1. How to use Meta Tags to optimize a web page.
In part one of this Search Engine Optimization article series, we covered the
critical steps of content development during the web site design process. If the
content of each page is optimized by focusing on one specific keyword that is
related to the main theme of the entire site, the page has a better chance of
being found and indexed by search engine crawlers. However, it is critical to
write a page that is also human friendly. If the site does not have relevant
content to the keywords you choose, it will drop in popularity and ultimately
become invisible to search engines. Therefore, unique and engaging content that
has a value to the reader will also score big with the search engines.
After carefully choosing your keywords, creating the H1 heading,
subheadings and alt tags, next is the all-important step of developing Meta Tags.
Meta Tags are small text blocks written within the HTML page that describe the
contents of the website and the particular page to web crawlers and browsers.
The text is not directly visible on the browser page. To see it, you would have to
look at the source code of the page and they are usually the first few lines of the
page.
Many variations of Meta tags are available for our use. They each describe a
different type of information. For instance, the description Meta tag is used to
write a one paragraph description about the content of the page. Using the
keywords met a tag, you can provide list of keywords that you want the crawler to
use to categorize your page. You can use met a tags to issue specific
instructions to robots such as when to check back for updated content, or even
not to index the page at all. You may want to exclude certain pages from
appearing on search engine result pages, such as internal pages intended for
staff member.
Remember, if your website does not have met a tags, then it is unlikely to
ever have a high listing within any of the major internet search engines ( except
Google) and directories. Unfortunately, many website designers and developers
overlook this important aspect of website development. It’s important to develop
these met a tags correctly in order to gain the benefits. Hiring an expert will pay
off, but if you want to try it yourself, you can follow the guidelines below.
In this article, I will describe the basic fundamentals of correct Met a Tag building
for a webpage:
1. Start with the title tag. Google indexes this important tag and
recommends that you have different titles for each page. Title appears on
top of browser window as well as the bookmarked text when the visitor
bookmarks your page. Title is the text that appears on search engine

2. results page as the heading of the page. Make sure you write compelling
title tags to evoke response and get the click. For instance, using our
example from article one, if you are making a title tag for gold sandals
under $20, you would use the following <title> Gold Sandals Under
$20</title>.The title tag is enclosed between <title> and </title>. Notice the
forward slash (/) before the < in the second use of the word title. This must
be included to close, or signal the end, of the tag.
2. The next Met a tag that is important is the description tag. This would
provide a short description about the page. For instance, <Met a title:
“description “content=”the description would go here including important
keywords/>. Don’t use too many words. Try to keep it fewer than 170
characters.
3. Keyword tags are also very important and contain relevant information
about your site. An example would be, <Met a name="keywords"
content="Gold Sandals, women’s shoes, Los Angeles, California/>. Don’t
use too many keywords and include your location if you have a physical
store.
4. There are a few other Met a tags like the “robots” tag that tell search
engine spiders whether or not to follow the links on the page and if the
page should be indexed or not. There are plenty of great articles and
how-tos on the web to help you learn more about met a tags.
Even if you don’t know anything about coding HTML pages, you can use
Dreamweaver or other tools to add met a tags to your pages. If done correctly,
Met a tags in combination with other marketing strategies can help you increase
your ranking quickly. Although, people generally only use description and
keyword Met a tags, there are many other ones that can be beneficial. It is
advisable to hire an expert that can develop and supply different Met a tags
because it can become challenging to manage.