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Does Google read META tags?
Published: May 27, 2005
The answer to this is yes because it's HTML and as such it has to wade past it to reach the rest of the content, but the information within the two most popular META tags, keywords and description, is largely ignored by Google and many other top search engines.
Until now that is...
Breaking news
I had to be sure but for a little while now Google has been using my META description tag to populate the text under the search engine listing for the majority of my articles. Why? I have no idea because it has ignored it for soooo long. Many sites I know and some I've written have no keywords or descriptions and still cut it at the top.
META tags don't offer a ranking benefit
Check my Formula 1 (http://formula1photos.tn38.net) site in Google. It's half way down page 1 amongst over 6,000,000 results for more than one phrase. Not bad for a site with no keywords or description META tags (and no PageRank come to think of it since the site is still quite new).
- Google.com: "f1 images": Page 1
- Google.com: "formula 1 photos": Page 1
- Google.com: "imola f1": Page 1
- Google.com: "monza f1": Page 1
So what's the point of the META description tag?
Well, since it's being displayed amongst results, start to write good, attractive copy that will encourage someone to click on your link over the others. You may as well, it's what it's there for. Remember the golden rule. Every page must be unique and that includes META tags. Don't expect explosive sales figures because of it though.
Google does index the meta description and has done for some time. It uses this in the page listings for some web pages. However, my feeling is that it may not put much weight on this when it comes to working out the position of each listing. As an example, search "web design horsham" and the CVW Web Design website listing has its meta description shown. This particular example has been this way for several years. I would always recommend using a meta description (and meta keywords come to that) simply because there's no harm in doing it and it might give you an advantage in some search engines.