META tags are tags that provide relevant information about your site to search engines. It is therefore important to know how to use it properly so that your website can be in the best results.
For example, the META charset tag lets you choose the text encoding method. This method determines how letters and other characters will be perceived as numbers for browsers to understand. On the other hand, this tag is usually easy to establish. The reason is simple, there are few encoding methods that all browsers understand, so it becomes easy to choose one.
Other than the charset tag, there are a variety of them. Each is easy to add to a standard HTML page, or there are several modules to introduce them. Here is a list of the most important tags, their explanation and their uses.
The title tag
The title tag <title> is the first thing users notice in search engine results. It is the title of your page that offers an overview of the content of your page.
It is important how it appears in search engines, but it is also this title that appears in social media shares.
The content of this tag should therefore be clear, precise and descriptive, and it should be restricted to 70 characters.
If it is possible to add keywords in the title, this could improve SEO. On the other hand, it is more important that the title is clear and presents the content of your page well. If there are multiple keywords in your title, but it becomes inconsistent, it could hurt search results.
The title tag is not only useful for visitors, but also for search engines. Thus, it is necessary to marry clarity and context to ensure that the title is understandable for everyone.
If you are using a plugin like Yoast SEO in wordpress, it is easier to add a META title in the SEO section. This section also allows you to preview what your title would look like in search results.
Otherwise, another way to add a title is to do it directly in the HTML document. The addition should look like this:
<head>
<title> Title example</title>
</head>
An example of a <title> tag in the search results:
The meta description tag
The META description is as important as the title. The content of the description tag appears directly below the content of the title tag in search results. It displays the summary of the content that will be found on this page.
The META description should offer an accurate and concise description of what is on your page. It is usually what determines whether a user will click on your page or not. It is therefore important to take the time to optimize it.
However, Google could present a longer META description. Previously, the optimal length of a META description was 150 to 165 characters. Now, after an update to the way Google displays its results, the description may be longer. This is caused by Google itself. According to an algorithm that has been in development for a long time, Google looks for descriptions of parts of text that make the most sense according to what the user is looking for.
The optimal character length of a META description is 150-165 characters long and describe your content well. If it’s longer, the content probably won’t show up in search results.
Just like the titles, you can add the description with modules like Yoast for Wordpress, or add it directly to your HTML document:
<head>
<meta name=”description” content=”Concise description of your page.”>
</head>
The META robots tag
This meta tag tells search engines which pages on your site should be indexed.
A tag that tells the search engine not to index a page or follow links on a page would be written like this:
<meta name=”robots” content=”noindex, nofollow” />
However, if you wanted the search engine to index your page and follow the links on it, the tag would be written like this:
<meta name=”robots” content=”index, follow” />
The tag should be placed in the <head> section of your HTML document, like every other META tag. If you don’t add this tag, search engines default to indexing and following links automatically.
This tag could be useful if you have important pages in your site but in which there is not much content. You don’t necessarily want them to show up in search results, but are still prominent on your site. So you can use this tag.
It is possible to configure this tag in the Yoast plugin for Wordpress.
Image alt text
Image optimization is now an important criterion in search engine optimization. It offers the opportunity to rank among the top search results, but with visual content.
Your images should be accessible to all users as well as to search engines. Alternative text can ensure both of these criteria: it gives text that displays in cases where the image could not display, it allows better accessibility to your site for people with disabilities and it also gives a description of your image to search engines.
You can include keywords in the alt text, which would make sense, but don’t overdo it. Exaggeration would only hurt your SEO.
Canonical tag
If you have almost identical pages on your site, it would be important to tell the search engines which one to prioritize. Same thing if you have content on your site that has been published elsewhere. You can take care of both of these scenarios with the canonical tag without incurring a duplicate content penalty.
To avoid mixing search engines and losing your place in search results, you must use this tag to guide the engine to the link that would be the main one. It therefore emphasizes the right link and prevents others from harming your SEO.
You can add or modify a canonical URL in certain modules for WordPress or include it in the header of your page. To include the canonical tag in an HTML document, you have to do like this:
<head>
<link rel=”canonical” href=”http://exemple.com/” />
</head>
Title level tags
Title level tags are part of your content. These are what you should use to structure the content on your page.
In addition to making your page easier to read, title level tags help search engines know what your page is about in more detail.
The order of the heading levels, from h1 to h6, gives the importance of each section. An h1 header usually determines the main title of the page or the title of an article, while h2 headers are used as subtitles to section your content.
As important as title tags can be, it shouldn’t be overdone. Think quality, not quantity. Having five different headers on your page won’t necessarily help your SEO. Instead, think about using them strategically to section your content and introduce the important points of each section.
Here is an example header arrangement from this article:
<h1>A quick and easy guide to meta tags in SEO</h1>
<p>A paragraph of content</p>
<p>Another paragraph of content</p>
<h2>Why META tags are important?</h2>
<p>A paragraph of content</p>
<h2>Six basic meta tags for optimizing your site</h2>
<h3>1. Title tag</h3>
It is usually suggested to use only one h1 header, but you can use several h2 or h3, while respecting their hierarchy.
How to optimize your meta tags
In addition to helping search engines, these tags can also help users have a better experience on your site, in addition to ensuring good content structure.
Here is a list to help you optimize your meta tags and improve your performance:
- Check if all your pages have a unique title tag and META description
- Be sure to use heading level tags correctly
- Do not forget to write an alternative text for each of your images
- Use robots tags to guide search engines
- Don’t forget to use canonical tags if you have duplicate content
- You make a list like this of steps to repeat when creating new content and introduce meta tags into your routine.
That’s it, you are now better equipped to optimize your site for search engines!
If you have any questions or need help deciding which meta tags to use,
do not hesitate to send us a hello!
Josée Barrette
I started working in the web industry in 2005 as a project manager/coordinator. Subsequently, I led production teams and project managers. In 2014, I decided to put my knowledge and experience at the service of small businesses and self-employed workers.