SEO is the most vibrant buzzword these days; more and more global businesses are becoming aware of this and utilising it to gain top rankings for their websites. But have you ever heard about its integral part - Meta descriptions? Do you know its importance or how it works? Let’s find out...

Meta descriptions are highly essential when it comes to on page optimisation. These are the HTML elementsthat provide briefexplanation of the content present on the web pages. It is also helpful for the users as well as search engines to understand about the web page and its overall theme. These Meta descriptions are used by the search engines in order to display preview snippets for a given page.Therefore, optimising these Meta descriptions are quite significant.

In general, the basic function of a Meta description is to get the visitor to click your website’s link. When a user searches a specific element on the web, search engines show a brief description along with the website’s clickable link to the user so that he or she can take some action.

In fact, Google uses click-through-rate (CTR) to determine whether your site has the relevant web page,which the end-user is searching for. If more people click your result according to the relevancy of the description, then it will move up on the SERP. This is why it is essential to optimise the Meta description. But do you know how to create the ideal relevant Meta descriptions? No, let’s find out...

Here are some of the characteristics of the Meta descriptions that will help you to create a compelling web page summary.

Hidden characteristics of a good Meta description:

• Descriptions should be unique –This should be the very first thing you do; you should always use unique descriptions for your web pages. It should provide concise explanation (quick summary) of each page in a unique manner. Remember, uniqueness is the most valuable key! On the other hand, duplicate Meta descriptions force Google to ignore them.
• Keep 135 to 160 character lengths- There are no set rules or guidelines regarding character length of descriptions, because Google can show anything as per its algorithmic protocols and relevancy guidelines, but in general 135 characters is fine to describe your web page’s theme. However, sometimes Google may take more than 250 characters.
• It should be actionable – Yes,your Meta description should be crisp, concise, actionable, relevant, readable, and inspiring, rather than boring or dull. This is because catchy descriptions will attract users. In fact, it should have a strong call-to-action in active voice, which can motivate the end-user.
• It should be well-structured – You canuse technical specifications, product features, product pricing or any other elements that can best describe your product. However, you can also use rich snippets for a better explanation.
• It should complement the content. Now this is very important. Google always gives prominence to the Meta descriptions that best describes the page’s theme, which encouragesvisitors to click it. So make the meta descriptionsthat best matches the content of the page.
• Keyword focusing-It seems complicated, but it is quite simple! If the keyword or key phrases go with the text in the meta description, Google will more likelyuse that meta description. In fact, it may bold it in the search results for the users.

Is it a deluge of rules and regulation for you? Or you are still confused that how do you stay on top of SERP? The fact is, interpreting the exact rules and striking the right balance is the key to SEO. So all you need is to find a correct way to create Meta descriptions.

Advantages of using Meta descriptions:

• Helps to communicate the web page’s summary.
• Has significant impact on your search engine optimisation efforts.
• Helps to increase the overall click-through-rate (CTR).
• Helps to encourage users to click the page.
• Helps to influence the target audience.
• Meta description is the major contributing factor of SEO.

Conclusion

Every business who needs to improve its online visibility should work diligently on the Meta descriptions.Of course, it’s much harder to predict what Google will consider the best. But, optimisers must adopt the ideal technique of developing Meta descriptions to support their web page. Today's the day to start and reward your online business.