How to optimize the TITLE Tag

How to optimize the TITLE Tag

Follow these 5 simple steps to optimize the TITLE Tag so your website ranks higher in Google.

1. SELECT YOUR KEYWORDS

A good keyword research is vital and you should devote all necessary time to this task. Use the Google AdWords Keywords Tool to do your research. Try to think how the user would search for what you are offering. What would he search for in Google?

When researching for keywords with the AdWords Keywords Tool, concentrate on the number of searches and the competition of each result, they are important if you want to obtain a lot of visits.

On the other hand, remember that it is relevant traffic what you are looking to attract, your visitors should generate conversions. Think about the psychological aspects of the keywords you select, do not focus only on the ones that attract more traffic.

2. LIMIT THE NUMBER OF KEYWORDS

From the list of keywords that you got with the Google tool, select three: one primary and two secondary keywords. A usual begginer’s error is trying to optimize for too many keywords on one page (this is called «keyword stuffing»), something that search engines penalize severely.

If you try to optimize for many keywords, each individual keyword loses relevance. Also, even if your website acquires a high ranking in Google, titles that only show a list of keywords are not as attractive as descriptive titles, lowering your CTR.

3. 70 CHARACTERS MAXIMUM

Titles with more than 70 characters are cut off on the Google results page. Try to create a short title that includes the three main keywords you have selected and that describes the content of the page.

This way we increase the CTR because keywords are highlighted in Google and we lower the bounce rate because the title is descriptive and the user finds something he expects on the page.

4. IMPORTANT KEYWORDS FIRST

The Googlea lgorithm gives more importance to keywords that appear first in the TITLE Tag. If you want to include your name or your brand in the TITLE Tag of all your pages (this is important to give consistency to your website), insert it at the end of the TITLE Tag.

5. UNIQUE TITLE FOR EACH PAGE

It is possible that if you use a CMS like WordPress the same titles may appear on multiple pages of your website. This can cause duplicate content issues, which is penalized by Google.

In order to identify pages with duplicate TITLE Tags you can use Google Webmaster Tools.