Description Meta Tag Syntax
The description Meta tag is one of three tags you should have in the heading section (between the <head> and </head> of each of your website pages. In probably won’t help with Google search engine optimization (SEO) but Google may use it in their search results snip-it if it’s pertinent.
The HTML Syntax for the Meta tag looks like this:
<META NAME=”Description” CONTENT=”A short sentence or two describing just this page and not your website… goes here.”>
For all Meta tags you need to tell search engines what each Meta tag is, in this case it’s the Meta Description tag, thus the “Description” and then the CONTENT for that meta tag. CONTENT is the variable that stores the data for that tag so again in this case it’s the description for this page.
Since your page description may be used in the search results by Google, Yahoo and Bing, your description needs to sell your page (NOT YOUR COMPANY OR BUSINESS) hard. You need to sell searchers that when they see your brief description in the search results that if they click on the link to your page, it has the content they are looking for.
Include your page’s keyword in the description meta tag. Google SEO best practice is to make sure your keyword is included in the description meta tag, once! Because of spamming, the search engines have stopped using the description text to determine your search engine results and you probably don’t need to include your keyword in this tag. But in some cases if the description includes the keyword for that page, the search engines will use your description on the search engine results pages, so control you own destiny.
What If My Website Design Software Won’t allow a Description Meta Tag
It’s a best practice in the SEO world to include the Description Meta, but in some case the software used for your website design will not allow you to add Description Meta Tags. Don’t worry about it, the search engines will figure out what to display.
TBD Link to What if I don’t have a Description Meta Tag
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