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Description on google results...

by aygabtu
7 replies
  • SEO
    • |
If google isn't using the description meta tag value in the results they show, does that mean they might have flagged it as keyword stuffing? They are currently using the first line of text below the banner I have which is about registering on the site, not the page itself. Pretty stupid if you ask me.
#description #google #results
  • Profile picture of the author SamDermot
    Banned
    I have seen most of search results are with meta description, if not then there would be any problem in your meta description, it may be too long, missing any coding or there would be some stop words etc.
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  • Profile picture of the author Mister Rex
    Google will decide if they use the meta description or not. It isnt page specific, it is query specific. This also isnt a bad thing. What google is doing is trying to match the keywords to keywords on the page. If the keywords are already in the meta desc, chances are google will use it. If not, they will find that keyword somewhere else in the site and use that.

    You may have seen results where there is a snippet of text followed by three periods. Example: this is an example meta description... for more information on keyword blah blah

    What they do there is take the first line of the meta description and a line of text from the body of content that is relevant to the search. Again, this isnt a bad thing and is not hurting you.
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    • Profile picture of the author aygabtu
      The site has been around for 7 months and it has always used my meta-description up until now. Not sure exactly when it switched, but must have been in the last week or so.

      It also is not a combination of my meta description and other content, it is only the first full sentence on the page, below the menu bar.

      I get the feeling that google is trying to tell me that my meta description is too optimized. The first part of the meta descriptions match the title and h1 tags on each page.
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      • Profile picture of the author aygabtu
        Actually looked at some of my competitors and google is ignoring the description on some of theirs also. Wonder what's going on.
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  • Profile picture of the author C Rebecca
    No, not necessarily. This means either your description is unavailable to the crawler or your description is not suitable according to the content of the website.
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    • Profile picture of the author aygabtu
      Originally Posted by C Rebecca View Post

      No, not necessarily. This means either your description is unavailable to the crawler or your description is not suitable according to the content of the website.

      They've used it up to 2 weeks ago. Since I noticed it though, I've modified it hoping they would pick it up but I also changed the content on my site and they picked up the first line of the pages(I changed this also) instead of my meta description.
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      • Profile picture of the author paulgl
        Google has had that policy for years. Using what it deems fit
        for the searcher, not the webmaster, who may be trying to
        fool someone...

        Recently google has stated they are going to be "changing"
        even more webmaster goodies, AKA meta-duping, like
        what they use for the link, snippet, etc.

        But then, a wise webmaster was already aware of this long
        before they decided to actually kick it into high gear.

        One can only assume that their algo/bots will even determine
        a page they feel is just spam, or trying to shmooze someone
        or something, just by looking at idiotic meta descriptions.

        But then, once again, wise webmasters already knew how to make
        a true meta description. And it aint keyword stuffing or any other
        such meta rot that seems to just never die. Same goes
        for the title tag. Google has told people time and time again how
        to actually do it.

        Paul
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