How Do I get Google to update my Snippet

[stebout]

Hello. I'm looking to get Google to use my Meta tag as the snippet displayed for my website. Google is using is the first sentence on my website. I've modified my Meta tag several times, but can't seem to get them to update. Any ideas? Do I need to wait longer? Thanks, Steve.

[tim_buchalka]

I suspect you are not being patient enough. It takes a while from when you change a page, for the change to be found by google, and then for the change to be displayed in the search engine results.

Read this thread for details.

how long does it take to get indexed?

Cheers

[Midir]

I had a problem like this for a website of mine that was getting 40-100 visitors a day, and it took google over 2 weeks to update the snippet.

[MikeWike]

I think it usually takes ~1 week. It might be faster or slower, depends on the crawlers.

[theverysmartguy]

I changed a "snippet" on one of my sites, and Googles crawled and changed it within a few hours.

All I did was make sure the site was pinged; and then ran it through an indexing program as well.

Once I did all that, Google came a running.

-- Jeff

[paulgl]

I may be wrong on this one, but if the site in question is
in your sig, that meta description is not even as good as
the first line of the webpage. Google is actually pretty
smart in those things, and they do it to help the
searcher, not penalize you. It's your benefit as well
to include whatever looks best.

But, as I said, google may change it over time.

Just answered a similar question today here.

Wikipedia uses none of that crapola meta, but
their content is optimized. People should optimize
content, not meta tags. In fact, I'd say
"optimized meta tags" is an oxymoron.

That's like saying a "great gas mileage hummer."

Paul

[stebout]

Thanks everyone for the feedback. I'm new to all this and every bit of feedback helped. Google did modify my snippet as of yesterday.

paulgl: yes it's the site in my sig and thanks for the feedback. I'll re-evaluate.

I do have another question and not sure if I should start a new post or continue on this one...I will continue here and if I shouldn't please let me know.

Does anyone know how often Google re-evaluates a site and determines on what page it will show on the search results for that phrase. Last week I was on the first page for search term "Pringles Coupons" but now I'm on the top of page 2? Cheers!

[tim_buchalka]

Originally Posted by stebout

Does anyone know how often Google re-evaluates a site and determines on what page it will show on the search results for that phrase. Last week I was on the first page for search term "Pringles Coupons" but now I'm on the top of page 2? Cheers!

Google evaluates results effectively in real time/continuously. It's an ongoing thing that is happening in the background all the time.

Remember that indexing and ranking and completely separate processes and not really related to each other.

It's normal for your rankings to go up and down over time, particularly for newer sites or when first ranking for a keyword.

It's a sign that your site probably has not got enough authority so focus on adding more content and internal links and some backlinks as well.

Cheers


Tim

[UMS]

Keep in mind that Google won't automatically use your meta description if in Google's infinite wisdom, they find a more representative snippet in your article body.

[stebout]

Thanks Tim!