What are meta tags

Meta tags are HTML elements that give search engines and visitors information about the content of your page. These tags appear only in the page’s code, which any user can view by clicking “View Source” (Ctrl+U). In short, meta tags are very important for a search engine because they determine the content of the page. Meta tags are the first point of contact and give an initial impression of your page to search engines.

Meta tags are placed in the head section of an HTML file. They are hidden descriptors for the search engine to understand what content lies on your page. The various sites have different ways of including Meta tags. For example, WordPress has free plugins known as the All in One SEO Pack and Yoast SEO. These are highly used options, and you can choose the one that best fits your needs.

Are Meta Tags Still Important for SEO in 2024? 

Absolutely; meta tags are still applicable, though not all of them are effective in 2024.

From my experience, to rank high on Google this year, you need to focus on creating high-quality content and enhancing user satisfaction. The purpose of this post is to highlight which Meta tags are still valuable and which ones are no longer useful.

(See below: I’ll Walk you through a few “bad” Meta tags that should be ignored.)
 

Which Meta Tags Are Supported by Google?

Google supports a variety of meta tags, including:

Meta Tag Name Description Example 
Description  Provides a brief summary of the page, which can be displayed as a snippet in search results <meta name=”description” content=”Boost your online presence with over 55 tools for SEO, PPC, content creation, social media, competitive analysis, and more.”> 
robots Regulates how search engines crawl and index your pages. Use ‘noindex’ and ‘nofollow’ to prevent these actions. If not specified, ‘index’ and ‘follow’ are the default settings.  <meta name=”robots” content=”noindex,nofollow”> 
googlebot Similar to the robots meta tag, but specifically for Google. <meta name=”googlebot” content=”noindex,nofollow”> 
notranslate Prevents Google from offering an automatic translation of your page in search results. <meta name=”googlebot” content=”notranslate”> 
nopagereadaloud Directs Google not to use text-to-speech (TTS) services to read the page aloud. <meta name=”google” content=”nopagereadaloud”>  
nositelinkssearchbox Prevents Google from showing sitelinks search box in the search results for your site.  <metaname=”google” content=”nositelinkssearchbox”> 
google-site-verification Verifies website ownership for Google Search Console. This tag is case-sensitive. <meta name=”google-site-verification” content=”+nxGUDJ4QpAZ5l9Bsjdi102tLVC21AIh5d1Nl23908vVuFHs34=”> 
Content-Type and charset Specifies the content type and character encoding for the webpage, ensuring correct rendering of non-ASCII characters, such as accented letters. <meta http-equiv=”Content-Type” content=”text/html; charset=UTF-8″> 
refresh Directs the browser to redirect to a new URL after a set time. This method is not recommended for redirects; a server-side 301 redirect is preferred for better SEO and user experience. <meta http-equiv=”refresh” content=”5; url=https://website.com”> 
rating Indicates that a webpage contains explicit content. <meta name=”rating” content=”adult”> 
viewport Controls how the webpage is displayed on mobile devices. <meta name=”viewport” content=”width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0″> 

Here are two important notes about meta tags :

Meta Keywords Tag: The meta keywords tag was originally used to help search engines understand a webpage’s content by listing relevant keywords. However, due to frequent misuse and keyword stuffing, Google and other major search engines no longer consider it for ranking purposes.

Hreflang Attribute: This attribute is confused often with a meta tag but is not. This is used within the HTML head section, within the <link> element to tell the search engines that what is the language and region the page is targeting to in order to deliver the appropriate version of a page for the user according to the language and location of a user.

How to check Meta tags on a site

To check the Meta tags of any webpage, right-click on the page and choose “View Page Source.” You can also use SEMrush, particularly the SEMrush Audit Tool, or Screaming Frog to analyze the Meta tags of any site.

Most Important Meta Tags for SEO in 2024

I personally focus on 7 key Meta tags that can significantly enhance the optimization of your startup business or active website. Here are my insights on each of them:

  1. Title Tag
  2. Meta Description
  3. Canonical Tag
  4. Alt (Alternative Text) Tag
  5. Robots Meta Tag
  6. Social Media Meta Tags (Open Graph and Twitter Cards)
  7. Responsive Design Meta Tag

These Meta tags play a huge role in enhancing search engine visibility, user experience, and ensuring that your content appears correctly on different platforms.
 

