Google Rolls Out Longer Meta Description Snippets
Author: George Zlatin
March 24, 2009 • Filed Under: Google News, Keyword Research, Landing Pages, SEO, Testing, Usability • 3 CommentsToday Google announced that they are rolling out longer meta description snippets for some keyword searches. The new feature will appear in search results for queries that are 3 words or longer and have a very specific intent. So for example, if you are searching for something like “Google Rolls Out Extended Snippets” you’ll see some results that have longer meta description snippets (3 or 4 lines instead of only 2) like this:
I think this is a pretty good move as far as improving search results since it will decrease the chance that a user will click on something that they weren’t looking for. It helps users find what they are looking for easier.
We don’t recommend updating all of your meta description tags to make them longer since these snippets will only show for longer queries which usually bring up deep pages within your site. So if you are an e-commerce site for example, you’re better off leaving all of your product page meta descriptions blank and letting Google use the content on your product page to display to users. They will more than likely display a snippet that is more relevant to the user based on what query they typed.
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It should be added that if using AdWord, and especially broad match keywords, these types of queries could still trigger paid search attempts for any match type. I applaud Google’s effort here, but on the other side – still beware of broad match.
Comment by Nathan Pabich — March 25, 2009 @ 1:40 am
This is nice for relevancy, but like you said, it will make adwords ads stick out more as advertising for the users, hence they might not click it, and it will decrease the ctr of your campaigns. – And make them more expensive.
Nice for content-packed websites that focus on organic search traffic, but bad for advertisers.
– Preben
Comment by Preben Frenning — April 9, 2009 @ 7:26 am
I wouldn’t leave all your meta descriptions blank, Google relies on them heavily to differentiate between pages. Plus you’ll avoid unnecessary errors in your Webmaster Tools.
Comment by Xander — April 17, 2009 @ 7:00 am