The internet serves as your best salesperson, 24/7. But for it to work for your business, you have to be found. Writing meta descriptions is a simple way to help give your website visibility a boost – but it can be daunting. However, with the right information and some true dedication, you can boost your SEO and propel your company goals to new heights.
Ready to shoot for the moon and get the attention of search engines? Here’s what you need to know about writing meta descriptions.
What is a Meta Description?
The meta description is a short narrative that appears just below the link of a search result. It’s precise, describes the content, and lets the reader know right away if it fulfills the requirements of the search. The meta description has a lot of power — with the critical end goal of compelling the person to click through to the website.
When you’re writing a meta description, be sure to make it relevant to the content, detailed, and as eye-catching as possible. The better the meta description, the more it helps to contribute to your ranking on search engine results pages (SERPs).
What to Consider When Writing a Meta Description
Think critically about the product, service, article, or other information you are trying to promote before writing meta descriptions. You can’t expect someone to find it in the plethora of pages and sites on the world wide web if you are not clear yourself.
The following areas should be considered when writing meta descriptions:
Length — as a standard, keep it under 155 characters. Google sometimes adds other information (like the date), and a longer description could get cut off.
Clarity — be relevant and specific. Don’t fill it with fluff. Readers are pretty discerning, so using descriptive, clear language that is simple to understand is important.
Focus Keyword(s) — use the focus keyword(s) but don’t make the meta description so stuffed with them that they don’t make any sense.
Active Voice — use active voice to create dynamism and to propel the searcher to take action. In its essence, a meta description is a call to action. Starting the text with verbs like “Learn,” “Discover,” and “Find,” are popular strategies.
Benefit/Solution — give them valuable, informative descriptions that showcase benefits or solutions if possible. A couple of examples include: “Looking to cover that bald spot?” or “Find the longest-lasting car wax to keep your car looking fabulous.”
How Do You Write an Effective Meta Description?
Writing a compelling meta description takes a bit of practice, but there are certain rules to go by to create a fantastic piece of content. Keeping these rules in mind when composing descriptions across a broad range of products and services will not only help your SERP ranking, it will boost your overall SEO and comprehensive digital marketing efforts. (More sales!)
Provide enough information
The meta description should be long enough to offer a complete understanding of the content on the click-through. Introduce the searcher to the topic and provide the necessary details that are needed to make it clear to them what they have found.
Make it convincing
Write the description in a persuasive tone so that the person is inspired to read it and click through to the page. Be confident and bold but don’t lose sight of the important details.
Spark the interest of the searcher
The meta description should not only hold all the necessary information that the reader should have regarding the topic, but it should also be unique. Don’t just cut and paste other similar meta descriptions. You need to spark their innate curiosity to drive them to click.
Troubleshooting Meta Descriptions
If your site is not performing as you think it should, one culprit may be the meta descriptions. As mentioned above, it can take a bit of practice to produce effective ones consistently, but it is well worth your while to spend some time making them better.
If your meta description isn’t showing up on searches, it is possible that Google created something else for you. Typically, Google will do this when someone just copied and pasted other content (making a duplicate) or if they didn’t feel it was relevant.
You can seek out different web crawlers that can analyze data and provide powerful information to boost your overall SEO and specific meta descriptions.
Ready to Boost Your SEO with Compelling Meta Descriptions?
This guide can serve as a starting point to boost your SEO. Don’t get overwhelmed by the amount of information that needs to be created for a website. Start off with the most important pages: your home page and significant product and services pages (the ones that are currently the most popular). Once you get the hang of how it works, you can delve into the deeper pages.
It’s about setting priorities and making sure critical areas of your site are well represented with carefully-crafted meta descriptions. From length to precision to persuasion, writing meta descriptions that boost your pages higher in the rankings makes a big difference in whether or not your content, products, and services will get found.
Make sure to keep the tips above in mind to create engaging content that’s powerful fuel to escalate your business goals. With the right information and some dedicated effort, writing meta descriptions that work will boost your SEO. Ready to get started?
