Transcript Meta Tags - The Daley Journal

Meta Tags
Web Notes can be found by opening
Power Point and going to this file:
(H:/OPEN/DALEY/WEB/NOTES/ META TAGS)
What are Meta Tags?

Extra information
that you can add to
your web pages.
 This information can
range from the more
popular keywords
and description to
the more boring
robots and
copyright.

Example:

<meta name=“Joe’s
Landscaping"
content=“Joe’s
Landscaping, Mays
Landing, NJ
Specializing in
mowing, fertilizing
and seeding.">
Will Meta Tags help my page rank in
search engines?

Yes and no.
 Really more no than yes.

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
In the earlier days of the Internet keywords were
very important to early search engines.
As the web grew and more people tried to get
noticed, the keyword system got a little abused.
Most search engines started using other criteria as
well in their ranking system. In most search
engines, keywords play a part, but not a huge part
when determining relevance.
Two types of Meta Tags

There are two types of meta tags...
name
 http-equiv.

Name meta tags

The basic structure of the name type
meta tag is listed below
each is made up of name and content.
 <meta name=“Joe’s Landscaping" content="
Joe’s Landscaping, Mays Landing, NJ
Specializing in mowing, fertilizing and
seeding ">


Meta tags go in the head section of your
document...
Description meta tag
Part of the “name” meta tag
 This is description of the page or site.
 In your description use words and
phrases that you would like to show up in
a search.

Description Sample

<meta name="description"
content="Joe's Widget Company - your
complete widget headquarters. All sizes
and colors of widgets from extra small to
extra woofy. Online ordering and
overnight delivery available.">
How it would look on a search query

Joe's Widget Company
Joe's Widget Company - your complete
widget headquarters. All sizes and
colors of widgets from extra small to
extra woofy. Online ordering and
overnight delivery available.
URL: http://www.joeswidgets.com/
Keyword meta tag
Part of the “name” meta tag
 A comma-delimited list of keywords and
short phrases...

Keyword Sample

<meta name="keywords"
content="widgets, widget holders,
ergonomic aids, tools, braces, Joe's
Widget Company, widgomatic">
Easy Does it

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
Don't get too crazy with keyword and description meta tags.
The search engines have gotten pretty smart lately and they have
ways to weed out overdone keyword lists.
Whatever weight they give to keywords and descriptions will be
diminished if you did something like this...


<meta name="description" content="Lots of widgets and more
widgets and widgets for widgets, not to mention widgets and the
worlds biggest collection of widgets. Joe's Widgets are the widget of
widgets.">
<meta name="keywords" content="widgets, widgets, widgets, big
widgets, small widgets, red widgets, blue widgets, yellow widgets, tall
widgets, widgets widgets,">
If you overload your meta tags with the hope of ranking higher,
you might instead find yourself penalized and your page might be
tossed out of the index all together.
Your Assignment
Take a company from the end of your
row
 On page 24 in your manual you will be
writing descriptions and keywords for
your company
 Complete #1 through #5

Robots / spiders





A search engine uses a computer program to
find and index (catalog) web pages.
It "moves" from one page to the next by
following links.
This type of computer program is called a
"spider" or a "robot".
These robots can be told what links to follow
or not follow, pages to index or not index.
The most common method (assuming you
wanted to control the robot) is to make use of
the robots meta tag in individual pages...
Example of Robots

<meta name="robots"
content="all|none|index|noindex|follow|n
ofollow">
Whenever you see a list of items separated
by a pipe -> | , the pipe means "or".
 You (normally) may choose one from the list
of items.

What each item in the Robot does…

All





This is the default.
To "index" means to place in their database so it is
available for searches.
It means that the spiders (or robots) can index this
page and follow all links on this page.
If you want robots to index everything and follow
everything, then just skip the robots tag.
The robots will index and follow everything
automatically.
What each item in the Robot does…

None
instructs the browser to basically ignore the
page.
 Don't index anything and don't follow any
links.

What each item in the Robot does…

Index

The robot should index the page.
What each item in the Robot does…

Noindex

The robot may not index the page, but it
is welcome to follow links on the page.
What each item in the Robot does…

follow

The robot may follow links on the page.
What each item in the Robot does…

nofollow

The robot is welcome to index the page,
but may not follow any links on the page.
What’s the point

If you're thinking there seems to be a bit of
overlap in those instructions…there is!
 For the most part, all you need to worry about
are none, noindex and nofollow, or just
leave that meta tag out for the robot to index
and follow everything.
 So what’s the point…I’m just trying to show
you some of the tricks of the trade


Check out good corporate sites like FORD, BANK
OF AMERICA, etc.
Look at their meta tags
Some Examples

How do I prevent the spiders from
indexing my page?

<meta name="robots" content="noindex">
Some Examples

How do I prevent the spiders from
following links on my page?

<meta name="robots" content="nofollow">
Some Examples

How do I get a search engine to
completely ignore my page?

