SEO Tycoon

**T-L** · 09-12-2006, 08:21 PM

There seems to be varying opinions on this, but what META tags are still utilized by search engines?

**A.N.Onym** · 09-12-2006, 08:24 PM

It depends on how you qualify 'utilized'.

They don't use them for ranking your site or pages any more.
But they do use them to understand what your page is about.

They also use meta description to show it as a whole or snippets from it and from the page in the Search Engine Results Pages. That's the point of using meta description, because if you use unique descriptions for each page, you'll be able to increase click-throughs from the SERPs by adding call to action.

**abohart** · 09-13-2006, 12:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by A.N.Onym

... you'll be able to increase click-throughs from the SERPs by adding call to action.

Can you explain what you mean by "call to action"? I'm just wondering if I'm doing my description tags correctly...

**kthdsn** · 09-13-2006, 12:46 PM

I only use meta description tags, the rest seem pretty useless.

At work we have to use loads of meta tags and dublin core tags (I work on a government website) and they just don't seem to add anything useful to the site.

**Blonde Jon** · 09-14-2006, 12:00 AM

The only thing I worry about between my <head> tags is my <Title>. I've wrote a bunch of mumbo jumbo in my meta tags and still get good rankings. Metatags were a thing of the early 90's.

**disquietus** · 09-14-2006, 12:20 AM

Google picks up the description to use as the description for you main URL, but that's about it, as far as I can tell. I don't even bother with the keywords.

**Pearse** · 09-14-2006, 03:11 AM

I use the keyword meta tag for orginizational reasons... and sometimes just to fish with the competition.

**T-L** · 09-14-2006, 09:11 AM

Lots of varied responses, like I assumed.

Based on people's opinions I've decided I'll stick with Title, Description, and Keywords. Like everyone else I don't believe they're all used, but they're easy to implement and won't cause any bad effects.

**cooldesigner** · 09-14-2006, 09:17 AM

Other than Description tag, I also sometimes use the following content-type tag.
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf8" />

**davejuk** · 09-14-2006, 11:26 AM

You should ALWAYS set the character encoding as well as the page language in your META tags.

Description, abstract, and keywords are a complete waste of time in most cases; perhaps just set them for your home page.

I wouldn't even set the description for Google, since it will do it itself based on the search query and highlight words from the query, increasing the chances the user clicks.

**kthdsn** · 09-14-2006, 12:12 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by davejuk

You should ALWAYS set the character encoding as well as the page language in your META tags.

I disagree, you should set the encoding in the xml declaration and set the language in the html tag, eg:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.1//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml11/DTD/xhtml11.dtd">
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en">

**Chris B** · 09-15-2006, 01:56 AM

I tend to go for just the Description, Keywords mainly.

**A.N.Onym** · 09-15-2006, 03:30 AM

That is if you run XHTML, sure.
But what's left for us HTML 4.01 Strict? Meta tags

**kthdsn** · 09-15-2006, 08:49 AM

Ahh ok, I haven't used HTML for a couple of years now, I forget

**PeterLancs** · 09-15-2006, 11:49 AM

I have these in mine

Code:

<meta name="author" content="Peter Bennett, Brakes International, Peter@brakesint.co.uk, 01 September 2007">

<meta name="description" content="Brake pads & brake pad fitting kits - Buy direct from Brakes International, importers & distributors of quality car brake parts.">
<meta name="keywords" content="Pads, brake pad, brake pads, car brake pads, brakepads, car brakepads, vehicle brake pads, vehicle brakepads, brake friction pads, performance brake pads, competition brake pads, brake friction pads, pad fitting kits, pad pins, pad fittings, pad wear sensor wires, pad wear indicators" />
<meta name="page-topic" content="brake parts">
<meta name="robots" content="index, follow">
<meta name="rating" content="general">
<meta name="copyright" content="Brakes International">