Do meta descriptions matter? The latest research
Do meta descriptions have value today? See what case studies say about AI Overviews, ChatGPT snippets, CTR, and when writing them is a waste.
Topic: Meta element
SERP Simulator Tool: Preview your Google snippets before they go live
Use our free SERP Simulator to preview Google search snippets, test title tags and meta descriptions, and optimize your pages for higher CTRs.
How to optimize a website for AI crawlers and AI agents
Learn how to optimize your site for AI crawlers with technical SEO best practices — and control access by blocking or allowing crawlers with directives.
Googlebot: What it is, how it works & how to optimize
Learn how Googlebot crawls, renders, and indexes your site. See every crawler type, how crawl budget works, and the technical fixes that improve visibility.
Meta tags in SEO: What they are & how to use them
Meta tags guide search engines and users. Learn what they are, how they impact SEO, and best practices for titles, descriptions, and beyond.
Google testing AI-generated descriptions for search snippets
Google Search is testing replacing your meta description with an AI-generated one and an AI-generated summary of your search snippet.
Robots.txt: SEO landmine or secret weapon?
Robots.txt tells search engines what to crawl—or skip. Learn how to create, test, and optimize robots.txt for better SEO and site management.
A checklist for effective SEO QA
Integrate SEO QA into engineering workflows to catch technical issues early, safeguard visibility, and maximize existing development work.
No, llms.txt is not the ‘new meta keywords’
SEOs ignored meta keywords for good reason, but llms.txt is different. Understanding how could shape your AI visibility tomorrow.
On-page SEO in 2025: What you need to know
Learn the essentials of on-page optimization to strengthen your website's SEO foundation and boost your organic visibility.
Meta tags for SEO: What you need to know
Meta tags are levers of control – not just code. Use them to boost visibility, drive clicks, and shape how AI sees your content.
Google AdSense adds new tools to make site verification faster and easier
The platform now offers real-time verification and meta-tag verification in addition to its existing methods.
Robots.txt is not the answer: Proposing a new meta tag for LLM/AI
Using robots.txt for managing data usage in LLMs is the wrong approach in this new age of generative AI products. Here's why.
This day in search marketing history: February 23
Google penalizes Natural News, plus: Google AdSense separates YouTube earnings, BrightEdge acquires Oncrawl, florist war on AdWords and more.
This day in search marketing history: February 20
Google stops supporting meta news keywords tag, plus: Google Ads tweaks mobile speed score algorithm, Voluntary Code of Practice and more
The ultimate recipe for writing SEO content
Approach good content as if you were in your kitchen ready to cook up a tasty dish.
Google adds new robots tag indexifembedded
This new robots tag lets you define if you want your content indexed when it's embedded through iframes or other means.
10 Common SEO Myths
Contributed by Anh Luu, Copywriter for Phonexa Some SEO Myths are harmless and do little to take away from your overall performance, while other myths can actually harm your productivity over time. You’ve probably come across some of these myths during your research on SEO and have thought of them as true. Well, it’s a […]
Bing adds snippet controls to help sites control their search result previews
Google began supporting these new controls last September and now Bing adds control for snippets.
Meta descriptions and branding have the most influence on search clickthrough, survey finds
The majority of participants also agreed that rich results improve Google search.
Google’s new snippet settings give webmasters control over their search listings display
Google adds max-snippet, max-video-preview, max-image-preview and more to the nosnippet snippet controls
Meta robots nofollow gets the hint treatment too
Robots won’t support the new UGC and sponsored link attributes, says Google’s Gary Illyes.
SearchCap: JavaScript powered websites, Google axes political ads & Amazon consumer survey
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Priorities for diagnosing JavaScript-powered websites Jun 7, 2018 by Maria Cieslak Contributor Maria Cieslak digs into JavaScript and some of the chaos associated with it and compiles a detailed checklist you […]
Google News no longer supports the standout meta tag and Editors’ Pick
A few months after Google drops support for the meta news keywords tag, Google removes two other webmaster-related publisher features.
Google confirms it shortened search results snippets after expanding them last December
Time spent increasing meta descriptions for the longer Google search results snippets may have been wasted.
Google drops support for meta news keywords tag
After years of telling publishers to use the news meta keyword tag, Google said it stopped supporting it months ago.
SearchCap: Bing & Reddit, Google travel pricing & meta descriptions
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Google: Fundamentals of writing meta descriptions don’t change with longer search snippetsDec 14, 2017 by Barry Schwartz Google has officially commented about what webmasters should focus on when writing meta descriptions […]
Google: Fundamentals of writing meta descriptions don’t change with longer search snippets
Google has officially commented about what webmasters should focus on when writing meta descriptions after Google extended their search result snippets.
Google officially increases length of snippets in search results
Company says change is meant to provide more descriptive snippets.
SearchCap: AMP data, agency relationships & hip hop Doodles
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Is your marketing organization ready for martech?Aug 11, 2017 by Scott Brinker Join me August 15 live for this exclusive webinar. Disclosure and transparency: The agency/client relationship twinsAug 11, 2017 by […]
Google officially stops using DMOZ for source of search results snippets
With that, you no longer need to worry about using the NOODP directive to prevent Google from using your DMOZ description.
SearchCap: Google image saving, link building outreach & more
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: The real impact of Google’s new paid search ad layout on organic searchMar 29, 2016 by Winston Burton We’ve heard a lot about how Google’s changes to its paid ad display […]
SearchCap: Bing Top Searches, Google HTTPS Default & My Business API
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: New Google My Business API Dec 17, 2015 by Barry Schwartz Now developers can automate the management of their businesses Google My Business listings via the new API. Final Chance To […]
Google Allows You To Disable The Sitelinks Search Box, To Search Within The Google Search Results
In early September, Google introduced the Sitelinks search box that gives webmaster the ability to control how Google handles searches conducted within the search within this site, in the Google search results snippet area. Google is now letting webmasters disable the feature completely. For example, if you search for [youtube] in Google, Google will add […]
Google’s Matt Cutts Gives SEO Advice For Times When Your Products Go Out Of Stock
Google’s Matt Cutts answered in a video what webmasters and site owners should do about their out of stock products on their e-commerce sites. Matt Cutts basically said it depends on the size of the e-commerce site. He broke it down into three sizes: small sites with tens of pages, medium sites with thousands of […]
Google’s Matt Cutts: Don’t Duplicate Your Meta Descriptions
Google’s Matt Cutts, the head of search spam, released a video today providing an SEO tip on meta descriptions. Matt said, do not have duplicate meta descriptions on your site. Matt said it is better to have unique meta descriptions and even no meta descriptions at all, then to show duplicate meta descriptions across pages. […]
Rejoice! Safari Is Once Again Providing Google Referral Information In iOS
Since last September, people using Safari on iOS devices and searching on Google have appeared to publishers as if they came directly to their sites, not via Google. Now, the problem has ended, with iOS now apparently having been upgraded to support the “meta referrer” tag. No, this doesn’t solve the “not provided” issue, where […]
Mystery Solved: Why Mobile Safari Searchers Appear To Come “Direct” To Sites Rather Than Via Google
Since September, people using Safari in iOS 6 and searching on Google have appeared to publishers as if they’ve come directly to their sites, as opposed to having been driving by search. At last, the reason behind the Dark Google cut-off of data has been found: mobile Safari doesn’t support the “meta referrer” tag. I […]
SearchCap: The Day In Search, February 22, 2013
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the Web. From Search Engine Land: After Penalizing Interflora & UK Newspapers, Google Warns Against Advertorials After penalizing Interflora and UK newspapers Google has issued a stern warning that selling links on sites that pass PageRank can […]
Only 5% Of News Publishers Use The Google News Keywords Meta Tag
Just over three months ago, Google launched the news keyword meta tag designed to let news publishers have a better chance of ranking for words they might not have included in their headlines. Adoption rate so far? Only about 5% of the sources within Google News use the tag, according to new data provided by […]