To maximize your search engine optimization effectiveness, be sure to give your customers, as well as the little search engine spiders that index your webpages, a clear picture of what your website and each of its individual pages are about by properly using the title and description elements.


Many search engines display your website’s title and the first 15 or so words of your description in their search results. That means you need to go for action words which demand attention. Subtlety will definitely not win any awards when it comes to your site’s title and description.

Remember to have title and description metatags for every page in your website. These titles should be very brief and specific, but extremely descriptive. Good metatag descriptions provide a quick, powerful snapshot of what is contained on the webpage. 

                  Specifics...

Now let’s get down to some specifics. Webpage titles are limited to 30 characters, site descriptions can be no more than 100 characters, and the length of your URL (also known as your web address) must be less than 255 characters. These character counts include both spaces and punctuation.

Be concise and crystal clear in the description of your website. The text and the keywords must relate directly to your website content, and do be sure to mention the name of your business along with the name of your product or service.

To improve your click-through rates, always include one (or no more than two) keyword or phrase in your title and description text. Also, proofread everything - not once, not twice, but three times. It is often easy to miss a glaring error the first time around, and nothing makes your site look amateurish faster than poor grammar or typographical errors.


Avoid repeating yourself in your descriptive text. Another problem area is excessive capitalization. This makes your website appear somewhat juvenile and definitely unprofessional. Instead, use correct capitalization. Titles should always have the first letter of each word capitalized, and descriptions should be constructed as sentences with only the first word capitalized.

Here are several more quick guidelines that will turn your website title and description into digital gold:

• Never use vulgar or obscene language.
• Do not use words that make your title or description seem gimmicky.
• Do not repeat words (i.e., Sale, Sale, Sale!)
• Refrain from using a lot of superlatives.
• Double-check phone numbers and other contact information, any dates mentioned, and link URLs for accuracy.