Meta Description Best Practices

meta description

Meta descriptions best practices you should adopt for your website

 

At the start of every webpage, is a meta description. When a user puts in that keyword to hunt for sites on a search engine, this invisible HTML element appears on the listing under the meta title, and provides a summary of the page’s content to help them better get a sense of what they can expect from the site.

 

While functional, the brief description has become a critical component to good SEO protocol, and so it has become important for organisations to include meta description best practices in place to garner good SEO.

 

SO WHAT MAKES FOR GOOD META DESCRIPTIONS?

 

 Looking at others’ descriptions, writing a meta description seems deceptively simple, but it is exacting this simplicity that challenges. If you’ve tried to express yourself in early Twitter days, you’ll understand the pain of reducing your choice points into a limited number of characters. The same can be said for the meta description.

 

Here are some meta description best practices to help you craft that ideal piece:

 

1. Keep it to a certain length.

 

Just like Goldilocks and her adventures, you don’t want to create too short of a meta description to lose marketing estate, nor have it so long that it gets truncated. Keep it between 155 to 160 characters for the best effect.

 

2. Write compelling content

 

Make it concise and impactful. Deliver a summary but give it a spin to make it stand out from the other competitors when the listings appear. Think about the generic way others might frame this and find a compelling reason to make the person click through yours.

 

3. Avoid repeats

 

Due to the natural algorithms of the search engines, it’s best to avoid repeating your meta descriptions across multiple pages as they might actually compete with each other. Adding on to that, you’ll also lose the precious opportunity to qualify your pages for better SEO functionality with proper unique descriptions.

 

4. Use your target keyword

 

Inserting your researched keyword into the meta description is great meta description best practice, and again, boosts overall SEO fundamentals. But just remember to keep it natural.

 

5. Match the content

 

This should go without saying but do have meta descriptions that match the actual content. Some websites trick users through misleading meta tags and while this has short-term benefits, you’ll ultimately lose out on credibility and both users and the search engines alike will quickly spot this, increase bounce rate and pull down your ranking.

 

6. Write for your audience

 

Think about how your page would most help a user clicking through to it and really present it to them – with a unique proposition, if possible. This could be a promotional mechanic or a new technical specs, or hawking unique or patented features that no one else has. Think about the hook. One of the best ways to do this is to imagine the problem you can solve for the user. Highlight that and you’ll garner your best chance to have someone notice and click through.

 

7. Make it actionable

 

Much like copy, using an active voice with definitive call-to-action liners can be very compelling if it matches the search intent of the user. Consider using this for some of your most compelling pages, such as landing pages. “Learn more”, “Try it for free”, or “Get it now” are some great examples.

 

EXAMPLES OF GREAT META DESCRIPTIONS

 

Learning from the online giants of the space is a great way to pick up tips on how to implement your own meta descriptions best practice. Here, we share a few of our favourites:

 

Shopee

 

shopee meta description

 

Why it works:

 

No fuss, no muss. The e-commerce giant delivers straight deals to their customers and their no-nonsense description clearly explains their function and what they offer, which can be adjusted to their top-selling items.

 

Lazada

 

lazada meta description

 

Why it works:

 

Shopee’s competition adopts a similar approach but uses an active voice and includes a call-to-action for more immediacy.

 

Facebook

 

facebook meta description

 

Why it works:

 

Short, simple, and straight to the point. The meta description of the social media bigwig clearly explains the value of the page and what to expect.

 

Google Play

 

google play meta description

 

Why it works:

 

Short, simple, and within such a short sentence, can both clearly explain what it offers and what the visitor can expect, as well as the benefits of a perpetual service.

 

Whatsapp

 

whatsapp meta description

 

Why it works:

 

Delivers a succinct first sentence clearly explaining the page’s value, then proceeds to explain the features of the page.

 

LinkedIn

 

linkedin meta description

 

Why it works:

 

Simple and descriptive. LinkedIn’s meta description highlights their networking USP with definitive figures, and tells the visitor what they’ll get when they click through.

 

Youtube

 

youtube meta description

 

Why it works:

 

Youtube’s meta description is very straightforward with a personable touch, but also promises breadth through the use of select words such as “world”.

 

Reddit

 

reddit meta description

 

Why it works:

 

Brief and straight to the point, this meta description also hammers in the community aspect with aggressive repetition of a keyword – community.

 

Netflix

 

netflix meta description

 

Why it works:

 

Delivers simple premise and function but also softly inserts branding by including it before their products.

 

Amazon

 

amazon meta description

 

Why it works:

 

There’s a reason why Amazon has evolved to be one of the world’s online retailers and they’re happy to hawk their benefits. Aggressively hawking their logistics followed by their pricing allows them to quickly address most shopper’s two biggest concerns – delivery and cost.

 

CONCLUSION

 

Meta descriptions may be invisible to the user, but they do contribute to healthy fundamentals when optimising a website for good SEO. Comb through your site with these meta description best practices and watch your traffic improve over time as they become relevant to the users and their search intent. Good luck!

 

Still a little lost on building that first website or optimising it for SEO? Let the consultants at Weave guide you through similar best practices and achieve the results you deserve.

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