If you have ever read a text about on-page SEO , one of the things you will surely read there is that writing a meta description is one of the most basic and important items when it comes to optimizing content on a web page. Metadata, which includes the meta description, are short texts that describe the content of the page. They are often not seen on the page itself, but only in the source code of the page. The key elements that Google looks at aren’t actually visible on the actual page that readers see.

Where is the metadata?

The only difference between data you can see (on a blog page, say) and metadata you can’t is location: metadata exists only in HTML, usually in the head of the page, and so is only visible to browsers (and people who know where to look). You could say that metadata is actually data about the data on your page.

Metadata has long been a direct factor in search ranking. But they are not anymore. Google has been very clear about this. So, adding your targeted keyword to the page’s meta description will not immediately yield ranking results. But meta descriptions definitely have an indirect impact on rankings.

The most important users of invisible metadata are search engines ( Google ). These elements provide important information to search engines about the content and purpose of the web page. In the visible world, metadata determines what text and link Google will display when your page appears in the results after someone performs a search.

Two very important categories when it comes to metadata are the SEO title ( Meta Title Tag ) and meta description ( Metadescription ).

SEO title

The SEO title is one of the most important elements on the page, which tells search engines what it is about and which keywords to focus on. Likewise, a good title will certainly attract the attention of users and make them click on it. Titles should contain about 60 characters, including spaces. Titles with more than 60 characters are generally truncated, and additional characters are not displayed.

Each page should have a unique and well-done SEO title. Use keyword research to identify the optimal words to use in your headlines.

A good meta description is very important

A well-written description will attract users to click on the link and come to the site, and in the long run, if the content provided to them is of high quality, this will also affect the improvement of the site’s ranking. The more informative the description, the more likely someone will click on the link on the results page and visit your site.

There’s a catch here, and that’s that Google often chooses its own meta description when displaying your page in search results. This can be quite frustrating, when you realize that your painstakingly crafted meta description has been completely ignored and instead Google itself has chosen a specific snippet of text from the site page. But, precisely for this reason, you must take care of the quality of the entire text and content on the site. With this being the case, the question is, are meta descriptions still important for SEO?

The answer is yes. As we have already indicated, a good meta description increases the site’s CTR, and therefore has a positive effect on its evaluation by search engines.

The best meta description length can vary and Google has been known to vary the length of characters it displays. The approximate range of the description is between 155 – 160 characters.

Metadata and Yoast

If you use the WordPress platform to create a site , one of the useful tools for editing metadata is the Yoast plugin , which can greatly facilitate their optimization. Yoast provides the ability to create all the metadata, while also providing you with technical guidance. After installing this plugin, a menu will appear under the content of each page or article where you can manipulate metadata.

By selecting the Edit Fragment option, you can set the SEO title as well as the meta description. There is also an option here to edit social media metadata. Be sure to use your main keyword in your meta description. When you’re done you’ll be able to see how it will look in the search view. Once you have done this your article or page is ready to be published with the metadata successfully set.

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