Google does not index any meta and probably don't care about it. Yes, including the meta description.
This one came out, after a long discussion in a Bulgarian SEO forum, if the meta descriptions has anything to do with the better positioning in Google SERP.
After certain point, there were simply three fractions, one saying it is indexed, one saying it is not indexed, but helps in SERP and a third one, saying neither it helps, neither it is indexed.
Therefore, what we have done is testing it...
1. Stage one, is it indexed?
We have put a non-existing keyword in the meta description of a large, very well indexed site. On the next day, when writing site:thisdomain.com it already appeared in the summary of the web site, but... searching for the keyword in Google was giving back - 0 results. This basically proved, that Google does not index meta descriptions and they are not resulting directly in the SERP.
2. Stage two, if it is not indexed, does it help?
This stage is still in testing, but the preliminary results seems to prove (till now), that in fact Google does not care about what is in the meta description. Yes, it uses it for a summary of the web site... but, it appears to be the only usage of this page and nothing more.
How is in fact tested stage two:
1. Two web pages on the same domain (under different folders), both have only one link from the very same page. Both have exactly the same content, except of the one missing the meta description. Both folder names are totally irrelevant to the keyword.
2. If the site without the meta description goes at first place (remember the keyword is not existing), it is very probably that Google does not take in consideration the meta description or it even may have negative impact.
3.If the site with the meta goes at first place, it is more or less 50:50 if it was just a luck, of this being the first result or it has a real impact.
In any of the scenarios, the tests will be reperformed in order to gain some statistical assurance.
From Joomla! perspective... does Joomla! need to support meta keywords, while it is proved that there is no usage of these?
Well, the meta descriptions should stay for now, because at least they appear in the site summary in the SERP.
After certain point, there were simply three fractions, one saying it is indexed, one saying it is not indexed, but helps in SERP and a third one, saying neither it helps, neither it is indexed.
Therefore, what we have done is testing it...
1. Stage one, is it indexed?
We have put a non-existing keyword in the meta description of a large, very well indexed site. On the next day, when writing site:thisdomain.com it already appeared in the summary of the web site, but... searching for the keyword in Google was giving back - 0 results. This basically proved, that Google does not index meta descriptions and they are not resulting directly in the SERP.
2. Stage two, if it is not indexed, does it help?
This stage is still in testing, but the preliminary results seems to prove (till now), that in fact Google does not care about what is in the meta description. Yes, it uses it for a summary of the web site... but, it appears to be the only usage of this page and nothing more.
How is in fact tested stage two:
1. Two web pages on the same domain (under different folders), both have only one link from the very same page. Both have exactly the same content, except of the one missing the meta description. Both folder names are totally irrelevant to the keyword.
2. If the site without the meta description goes at first place (remember the keyword is not existing), it is very probably that Google does not take in consideration the meta description or it even may have negative impact.
3.If the site with the meta goes at first place, it is more or less 50:50 if it was just a luck, of this being the first result or it has a real impact.
In any of the scenarios, the tests will be reperformed in order to gain some statistical assurance.
From Joomla! perspective... does Joomla! need to support meta keywords, while it is proved that there is no usage of these?
Well, the meta descriptions should stay for now, because at least they appear in the site summary in the SERP.
Views: 25
Tags: description, google, joomla, meta, seo
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Comment by Amy Stephen on February 6, 2010 at 8:04pm
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Last September, Matt Cutts came out with a blog that said Google no longer uses Keywords. The Meta Description is used on the search results page, so, it's still useful. (I agree it doesn't help with placement, but it does serve as a useful descriptor for the human eye when they are deciding which link out of the top 10 or so to click.)
The Meta Tags has been hijacked by a number of Extensions for Tagging. Even the core Related Articles uses it for that purpose, so, there is still good value there. Other than that, though, I agree with you, it doesn't help with SEO.
Good piece - glad to see your testing continues! Considering taking 1.6 out on a spin, too! :)
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Comment by Ivo Apostolov on February 6, 2010 at 8:08pm -
The tagging system of the related articles module is a bit... strange and old school. However, prior to having a hook to have tags within com_content (without hacking this and that, but integrating), it appears that replacement would be a hard task.
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Comment by Ivo Apostolov on February 7, 2010 at 5:50am
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It appears that at least at the moment, Google ignores content, that the user does not see (i.e. meta descriptions). Lately, there were many penalties by Google (for Bulgarian sites at least) due to contents/links that had surrounding display:none.
This means the real content becomes more and more important. But... even with the greatest content, it will be hard, if you do not have appropriate links. Build links, build content, build your site with nice code and I think that's quite enough. I am not sure SEF URLs would even have that impact, they had 2 years ago...
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Comment by Alessandro Nadalin aka Odino on February 7, 2010 at 9:30am -
Hi Ivo,
sure, meta keywords has nowadays no role for positioning, but only for humans.
Read this wiki: http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keyword_stuffing, translate to english or bulgarian first ;-) it explains some bad ideas like display:none, etc
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Comment by Ivo Apostolov on February 7, 2010 at 9:39am
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What role does the meta description has for humans? They even don't see it on the page...
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Comment by Alessandro Nadalin aka Odino on February 7, 2010 at 9:50am
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sure they see the meta description... on the SERP!
Read the following examples SERP examples as a REAL human:
http://www.google.it/#hl=it&safe=off&q=site%3Awww.roscripts...
http://www.google.it/#hl=it&safe=off&q=site%3Awww.supercrum...
which one do you'd rather click?
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Comment by Yannick Gaultier on February 7, 2010 at 10:01am
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Comment by Yannick Gaultier on February 7, 2010 at 10:02am
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note sure where the link went, sorry : SEOMOZ factors ranking
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