<meta name="robots" content="none">
Some Examples

What do I do if I want the search
engines to index the page and follow all
links?
Don't add a robots meta tag.
 The spiders will index and follow everything
automatically.

The end of spiders / robots

The spider programs used by search engines
are usually very well behaved and they obey
what's in the robots meta tag
 Some spiders however, such as those used in
email harvesters are bad robots.


They could care less what you specify and they
index and follow whatever they want.
They don’t do any harm... they just collect
information (usually email addresses) for whoever
is running the spider. And you can guess what
happens with this info…
A refresher

Remember this ..

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
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
When you click on a link a request is sent for a file to a server.
That request is made using a particular protocol (format)
called HTTP (Hyper-Text Transfer Protocol).
The server checks to see if it has the file, then sends back a
block of information plus the file.
That extra block of information is the "header" block.
It can contain extra information for the browser.
By using a http-equiv meta tag, you can sort of fake out the
browser and make it believe it's getting extra information from
the server. Only rather than from the server, it's coming from
you in the form of a meta tag.
There are a few http-equiv meta tags, but only one that is
worth learning about...
http-equiv="refresh"


This refreshes (or reloads) the browser.
It can reload with the same page, or with a
different page.
 It can reload immediately, or after a time
interval.
 The basic syntax is as follows...

<meta http-equiv="refresh"
content="5;url=http://www.newsite.com/">

5 is the number of seconds to wait before
refreshing, and http://www.newsite.com/ is the
new URL. This can be a full or relative URL.
What's a full or relative URL?


A URL (Uniform Resource Locator) is the address of a
file on the WWW.
A full URL is the complete address such as:



http://www.pagetutor.com/pagetutor/tables/lesson01.html
A partial, or relative URL is the address
relative to another page in the same domain:



lesson01.html
tables/lesson01.html
/tables/lesson01.html
Other http-equiv meta tags…

Other tags ….



expires, pragma, window-target, etc.
We'll skip these for a very good reason... they don't work!
At best, they'll only work for a very small portion of your
visitors. They're not worth bothering with... trust me.

There are other NAME type meta tags, such as author,
copyright, generator, etc, but those aren't really of any use
to you either.

The meta tags we've gone over have a solid use, and they
work nearly universally. Unless you have a specific need,
there is no reason to spend time messing with all the various
other meta tags.
Last thing ABOUT META TAGS…
Develop your description and
keywords tags
 use the robots meta tag only where
absolutely necessary



(you should really just let the robots do their
thing)
use the http-equiv="refresh" meta tag
if you want to re-direct visitors.
Improving your web site ranking
Your document's TITLE is probably the
most important criteria in most search
engine rankings.
 Choose it carefully. It should contain your
most important keywords without being
too wordy.

Improving your web site ranking
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Links.
The number of links pointing to your page is of great
significance when search engines rank one site
against another.
The idea is that a site with more links pointing to it
contains more desirable content. Makes perfect sense.
It's tempting to say the key to getting linked to is to
exchange links or get people to link to you.


Many people have gone down that "cart before the horse"
path and haven't fared very well.
How to get links you ask?? Simple. Have desirable content.
Or to put it another way - HAVE DESIRABLE CONTENT. .
Improving your web site ranking

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Use ALT attributes in your image tags.
Imagine the image was not there.

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The ALT attribute is what the search engine sees.
If your page is about widgets, and you have a lot of
pictures of widgets, the search engines will miss
them all.
Use appropriate ATL attributes such as alt="Red
Widget", alt="Super Widget", alt="Widget
Accessories", etc.
Improving your web site ranking

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Submit your sites to the big search engines by hand.
Don't use those Super Site Blaster programs and services (the
ones that promise to submit your site to 1000 search engines and
directories for $99.95).
Using one of those will accomplish three things...

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1) it will make you several dollars lighter
2) you'll be submitted to a bunch of useless or defunct link sites, and
most importantly
3) legitimate search engines might penalize you.
Just hand submit your home page to a half dozen of the bigger
search engines.
Their spiders will crawl through your site and index the rest of the
pages.
Improving your web site ranking
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Don't use phony "doorway" pages that load up on
keywords and redirect the visitor to your main page.
While this might work sometimes with a few minor
search engines, believe that search engine
programmers are smart enough to detect those sorts
of shenanigans and will likely toss your pages right out
of the index.
Your best bet is to remain completely above board and
leave the stupid search engine tricks to someone else
Improving your web site ranking



Don't use phony "doorway" pages that load up on
keywords and redirect the visitor to your main page.
While this might work sometimes with a few minor
search engines, believe that search engine
programmers are smart enough to detect those sorts
of shenanigans and will likely toss your pages right out
of the index.
Your best bet is to remain completely above board and
leave the stupid search engine tricks to someone else
Improving your web site ranking

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Promote your site consistently, creatively and
responsibly.
DON'T buy one of those CD's full of email
addresses and spam three million people.
You won't get much of a response and you
might get your ISP or web host a little angry.
Participate in web rings if you wish.
Offer something of value for free.
That’s it!
Understand all of it? Let me know
if you have questions!