How many of you are looking for ways to improve your SEO? How many of you would like to take it on in bite-sized pieces, understand what you’re doing, and know that your efforts are making your site all that more enticing to search engines all while seeing improvement in the number of click-throughs and visitors to your site and it’s pages and posts?
If you’re not raising your hand right now, you should be.
Today we’re talking about one of the “big 3” when it comes to search engine tactics. The algorithmic weight given to title tags is equal in importance to your visible text copy and the links pointing to your pages. Many of the websites I see don’t have customized links – and the silly part is… it’s super easy, and helps with your SEO in a big way.
Title Tags & Why They’re Important
Many of the sites I visit and those of my new clients often don’t utilize title tags in a way that’s really beneficial to their SEO. Most aren’t even sure what I’m talking about when I mention title tags.
The title tag is located at the top of your browser page. If you’ve got multiple tabs open in your browser like I did in the photo above, you’ll see the title tags listed on that tab. You might not be able to always read everything that’s been put into the title tag, but that’s ok – the search engines can, and that’s what matters.
Why Customizing Title Tags is the Better Deal
I often hear “well I bought the SEO for that and it’s all set up” after I suggest customizing title tags for a quick SEO fix during a site review. The standard title tags set up in your SEO plugin are fine – but they often are just whatever your page title is or what you put in for your post title. And how often are your page titles named simply “Blog”, “About”, “Services”, “Portfolio” and so on? Those title tags aren’t going to make you stand out in a Google search. We want each of our pages to be distinct, use keywords, and convey not only what’s on the page but our blog or businesses’ offerings.
Lets really make your SEO work for you. You can do it, in about 15 minutes or less.
Once you’re on the backend of your site and have gotten into your individual post or navigation page, you can scroll down and enter your title tag into your SEO settings under Document Title. It may look a little different if you’re using another plugin, but the idea is generally the same for all SEO plugins.
Putting it Altogether
Now that you know what a title tag is, how it works, and where you can go on each individual page and post to customize your title tags – you’re ready to get to it.
So what do you put in a title tag?
- company or blog name
- title of post that’s slightly varied from the original (think summary) if it’s a blog post
- summary description of page content ( i.e. “web & logo design for small business”)
- location of business/services etc. (i.e., New York City, Boise, L.A., San Diego)
- keywords that describe your small business, blog or personal brand (i.e., diy web design, logo design, small business branding)
You can see that just by listing one of these things, or several of them, so you’re pages and posts are accurately defined could make you show up in search engine results faster.
TIP: Think about what your potential readers/clients might be searching for if they’re needing your services and then use those as keywords. Conduct your own Google search for a business or blog like yours and see what auto generates as you type in your search – consider using these results as keywords as well.
Once you’ve gotten some ideas for your title tag keywords, take just a few minutes and craft them for all your navigation pages. Here’s an example of standard title tag that you can customize to fit your pages:
Company Name | Los Angeles Web & Logo Design Firm | CA Graphic Design
You can definitely add on major keywords – like the different services you offer (free printables, fashion consulting, small business marketing, etc), or the topics you blog about (paleo recipes, vegan meal plans, whole30, etc.) or locations you serve (if you’ve got brick and mortar options) or geographical hotspots for your industry (if you’re an online business).
You can spend quite a bit of time trying to craft a perfect title tag, but to be honest, there really isn’t one. Just focus on keywords and getting your name in there and you can continue to tweak as needed – all while those newly customized title tags do their job.
Here’s to growing your SEO and building your blog!