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All your SEO questions answered – for real – by an expert in the field
In the first part of this post, I shared the big picture of SEO with you based on my interview with SEO expert Kaila Strong, including an overview of what SEO really is, what is the basic terminology, and why your site needs it. Today we’re going to switch from the macro view to the micro details, and look at what exactly your meta fields should contain.
As a brief recap, in the last post we defined the meta fields as being the meta-title, meta-description, and meta-tags. These three fields are part of the non-visible code on your site that is used by search engines to “understand” (aka categorize and files) your site. The more accurate and descriptive the tags are, the better ranking your site will get on search engine results.
But what exactly do you put in those meta fields to optimize your search engine placement? And more importantly, where do you access these fields so you can edit them? Let’s get these questions answered!
Where Is My Meta Data?
Before you can even consider editing your keywords, tags, description or title, you need to first find your meta fields.
The basic answer is that your meta fields are located within the <head></head> tags on your website’s coded pages. For those of you do not code your website and instead use a front end dashboard to manipulate your page’s appearance, you would find your coded files with the template style files. These files have the ending .php – if you’re a Wordpress user, then your coded style files can be found under the Appearance -> Editor.
If your site already has meta data, then it will appear somewhere between the <head></head> tags like this:
<head>
<title>your business name and page title<title>
<meta name=”description” content=”a description of your site”>
<meta name=”keywords” content=”relevant keywords about your site”>
</head>
If you can’t find these anywhere in your coded header or main index file, then your site currently does not contain any meta information and it needs to be added.
However, many site platforms (like Wordpress) offer plugins that are designed to help you optimize your site without having you mess around with your code. Currently, I use “All in One SEO” for Wordpress, and love it. It allows me to alter my title, description, and tags for each blog post. The theme I’m currently using also has a SEO tag space for the whole site which save me from having to touch the back-end code.
*Note: messing around in your coded files without coding experience is risky and can result in deleting, editing, and altering things you didn’t mean to and can’t fix. If you don’t have coding experience I strongly recommend you do not attempt to edit the meta code manually and instead try to install one of these simplified SEO plugins to optimize your site.
The Meta-Title
Once you’ve located your meta fields, the first thing to work on editing the meta-title. Kaila gave a perfect explanation of what to put in your meta-title:
“When writing a blog the title is everything. Not only is the title of your blog important, but so is the meta title as I described above. The meta title tags are shown at the top of a browser window, and they are also shown on search engine result pages (SERPs). Likely, your tags will differ from the actual title of your blog. A rule of thumb I use is to utilize two main keywords relevant to my blog post, and add a third keyword, my company name. For example, if you had a website (Music of the Soul) about classical instruments and wrote a post entitled “How to Buy the Best Classical Instruments”, your meta title for the page should be: Classical Instruments | Buy Instruments | Music of The Soul.”
SEO Specialist Ross Dunn created a simple, easy to remember meta-formula:
[Keyword Phrase] :: [Description of Page or Website Name]
The Meta-Description
According to Kaila, “Meta description tags should contain at least one of the keywords relevant to your page, along with a brief description of what is contained on that page. The key here is to entice searchers to click on your listing by describing what is continued within. Experts suggest keeping it under 160-170 characters.”
Ross suggests always starting your description with your title keyword phrase. So using Kaila’s example from above, the description would start with the phrase “Classical Instruments.”
The Meta-Tags
When it comes to meta-tags, Kaila’s advice is surprising. “While some experts suggest utilizing many keywords in your meta tags, I generally stick to no more than 3 or 4. Search engines do give weight to meta keywords, but not as much as you’d think. The important advice here, however, is just not to overdo it; which can be true with just about everything in SEO.”
If you are trying to build brand recognition or name recognition, it is important to include those things not only in your site’s meta-tags but also your blog post’s meta tags. For example, I include “The Life Uncommon,” and “Nacie Carson” in each of my meta-tags to make that when someone searches for this site or for my name they will be able to see a broad range of information.
SEO and the Uncommon Life
I have been working on my titles, descriptions, and tags for the entire life of the site so far, and I can tell you that I will continue to to tweak, edit, and reassess indefinitely. Do I revamp all my keywords every day? No. But I do make sure I fill out my SEO information for each post, and every month or two I recheck the keywords on the site at large and make some adjustments. Another thing I do is work through my old posts and adjust keywords as I learn more about SEO and how I can utilize it to increase traffic. While I have no sure proof that my SEO efforts are working, I can tell you that traffic rises significantly here every month – you can take from that what you will.
It is almost a guarantee that at some point in your Uncommon Life you will need to utilize a website or blog to help sell your products, showcase your services, or get your message out there. SEO is an essential tool that will help you succeed in your efforts. And like an Uncommon Life, SEO is really a process, not a destination.
Special thank you to Kaila Strong for sharing her valuable time and information!
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I wanted to give your readers a few good resource links to learn more about SEO and link building.
verticalmeasures.com/resources/seo-tutorial-videos/ (Really great video tutorials!!)
hobo-web.co.uk/seo/
mashable.com
seomoz.org
highrankings.com/forum/
stomperblog.com/a-top-ranking-hiding-in-your-site/
(Great 20 minute video, helps you visualize how search engines get their information from your pages)
Also a note about the meta keywords: The reason I use a rule of thumb to only place 3-4 keywords in this tag, is because a website owner should have dedicated pages for their major keywords. In the example I used about Classical Instruments, that site should have specific pages for: classical instruments (likely the homepage) and buy instruments (likely included in the tags on the homepage, but there should be a specific page, with keyword rich content for keyword buy instruments). This site would have other keywords (likely, the names of each of the instruments they offer), which they would probably like to put in the tags on their homepage. Stuffing a lot of keywords in the meta tags on your homepage, or any other page for that matter, only confuses search engines more.
@Kaila: thanks for the links and also for that additional note about meta keywords! You’ve been so generous with your time and information, and I know I for one really appreciate it!