What are meta descriptions?
Meta descriptions are a piece of text inserted in the source code's <meta name="description">, and their purpose is to describe the content of an individual page/URL. You can think of it as a kind of "teaser" for the page.
Meta descriptions are not displayed directly on the website, but in the source code, where they are read by search engines and shown in the search results, below the so-called title tag, for selected searches.
NOTE!
Meta descriptions, unlike the meta title, do not have a direct effect on a page's ranking, but play a major role in the page's CTR/click-through rate and therefore still have an effect on your page's organic performance.
What do meta descriptions look like? An example
Below you can see an example of how meta descriptions look in the source code:
And below, how it appears in the search results:
How do you write good meta descriptions?
First and foremost, you need to know what good meta descriptions are. A good meta description is one that attracts as many clicks as possible. The higher the click-through rate, the better.
And how do you achieve that? You do it by writing descriptions that:
- Are relevant and compelling.
- Include the primary keyword at least once, and preferably twice.
- Make the search result stand out — for example by using emojis, numbers, symbols, etc.
- Are the right length.
And in general, give the reader the desire to click to read more.
Do you want to optimise your meta descriptions for better visibility in search results?
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