Using The Title Tag

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Title tag[edit]

The title tag is found in the head portion of your pages. This title tag becomes the clickable title in search engine result pages (SERPs). A title should be under 70 characters in length. It should also include your keywords for the specific page, as close to the start of the title tag as possible.

Google recommends that you create unique, descriptive page titles to describe to searchers what the page is about.

If a title page is not specified, or importantly if Google determines that the title is not appropriate for the content being returned for the search term, algorithms may be used to generate alternative titles which are more relevant. In the screenshot below you can see the page title for this page (in large blue text)

SEF-Titles.png

Google recommends that you follow these key principles when creating a title:

  • Specify a unique title for every page
  • Make your title descriptive of the page content, and concise
  • Avoid keyword stuffing (repeatedly using similar words like "Foobar, foo bar, foobars, foo bars")
  • Avoid using generic titles - each page should have an unique title, ideally dynamically updated in relation to the content being displayed
  • Brand your titles, but do it concisely and in relation to the content being served
  • Use robots.txt carefully, don't disallow search engines from visiting your website

There are various Webmaster Tools which can be used to identify if there are problems with your listings in a particular search engine - it is always worth paying attention and correcting any problems.

Google support article on using titles for your web pages