8 replies to this topic

[CarolynSN]

Is it okay if my meta description and the actual text on the page are the same? I have a paragraph at the top of all my pages and I was thinking of making it my meta description too.

Carolyn

[Jill]

It's perfectly fine, but if that's what you're going to do with it, there's no sense in using it at all. Google will already have access to those sentences and will use them for their descriptive snippet if it makes sense to do so.

See my meta description article for more info on the best ways to use one.

[seobarry]

I usally write custom/unique meta descriptions for all important pages of the website. Less important pages, like news articles for example, I let Google decide.

[Jill]

@SEOBarry, the problem with not writing Meta descriptions for news articles is that you'll get no description (or a bad one) when people share your post on social media sites such as Facebook and Google+.

You may want to read that meta description article I mentioned above which discusses that. It's actually a more important, IMO, to use them on those types of pages more so than the main pages of a site.

[BusinessWebDesigns]

I think it's important to have a meta description on all your pages you care about. If you don;t they you let Google decided and they will just choose a random piece of text. If you write your own then you have the ability to make the user click on your results because you have click bait in the description.

[Mikl]

... they will just choose a random piece of text ,,,,

No, it's not random. It's whatever text they consider will best answer your query. In most cases, that means extracts that contain the keywords that you specified.

Mike

[Jill]

If you don;t they you let Google decided...

Google will decide what to use regardless of whether you have a meta description on the page or not. Please read the meta description article I linked to above before just repeating what other sites say.

[BusinessWebDesigns]

Just a quick response.


Mikl :Poor choice of words with random, but i meant that it will be unknown to you.

Also to Jill: I know Google chooses either way, but If you have a chance to offer a perfectly worded description for your listing that is CTR optimization etc it's allot better.

[chrishirst]

but If you have a chance to offer a perfectly worded description for your listing that is CTR optimization etc it's allot better.

Only in YOUR opinion!

Google's text analysis may "decide" otherwise