How Page Title Tags Help Search Engines Find Your Site

With many search engines, the information displayed on search results page comes from two places: the html “title tag” on the web page and its meta-description tag if you have one, or the search engines select text from the landing page for a site description. I don’t have to tell you that leaving it up to the search engines to find text that describes your site is a bad idea.

What Is a Title Tag?
This is the line of words that show at the top bar of your web page’s browser. The title tag has been–and probably will always be–one of the most important factors in achieving high search engine rankings. In fact, fixing just the title tags of your pages can often generate quick and appreciable differences to your search rankings. And because the words in the title tag are what appear in the clickable link on the search engine results page… changing them usually results in more clickthroughs to your site.

Title tags are definitely one of the most important factors as far as the algorithmic weight given to them by search engines; they are equally as important as your visible text on the page and the hyperlinks pointing to your pages — perhaps even more so.

Each page should have a unique page title and description meta-tag. A common question is “Do company names belong in the title tag?” I’d say yes, of course, but this doesn’t mean that you should put “just” your company name in the title tag. You also want to add a good descriptive keyword phrase too; something that will help compel the prospect to click on your listing. You’d be surprised how many sites just use “HOME PAGE” as the title, or worse yet, they don’t use anything and it shows untitled page. Others make the mistake of re-using the exact same words on every page of their site, which makes it harder for the search engines to know what each page is about that lowers your rankings for sure!

Your title tags should contain specific keyword phrases that match the content on the particular page. For example, if your company is ACME Incorporated, a Specialty Glassware company in Los Angeles, California, you shouldn’t place ONLY the words “ACME Incorporated” in your title tag, but instead use something like “ACME Incorporated Specialty Glassware – Bar Glassware, California.”

Be sure to do your keyword research to find the best phrases! You would need to be even more specific if you prefer to work with people only in the Los Angeles area. In that case, use keywords such as “Los Angeles Specialty Glassware” in your title tag or maybe “Specialty Glassware – Bar Glassware – Los Angeles.”

How your listing appears on the Search Results Page (SRP) is a critical aspect of you improving traffic. After all, if you have high search engine rankings but your targeted buyers aren’t clicking through, it won’t do you much good.

Write compelling titles tags and description tags so that your prospects select you over the competition.

Search your top keywords and see what the competition is using for page titles and descriptions. If you’re not the person who actually works on the site, you still need to communicate exactly what you want and make sure that your web designer understands these critical elements.

As for how many words should you use in the title tag, Google will display up to 66 characters of a title tag, cropping it to complete words. Yahoo! has an absolute cutoff in presenting titles of exactly 120 characters, which is substantially longer and gives you much more room to present longer titles. The best strategy for creating a long title is to make sure that the title works for both Google and Yahoo.

Now that you know how important title tags are for every page of your website, spend some time and come up with some that are descriptive and accurate. This will help the search engines find and rank your site, which should help more customers find you and buy your products. Good luck!

For more Internet marketing techniques to help you increase search engine rankings and generate more traffic to your site, check out the “Internet Profit Kit for Information Marketers: 101 Proven Tactics & Tools You Can Use to Build Your Business.” Visit https://www.internetprofitkit.com for details.