Meta description tags are displayed in search engine results as the text that is accompanied below the search result link. Meta description tag is not always displayed in the search engine result descriptions. The content from the page itself can be displayed if it is more relevant. However, having a meta description tag is important.
We can’t say for sure how much it impacts in search engine ranking. But we can say that it impacts a lot, if visitors are scrolling through the search results, reading the text snippets and deciding which one to visit. So, even though importance of meta keywords tag has faded away, meta description tag is still important.
Also note that not all of your pages and posts require meta description tags as the content from the page work great as well. You might only want to place such tags for important content, for which the automatically collected text description from the page itself is not adequate.
We normally place a meta description tag as:
<meta name="description" content="The page description or the description of the post is written here clearly in around 150 characters" />
Meta Description Tag in Blogger
Turning on Meta Description Tag in Blogger /Blogspot
When you create a new blog in Blogger, meta description tag is turned off by default. You can leave it as it is or you can turn in on.
To turn on meta description tag in Blogger:
- Open up your blog’s main administration area in blogger.com
- From the links in the left click on Settings > Search Preferences
- There you will find, “Meta tags” as the title and under it will be “Description” which is disabled by default.
- Click on “Edit” and in “Enable search description?” option will be shown. Select “Yes” in the options available.
- Under it, a text box will appear. Write a description of your home page in around 150 characters in there.
You’ve enabled meta description tag for your blog. Now your homepage, labels page, archive page and search pages will have the same meta description tag that you have entered above. If you are worried about having duplicate meta tags: Your default robot.txt file will not allow search engines to list anything under http://myblog.blogspot.com/search subdirectory url in your website. That means the labels page and your search pages are not listed. Only the archives page will have the same meta description tag as your homepage.
Meta Description Tag for Posts
Now that you have turned on Meta description tag for your blog, you will see a new option in the right side of the blog post composing area. On the right, you will see a field called “Search Description”, right under “Location” and above “Options”. Click on it and write down a meaningful, unique and short summary for your particular post. That meta description will be used for that post in search engines.
For posts where you have not entered a meta description, the meta description code will not be placed on that particular page. If you like, you can use the following code to add a default and partly unique meta description to such posts:
<b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == "item"'> <b:if cond='data:blog.metaDescription == ""'> <a expr:content='data:blog.pageTitle' name='Description'/> </b:if> </b:if>
The code will add the title of your website as well as the title of your post in the meta description area. This code is useful if you do not want to skip the meta description tag in any post.
The code above goes around the top of the <head> tag of your blogger template XML code. To access it go to Template > Edit HTML and add the code right after the <title> tag in the <head></head> are of your blog. Be careful when making edits in the template html area.
How Meta Description Tag is Auto Added to your Blog
Right under the <head> tag of your blogger template, you will find a line that says:
<b:include data='blog' name='all-head-content'/>
This line auto adds important codes to the head area of your blog. The codes include meta description (if enabled), meta content-type, favicon information, canonical URL information, RSS information, openID information and some javascript codes.
If you do decide to skip the all-head-content tag for blogger (which might not always be recommended), you will have to manually add the codes that display meta information like description, favicon and canonical url.
To manually add meta description tag to your page:
Add the following code in the template html. Edit by going to Template > Edit HTML. Add the code right below the tag. It should be before in the head area.
<!-- For Home Page-->
<b:if cond='data:blog.url == data:blog.homepageUrl'>
<meta name ='description' content='A meaningful description for your homepage within 150 characters.'/>
</b:if>
<!-- For Posts -->
<b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == "item"'>
<b:if cond='data:blog.metaDescription == ""'>
<a expr:content='data:blog.pageTitle' name='Description'/>
</b:if>
</b:if>
<!-- For Archive Page -->
<b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == "archive"'>
<meta name ='description' expr:content='"List of all the posts made in this blog during the month " + data:blog.pageName + " archived."' name='description'/>
</b:if>
<!-- For Static Page -->
<b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == "static_page"'>
<a expr:content='data:blog.pageName + " page. This is a page from the " + data:blog.title + " blog."' name='description'/>
</b:if>
<!-- For Labels Page -->
<b:if cond='data:blog.searchLabel'>
<a expr:content='"Category " + data:blog.pageName + " of " + data:blog.title + " blog."' name='description'/>
</b:if>
To use custom meta description for individual label pages use this one instead:
<!-- For Labels Page -->
<b:if cond='data:blog.searchLabel == "Label Name"'>
<meta name='description' content='This is the unique description for the Label with the name Label Name. You can change it.' />
</b:if>
Thanks for this update, its really helpful