Meta tags <meta> are
valid (x)html elements that are used
on web pages to provide
web browsers with important information about the page.
They are not visible to the visitor, unless you view the page source
information. Although invisible to human visitors, they can have a dramatic
influence on
the user's experience. Meta tags are placed between the
<head> tags in each
web page and so appear at the beginning of the document. This allows web browsers to
gain valuable information about the page before it displays it.
Although most search engines ignore most meta
tags, some tags are important to all search engines and some search engines
use most of the meta tags. All search engines read the description
tag, robots tag and usually the rating or
classification tags. The amount of importance for each tag is
determined be each search engine. Most search engines ignore the
keywords tag. All meta tags are important to some
search engines and some meta tags are important to all search engines.
The time that the browser takes to load and display a web page
can be much longer, when the browser has to try to interpret the page
markup code. Good meta tag use, allows browsers to efficiently load and
display each page.
Web browsers, like Internet Explorer
and Firefox,
are actually known as user-agents. User-agents use meta tags to display
web pages the way the page author intended. Good use of meta tags allow the
user-agents to get the information to the user more quickly and accurately. User
friendly web pages are more accessible to people with disabilities.
The single most important tag is the description tag,
since it often appears as the text explanation of the page under the page title on
the search engine results pages. Since the description tag should
contain a brief summary of the page's information content, it's also very important to good seo.
A good SEO will often spend more than an hour writing each page description,
it's that important.
Early forms of search engine optimization often involved false
manipulation of meta information. This is where some of the false SEO information
comes from today. Whatever the
Black Hat method of meta tag manipulation, it's now a
complete waste of time and money. Search engines figured out the tricks and will
severely penalize sites that still try to use them.
The common language used for the text content on the
page. The tag indicates that it is written in basic English.
<meta name="description" content="Meta tags are still
important to search engines, web browsers and site users. Use meta tags correctly" />
The description of the page is a summary of the information
contained in the text.
<meta name="keywords" content="meta tag tags good use important" />
The keywords tag is not very important, frequently ignored by
search engines and often often mis-used. Using commas to separate keywords reduces
their overall value to search engines and usually make the list too long.
<meta name="abstract" content="Good meta tag use helps
create a good business web site." />
The abstract is a general description of the page and it's
importance to the site.
The classification tag helps search engines to determine
the type of information the site contains.
<meta name="rating" content="General" />
The content rating tag is now mostly outdated, since there
are better ways of verifying a site's suitability for various audiences. See
the Family online safety Institute
site. It still should be used, simply as a general indication of
the site's content.
<meta name="language" content="en" />
A more definite indicator to user-agents for the
language used than the http-equiv tag noted above.
<meta name="distribution" content="Global" />
This tag is strictly for search engines. Together with the
robots tags, the distribution tag tells search engines that
this document can be listed anywhere. Valid content for this tag include:
Global, local or IU. Internal
use documents should probably not be posted for the public anyway. Use the Global
content for most
business information pages.
<meta name="country" content="Canada" />
Simply a hint to search engines that give
country specific search results. This tag is often ignored.
The contact or contact_addr tag is really only used by the
people who read source code. It is still an important tag to help people
contact the author or site owner for information or verification.
A very important tag. Business websites need to establish
credibility. Every document has an author. Anonymous doesn't write
credible web pages. Several members of our team have and
will contribute to this page. Where only one or two people wrote the text content,
acknowledge them by name.
Although meta tags are still important, it's not for the
reasons that many web designers claim. Meta tags generally, don't have too much
value in search engine optimization. When search engines relied on meta data to
index and
rank web pages, web developers abused them. Now, the search engines rarely
trust them.
Meta tags Summary
Meta tags are still very
important to every good website. For
a business website,
the proper use of meta tags can make a big difference in
the visitor's experience.
Before you hire a
business website designer, read their source code to determine if they know
how to use meta tags correctly. You can read
the source code on any web
page by simply clicking the right mouse button and then clicking on the
View source (in Explorer) or View page source (in Firefox). Try it
on this page. If the
meta data is only directed at search engines, i.e. 25-50 words listed in the
keywords tag are too many to be taken seriously and the only other tag
is description, caution should definitely be your guide. You're probably
looking at
a graphic artist website, not
a professional business web site designer.
If you found this meta tags information useful and wish to link directly to this web page, simply
copy and paste the following code onto any of your site's pages:
<a href="http://
www.seowebsitesdesigners.com/meta-tags.html">Important meta tags</a>
Please note: Google does not permit direct search linking from non-exclusive business
sites and so they are not included on the search engine links list. Please
search Google directly at www.google.com
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