Meta description is the first thing about a website that we see on the SERPs. And so, it is highly important to make sure that you have optimized your Meta descriptions in an ideal manner. It may be worth mentioning here that Meta descriptions are not directly helpful with the rankings. However, this signal, even being an indirect one, plays a huge role in your SEO.

Things that are dependent on Meta description include click-through rate, perception about the quality results, and a perception about what is being offered in the web page.

Importance of Meta description for SEO

In the olden days of SEO, Meta description was perceived to be the factor helping in the SEO. You may wonder if it helped the websites to rank. Google states it categorically that neither Meta description was a part of ranking process in the past nor it is the case in the present. However, it is actually the primary description that helps your users understand what’s in the web page. If they like the description, they enter the website. And if the description is not convincing, they simply refer to other search results in the SERPs.

Given the function the Meta description has to perform, it becomes evident that it is the very first step that can help you in improving CTR, boosting traffic, increasing the chances of more conversions.

Difference between Meta Description and SERP Snippets

Many of the people mistake Meta description and search snippets to be the two names of one thing. It is not the case actually. Meta description is mainly an HTML tag which you can control. Its creation and optimization is entirely up to you.

On the other hand, search snippets are controlled by Google. Google creates them and show them on the SERPs. A search snippet may contain Meta description or the Google may choose to use any other part of description from the content body of the web page.

Now, we are going to discuss some tips to improve your Meta Descriptions.

The ideal or recommended length of Meta description

Over the years, the best SEO practice had been to keep Meta description no lengthier than 160-165 characters. However, Google changed it in the last year. Now, you can insert a Meta description of up to 300 characters. It means that you have got more space in which you can add an extra bit of details to the summary of what you want your users to see in the Meta description.

Research the SERPs

It is actually more of a manual approach to see what is going to be ideal for you. You can do a little SERP research to find out what is going on in the industry.

• First, you need to research the SERPs using your targeted keyword. The process can be a bit of time consuming but it is actually quite straightforward. And it is the way you can see where your competitors stand when people use the targeted query you are using at the moment.
• Then you are going to do a little research on what your competitors are doing. SERP research is helpful in this regard obviously.
• The data being displayed from the above two steps can be exported in the spreadsheet. This way, you can do an effective tracking.

Researching your clients

Another factor on which the success of your Meta description depends heavily is the description’s alignment with what your customers like at every phase of the buying journey.That’s where you are going to have to do an extensive research because the marketing funnel can be different for different audiences.