How To Use the Meta Description Tag

Posted by Paul Feakins on April 17, 2012

Here are a few quick, simple ways to make the best use of the meta description tag on your website.

Using it correctly can increase traffic.

• Keep the length between 150 and 160 characters - any longer and it will get cut off.
   
• It won't help you get higher on Google but it may mean more people click on your website from Google as it's displayed on the results page (see sidebar).
   
• It should describe the page content concisely, making Google users want to visit your page.
   
• It needs to be different on each page of your website because each page has different content.
   
• It shouldn't contain funny characters or even double quotes (") but single quotes (') are okay.