How to add META tags into your blog?

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Do you want to improve your blog value, get more hits, and ranked high on search engines? Then you must optimize how your blog is indexed in a search engine.

While there are lots of factors involved in building quality blogs that can draw huge traffic in, having simple things right in the beginning is as important. One of this simple thing is getting your blog indexed properly with the right description & keywords to optimize search engine rankings (known as Search Engine Optimization or SEO).

To get information, search engines use automated software agents called spiders, crawlers, robots, or bots to collect the a few words from a site or blog (typically the URLs, blog name, and blog description, and maybe some words in the early part of sentences or paragraphs) that will later be used as keywords to index the blog.

Because you cannot be certain which words are taken as keywords pertaining to your blog, it's most likely that your blog won't be indexed properly in search engines - in the worst case, your highly relevant keywords might not even be used to index your blog. When this happen, searches on keywords relevant to your blog may have your blog buried at the far end of the list of thousands and millions of pages. What a waste!

To have a control of what is read by crawlers on your blog to be indexed, you have to build what is called a META tag - basically a bunch of words that makes up the most relevant description and keywords of your blog. If the META tag exist, this is what the crawlers will read and index and get displayed on any searches related to your keywords.

Here's what a search on my blog looks like on Google. The description is exactly the one I have written in the META tag. The 1st search on the list shows the new META tag description that was made a few seconds before the snap. The old META tag is shown beneath it (22 hours ago).


There are basically 2 parts to a META tag: first is the META description and second is the META keywords. The description are what appears on a search. As you can see, if the description is too long, it'll be cropped as search engines only uses a few lines to describe the blog. An optimum number of characters to use for META description is 150 (including spaces and dots).

For META keywords, you can use as many words as you want, but don't repeat the same word too many times (more than 5) to avoid keyword spam. Crawlers can identify keyword spamming easily - which won't make it good either for SEO.

To create a META tag, simply copy the code below and rewrite your META description and keywords (the red text):

<meta content='text/html; charset=utf-8' http-equiv='Content-Type'/>
<meta content='Write your META description here. Keep it less than 150 characters.' name='description'/>
<meta content='Write your META keywords here as many as you want separated with commas. Keep word repetition less than 5 to avoid keyword spamming.' name='keywords'/>

Then, place it in between the <head> ..... </head> section near the top part of your template XML code. It's best to put it just below the <title><data:blog.pageTitle/></title> code.

For more details:
Go to this Free META Tag Builder tool. It directs you easily to build a META tag, create the HTML or XHTML code, and guides to paste it into your blog template XML code.

Just for the fun of it, you can analyze your blog's original description and keywords by submitting your blog URL at the Free META TAG Analyzer before placing the new META tags in your blog - so that you can compare how it is indexed before and after the change.

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26 comments:

khaerul February 14, 2008 3:53 AM  

thanks dzelque , now i can put meta tag into my blog.

manvik March 03, 2008 10:34 AM  

thanks for this useful blog.I can put my meta tags.
my blog is at http://boxofmovies.blogspot.com

Paul Krenz March 07, 2008 10:23 AM  

Thank you Dzelque, I owe you one for this advice. I was wondering why I had little or no traffic, but I can't wait to see what will happen now that I've used your tips.

If you want to see my blog and have any comments or criticism, please visit: http://health-is-everything.blogspot.com/

Thanks! :-)

usapresidentmccain.com April 09, 2008 8:34 PM  

Thanks for the info I have put meta tags in both my blogs after reading your post.

Open door to everyone... May 11, 2008 8:36 PM  

Thx you man!!!
It is working like charm:
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marshiemallows May 24, 2008 6:43 AM  

heya!

thnx, this post is really helpful. i'm a newbie with all this stuff and this post really did help me add meta tags to my site. tnx a lot dude!;-)

King John August 04, 2008 11:12 PM  

Great info I added my tags to http://bap.erosblog.net/

Usman Butt August 24, 2008 5:46 AM  

Thnx for telling buddy. I got added Meta in my blog Evolution - World

Admin November 09, 2008 6:26 PM  

thanks . it is useful informaiton for me

Alen4ik Litvinenko November 27, 2008 2:59 AM  

Thanks so much, this is so useful! now I can add it to my blog..
by the way please check it out!
http://www.alen4ik-didyouknow.blogspot.com/

.NET Dev December 15, 2008 1:05 AM  

To keep same description as title for all pages
See here
http://urenjoy.blogspot.com/2008/12/blogger-seo-tips-change-title-style.html

Xor December 18, 2008 1:18 AM  

hi,
to all of you with save issues:
- change all ” to ‘
- put a / bevor the >
- if you have & in your code, change them to & a m p ; (without spaces)

worked for me!

http://geldmitinternet.blogspot.com

Kaphish January 10, 2009 8:18 AM  

thanks a lot

visit me at kaphish.blogspot.com or kaphish.tk

Shawna February 04, 2009 10:01 PM  

thank you for posting this, i just set up my meta tags and I'm hoping to get more hits now! =)

Alan February 05, 2009 7:47 PM  

Thanks for the meta tag tips but there doesn't appear to be any closing "head" tag in the "External" template. So, where exactly do I put the meta tags? Also, the meta tag analyzer site link in your post says..."Notice! The following unexpected content was found in the robots.txt file located at mydomain.com/robots.txt which does not comply with the current "Robots Exclusion Standard". If directed to a specific User-Agent (robot) that accepts the following then you can ignore this message. Otherwise it is suggested this be removed. Please verify the robots.txt file before submitting to search engines:

1. Noindex: /feedReaderJson

I have a test blog in the works with your External template & would appreciate your input. Thanks!

todd fritsch February 26, 2009 6:39 PM  

thank for the info hottestcasinosonline.com

mssali2009 March 16, 2009 3:43 PM  

thanks dzelque, this has helped me a lot.

Rana Sinha March 22, 2009 3:03 PM  

Thanks dzelque for your good tips.

mashrafi9 April 04, 2009 12:53 AM  

Thanks, so helpful. now I've put those in my money making blog. mashrafis.blogspot.com

Entertainer April 29, 2009 9:48 PM  

Thank you.I have just applied on my blog.

ActressHunter May 13, 2009 7:00 AM  

Useful and genuine tips thanks,
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sevan May 20, 2009 1:35 AM  

tnx for info.
http://all2favorites.blogspot.com/

iliketo June 05, 2009 3:56 AM  

Thanks for this post. It is very useful.

sayuki288 June 07, 2009 11:55 PM  

thanks this will really help me alot on my blog

http://hwenthusiast.blogspot.com/

Rahul July 03, 2009 11:15 AM  

I am glad that my SEO increased by META.......s

and my blog is better than before. even my site has total optimisation better than top on google for few keywords..

earn money online.

definately i will rank well in few months.

IannaRosenthal July 13, 2009 4:40 PM  

Thank you so much for your help. This is hopefully going to help my blog take off a bit so that more people will see it. Your directions were great and very easy to understand.

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