How to make sure Google lists your page titles and descriptions correctly in their search results.
 by Casey Markee

How to make sure Google lists your page titles and descriptions correctly in their search results.

  • I'm diligent about making sure each of my pages have a unique title and meta description, and I put a great deal of work into optimizing them both for human clickthroughs as well as search engines. But I still see Google using the wrong titles and descriptions from time to time. Is there anything I can do to make sure Google always uses the titles and descriptions I want them to?

Answer: First, be aware that Google is always tweaking and experimenting with the display of their search listings. So no matter what steps you take, there is never a guarantee that Google will display your page's listing the way you've designed them.

In most cases, Google will use the title you specify in your title tag. However, if Google can't crawl your page because your server's down or blocked by robots.txt, then they may use your DMOZ listing for both title and description. Although we have see Google use the DMOZ listings less and less these days, you can prevent Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft from ever using your DMOZ listing in the search results with the NOODP meta tag. Just place the following at the top of your web pages:

<META NAME="ROBOTS" CONTENT="NOODP">

You can also prevent Yahoo from using your Yahoo directory listing by using the NOYDIR tag. Simply place this meta tag at the top of your web pages:

TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE