How to Write the Perfect Meta Description for SEO?

What is Meta Description all about?

When it comes to HTML elements, there are important elements, out of which these three types are the basics such as meta title, meta description, URL and meta tags (or slug). In the above picture, the one highlighted in blue font is the meta title, which is usually the page title of the website. The short description shown right after the meta title is the meta description. Meta description as mentioned before is the snippet of what the website is about. And the link given before the meta title is the URL, link to the website or to the page.

How does a Meta Description works

When you want to search for one specific thing that you are looking for, the search engines optimize accordingly by analyzing the text or the word we enter. Then a list of websites is shown to you based on your search, bringing it to you with the searched words in bold. The next part is where the role of meta title and meta description for SEO plays.

Meta titles are usually in blue font, in bigger font size. This is where our eyes would go first. Followed by the description, a snippet of what the whole information is or what you are looking for based on the words searched. This leads to finding what accurately you are looking for and the search engines like Google bring it to you. To understand this, let’s look into the following example.

This example searches for ‘birthday cakes’, which are the search words here. From this picture, we see 3 search results. In each of them, we can see the two search words are in bold font. What happened here is, Google’s search engine highlights a user’s search words or phrasing in bold in the search results. This helps us, users to notice these websites more easily. Now, let’s look into the description, what are the requirements for a meta description, what are the necessary steps for a good meta description etc.

There are important requirements to keep in mind when writing a meta description such as keywords, length, action-oriented words, accurate and readable description, etc. 

1. Keywords are one of the essentials here. Using the target (or important) keywords is so important as it helps the users to spot them in bold, making them easily noticeable. 
2. The character length is the most important factor. The meta description length is usually around 135-160. Though there is no compulsion on how long the description should be, it’s always good to use this, as this is a common range of length. 
3. Use action-oriented words (also known as CTA or Call to Action). This would help you to write better descriptions that would encourage the users to act.
4. Making sure your written meta description is accurate to the point and readable too. Being accurate helps the users to understand what the whole website or product is about by reading through the short description.
5. This is one of the good tips in using rich snippets such as ratings, customer reviews, calorie count, product information etc. This helps users by giving the necessary insights about the websites. 

These are the essentials to keep in mind when one writes meta descriptions in SEO. Well, now we know the basics of meta description and how it helps the users to find it, we also have to know a few don’ts too.

1. Avoid long text. It is always good to stay within the range limit of the character length, as it helps the users to look into a short precise description, rather than a lengthy text. 
2. Avoid using complicated words. Use simple language, so users can easily read and comprehend. Also, as suggested before, it is always good to use CTA words.
3. Avoid keyword stacking. Using the important or target keywords is so important, but make sure you don’t include a lot of keywords. It just could cause errors and maybe bore the users while reading too.
4. Avoid using the same description for more than 2 posts as it could confuse the search engine’s bots.

Last but not the least, use important SEO tools like SERP preview tools, meta description generators etc. Make sure to include all necessary information or insight of a website or about a product in a short and simple snippet. 

Just like meta description, meta title has a range limit of 60-80 character length. Keeping in mind the character length and how to write a good meta description, is always important.

So, understanding how meta description works is always better. From an SEO point of view, it helps to build good traffic. The right usage of targeted keywords would bring it to the top search results in search engines, bringing your page or website to the users. Using the right words or phrases for descriptions would give a good idea to the users about what your website or product is all about. This would lead to more search visits.

And from the users’ point of view, understanding how to write a good meta description, what are the necessary points to be kept in mind, would help to write or create the description. This would help the users to create content accordingly. All you need to do is understand the basics of SEO, and how to write good meta descriptions, meta titles, etc. Use SEO friendly tools too