Title Tag Optimization 101

Your title tags should always be optimized for maximum search engine visibility as well as user friendliness! Search engine use these tags to gather information about the website and give them weight when determining relevance. Many engines also use them as the headers on the SERPs. The user can also refer to the title tags to see what page of your website they are on. 

The importance of matching your title tag to your webpage cannot be overstressed. You should finish your webpage before finalizing the title tag, so ensure your title tag is appropriate and will be recognized accurately by the search engines. Title tags give you the opportunity to specifically denote each page, so don’t waste this opportunity by making them all simply refer to your whole website!

 Your content should be properly optimized with keywords acquired through solid research. The title tags should also reflect these keywords, and you should make sure that you have consistency between the webpage content and the title tag to ensure oproper ranking on the SERPs. The primary keyword should be used as near to the beginning of the title tag as possible. Make your title tag descriptive, so anyone viewing it will have an instant, accurate idea of what the page is about.

 Use the same keyword in the url also. Being consistent will only help the search engines in determining the value of your content. However, care should be taken to avoid stuffing your content, url or title tags with keywords, as this can hurt your rankings as the search engines begin to think you may be trying ti game the system. Use keywords properly to accurately describe your web content, and you will have good results and click through rates! 

Make sure you don’t use black hat methods like trying to deceive the search engines. Using keywords in your title tag that do not appear in your actual webpage content can hurt you with the search engines. The title tag should always correspond with the actual webpage content for maximum click through rates and search engine friendliness. Also be sure that you are using descriptive words in the title tag as this will improve customer click through even if the rankings in the SERPS are still low.

 The more information you can convey in your title tag, the more valuable it will be. Users who have several webpages open in different browser windows can quickly and easily check title tags to see which page they are on, and when bookmarking, will be able to recognize the page later when they want to find it again.

Pay attention to how your title tag looks. It should be 65 characters or less to avoid being truncated by the search engines; it should use title caps for a professional look, and again, all title tags should be page specific! If you follow all of these tips, your click through rate and your rankings for each webpage should improve.