I will dig deeper as to why the better rankings and incoming traffic recently.
Regards,
-
I would say more links and new/refreshed content would definitely have more to do with it than the presence or absence of a pipe.
With a pipe the title will be slightly longer. The example titles you gave seem on the long side, but nothing longer than most in that industry.
-
As i am responsible for the page changes, i didnt do much really. Just some minor tweaks in the description page, some new content, my incoming links have been increasing slightly. But i see better results with the pages with titles with no dividers.
Maybe its a coincidence, i just thought maybe something was going on with the dividers. But it doesnt seem that way. Is there anything else i might be missing as why these pages rank better than other similar pages?
Great star trek example haha, thanks!
-
Negative, its a network solutions hosted page. With regular code.
-
I also changed the meta description tag in these pages. I did some general content maintenance, such as review the outgoing links, add some images, but nothing else.
My incoming links have been increasing since July, but ive seen better results with the pages with Title Tags with no dividers or only one divider. I need to dig deeper, as i researched that the title tag alone doesnt make much of a difference.
-
The problem with figuring out the benefit of these minute changes is that there are thousands of other changes that have occurred. Many of them are out of our control. So while you were experimenting with separators, another webmaster might have made a change that made a competing page or pages decrease. And that's just one example.
It would make for an interesting outlying case if your site/pages were positioned just so that one weird, seemingly innocuous, tweak made the difference.
If you've seen the first film in the Star Trek reboot, you might remember how Scotty figured out his transporter problem. Well, actually Future Spock just gave it to him - since Future Scotty was going to fix the problem anyway. But upon looking at the calculations, Scotty realized that space itself was also moving. Which was why his previous experiments were a disaster.
What I'm saying is, aside from 'I'm a dork', is nothing exists in a vacuum. It's very hard to determine if a tiny change had a positive benefit. There are so many external factors/moving parts. Though it would help reduce uncertainty if you didn't change anything else.
-
Was this a Wordpress blog and did you install a plugin to do these changes ?
-
Jesus,
Did you change anything else besides just inserting the pipes?
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
-
I have updated title 4 days ago but still still showing old title and description on Google serps, How to resolve it?
I have updated the title tag but not showing, Please have look at the view source for this website- https://m.yolobus.in/ I want to show this title and description- <title>Online Bus Ticket Booking | YoloBus India</title> But showing the wrong title and description on google SERP- Title - YoloBus :: Home Description - Delhi Lucknow; Lucknow Delhi; Delhi Gorakhpur; Varanasi Lucknow; Gorakhpur Delhi; Delhi Delhi; Bangalore Bangalore; Manali Manali; Chennai Chennai 7mHsdmu
On-Page Optimization | | AnkitS.19900 -
SEO Implications of using Images for Article Titles
Hi guys! New to Moz Pro. I just recently completed an online course with Moz... I have a client who is writing some new content for their site, and we are approaching it with SEO in mind. I was wondering about using an image with text on it as the article title, instead of an actual "text on the page" title. Wondering if that's going to "cost" us anything, SEO wise. I guess we could use alt-text/title/description fields to make sure the keywords are crawlable for our article title but do they have less "weight" than a standard title? How does that work? Hope my question makes sense. Article header attached mB0PXsA.jpg
On-Page Optimization | | JakeWarren1 -
Q&A Page Titles
Hello All! I am currently updating page titles and metadata descriptions for a websites Q&A section and have run in to a problem while updating page titles. Since it is the Q&A section of the website, all of the page titles are around 100 characters and some are up to 200 characters long. Here is an example: Page Title: My child is working below grade level in math. Do I have to purchase the curriculum from the grade below as well? The problem is that this is obviously too long for a SERP to display however I know it is best practice to have matching titles on both the title tag and page title. My question is what hurts SEO value more: the title tag and title of the page not matching or having a very long title displayed on the SERP?
On-Page Optimization | | Myles921 -
SVG image files causing multiple title tags on page - SEO issue?
Does anyone have any experience with SVG image files and on-page SEO? A client is using them and it seems they use the title tag in the same way a regular image (JPG/PNG) would use an image ALT tag. I'm concerned that search engines will see the multiple title tags on the page and that this will cause SEO issues. Regular crawlers like Moz flag it as a second title tag, however it's outside the header and in a SVG wrap so the crawlers really should understand that this is a SVG title rather than a second page title. But is this the case? If anyone has experience with this, I'd love to hear about it.
On-Page Optimization | | mrdavidingram2 -
Are H1 tags important or influential?
We are in the process of correcting our site in hopes that Google will rank us higher in the SERP. We have many pages that have multiple H1 tags or no H1 tag at all. How important is the H1 tag? Will it help us increase our ranking on Google? Thanks
On-Page Optimization | | WebRiverGroup0 -
Hey guys! I was looking at adding the H1 tag lower on the page than the H2 tag because I want the top bit to be a call to action. Is this proper practice?
Hey guys! I was looking at adding the H1 tag lower on the page than the H2 tag because I want the top bit to be a call to action. Is this proper practice?
On-Page Optimization | | Web3Marketing870 -
Different page for each product colour?
Hi Guys, I've just read an ecommerce article that suggests it's a good idea to have a different page for each colour that the product comes in. However surely this will mean duplicate content? What are your thoughts? Have you put this tactic into motion and how did it go? Thanks, Dan
On-Page Optimization | | Sparkstone0 -
Title tag for category page
I'd like to know your views on the best approach for title tags for category pages for ecommerce sites. 3 examples A) Category name | Free delivery on $50 purchase | Brand name B) Discover best "category name" on brand name C) Category Name | 1st Keyword, 2nd keyword | Brand name Thanks!
On-Page Optimization | | walidalsaqqaf0