For years there was an easy tell if a so-called search engine expert was a fraud. If they told a Web site owner they weren’t being found at the search engines because their meta-tags weren’t fully optimized I knew they hadn’t read anything on the subject since 1997.

Meta-tags are pieces of information that appear in the source code of a page, but don’t appear on the page itself. These tags–primarily the meta-keyword and meta-description tag–had been an important part of search optimization in the late 90′s, but were then ignored by the search engines because they were often stuffed with mis-leading words to attract more visitors.

As search engines matured they became much more interested in the content that appears on the page, not under it.

Still, there is reason to pay attention to the meta-tags, specifically the meta-description. Major search engines such as Google and Yahoo often use the meta-description on their search results page. This means that you have some control over the words that appear when one of your Web pages is pulled up as a result of a given search.

By crafting a compelling meta-description you may get a searcher to click on your link as opposed to that of a competitor. Carolyn Phillips also suggests putting calls-to-action and phone numbers in a meta-description tag to motivate searchers to click on that link or pick up the phone.

So, while it still seems like there’s little help meta-tags can offer to your search engine rankings, a well-written meta-description, coupled with a keyword-rich page title can drive more qualified leads to your Web site.

For more details on how search engines might display your meta-tags, check out 7 Ways Your Page May Be Described in the SERPs by Jill Whalen.

Rich Brooks
Maine Search Engine Optimization