Everyone who has anything to do with online marketing understands that the META descriptions hold some importance in when it comes to marketing a site. However too many people misunderstand the role in which they play placing more weight on ranking factors rather then it being a useful tool to sell your site to the user. Having good rankings is once thing but your sites click through rate is a whole different ball game. For this reason I thought I would write 5 tips on getting the most out of your META descriptions helping your site get a bit more of that vital traffic…
1) Bespoke all META descriptions for all your pages.
This may seem pretty obvious but far too many sites only optimise their META descriptions for the pages they want to rank for and fail to recognise other pages. Due to this your other sites pages are not reaching their full potential. I am under the assertion that you never have a full picture of what people are searching for so make sure all your descriptions say something about the page the user might click through to.
2) Include any promotions or offers in the descriptions
SEO is becoming ever more competitive so with hundreds of sites all competing for traffic it is not about simply ranking well any more. Just as important you want to draw people in so that they click on your site. For this reason you should include any promotions such as free delivery which will differentiate yourself form the crowd!
3) Get your keywords in
This pretty much goes without saying however it is still worth mentioning as it goes beyond SEO. When someone types in a search query all the keywords are highlighted in bold on the search engine results page. This then draws in the user’s eye, increases their perception of relevancy and therefore increases the chance they will click through to your site.
4) Pay attention to the number of characters displayed
This is important taking account points 2 and 3. The amount of characters of a META description that display is roughly 155 characters (with spacing) and this means that you have to contain any promotion/offer and the keywords within this character number. It is no good mentioning your keyword or the fact your have free delivery after 155 characters as the user will to get to see it. So make sure you mention these as soon as possible.
5) Change them from time to time reflecting any major holidays/seasons
For example the Christmas period. People searching around Christmas will be more receptive to Christmas phrasing and offerings and so this can improve the CTR for your site. Of course this may not be feasible for all times of the year however it is certainly worth while for some such as the summer, January sales etc.
6) Spelling and Grammar
I know I said only 5 tips however this is worth mentioning. Misspelled words do not fill the user with confidence so make sure you double check all your descriptions before you put them live.
This about sums it up. CTR is really is one of the most important factors and these simple and effortless tips are definitely worthwhile as every click on your site ultimately counts.