1. Title Tag

  • Purpose: The title tag is one of the most crucial on-page SEO elements. It gives a short description of the content that a webpage has, and this is what will be clickable when a user is searching through the search engine results.
  • SEO Benefits: 
    • Directly affects click-through rates (CTR) because it is the first thing users see. 
    • The search engines use it to understand the topic and relevance of the page. 
    • Ensure it’s under 60 characters to avoid truncation in search results.
  • Tip: Use your main keywords near the start of the title tag while keeping it interesting and relevant.

2. Meta Description

  • Purpose: The meta description summarizes the page content and is usually listed below the title in the search results. 
  • SEO Benefits:
    • Although it’s not a ranking factor, a great meta description can enhance CTR.
    • It may offer an improved user experience since it clearly explains what the page offers.
  • Tip: Keep it between 150–160 characters and include a call-to-action (CTA) or keywords naturally to attract users.

3. Canonical Tag

  • Purpose: Canonical helps avoid duplicate content problems by pointing out the preferred version of a page when there are similar contents in different places.
  • SEO Benefits:
    • Helps consolidate link equity (backlinks) and signals to search engines which version of the content should be indexed. 
    • Avoids penalties for duplicate content.
  • Tip: Use canonical tags when you have multiple versions of the same content, such as product pages with variations or paginated content.

4. Alt (Alternative Text) Tag

  • Purpose: The alt tag describes images for search engines and visually impaired users.
  • SEO Benefits:
    • Improves accessibility, making your website more inclusive.
    • Search engines use alt text to understand the content of images, which can help in image search rankings.
  • Tip: Be descriptive but concise in your alt text, and where possible, incorporate relevant keywords naturally.

5. Robots Meta Tag

  • Purpose: Robots meta tag indicates to crawlers from a search engine how they need to crawl and follow content from the page.
  • SEO Benefits:
    • Prevent search engines to index any pages such as login, thank you, from indexing a page so no content gets duplicated 
    • Does not permit search engines to follow those links which hold no significance. 
  • Tip: Use values such as noindex, nofollow, index, and follow with caution to limit page indexing and crawling. 

6. Social Media Meta Tags (Open Graph and Twitter Cards) 

  • Purpose: These meta tags assist in controlling how your website is represented when shared on social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc. 
  • SEO Benefits:
    • Optimizes how your content is represented on social media, which could lead to higher engagement. 
    • Open Graph tags help to control the title, image, and description when your content is being shared on platforms such as Facebook. 
    • Twitter Card tags enable rich media experiences when your content is being shared on Twitter.
  • Tip: The image, description, and title need to be relevant and informative in order to represent the content being shared. Use correct dimensions and formats for the images. 

7. Responsive Design Meta Tag

  • Purpose: This meta tag ensures that your website is optimized for mobile devices. 
  • SEO Benefits: 
    • For Google, mobile friendliness is a ranking signal. It also follows a new algorithm called mobile-first indexing.
    • Improves experience across devices, which drives up engagement and reduces bounces.
  • Tip: Use the viewport meta tag to set the scale of your web pages for mobile responsiveness. 

Example: html Copy code 

<meta name=”viewport” content=”width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0″>

8. Viewport Meta Tag (Bonus Tag)

  • Purpose: Defines how the content is displayed on mobile devices by controlling the layout’s scaling and dimensions. 
  • SEO Benefits: 
    • Helps create a seamless user experience across mobile and desktop devices. 
    • Supports Google’s mobile-first indexing by ensuring pages are mobile-optimized. 
  • Tip: Ensure you use the correct syntax (width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0) to avoid layout issues on mobile devices. 

Conclusion

Meta tags may still be an important piece of SEO in 2024, despite the changes seen in the algorithms of search engines. They help the users know more about your page contents, thereby helping the search engine to understand your content and subsequently enhancing the user experience. Among many of these meta tags useful for SEO, there comes a set of meta tags important for SEO: including the title tag, the meta description, the canonical tag, the robots tag, and the social meta tags. 

Although some tags have lost their potency, for example, the meta keywords tag, others like the viewport tag and social media optimization tags continue to make contributions toward achieving a good user experience and mobile optimization-all of which are critical to modern SEO. 

To ensure your site performs well in search results, it’s essential to prioritize relevant meta tags and stay up to date with SEO best practices. Properly implemented meta tags can lead to higher click-through rates, better indexing, and more engagement from both search engines and users, ultimately driving more traffic to your website. If you’re looking to boost your website’s SEO performance, consider working with a reliable SEO company in Delhi NCR to ensure your site is fully optimized for success.