Weekly SEO news: 13 June 2017
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1. DMOZ is gone and you have to act: how to optimize your Google snippets 

Google has stopped using DMOZ for the snippets that are displayed on the search engine result pages. Search result snippets are very important. They help people decide whether or not it makes sense to invest the time visiting the page the snippet belongs to.

time to write better descriptions

Your website will get more visitors if your pages have descriptive and relevant search result snippets. Read this article to learn how to influence the snippets that Google uses for your web pages.

How does Google create the snippets?

Historically, Google snippets came from 3 different places:

  • the content of the page
  • the meta description of the page
  • the DMOZ listing description of a page

Of course, the content of the page is the most obvious choice for result snippets. However, Google often does not use the content of a page to create the snippet. For example, the page might not contain enough text content although it is relevant.

In that case, Google takes a look at the meta description of the ranked pages. In general, a meta description should be a short text that accurately and precisely describes the content of the page in a few words.

If the meta description was missing, too short, unrelated, or low quality, Google used DMOZ.org for the snippets. The quality of the DMOZ snippets were often of much higher quality than those provided by webmasters in their meta description, or were more descriptive than what the page provided.

Last month, DMOZ closed its doors and Google stopped using snippets from DMOZ. That means that it has become even more important than before to create good meta descriptions for your web pages.

How to get compelling search result snippets

There are several things that you can do to make sure that Google shows good snippets for your web pages:

1. Improve the content of your web pages

The content of your web pages is the most important source for the snippets. Before you improve the meta descriptions of your web pages, improve the visible content of your web pages. Meta descriptions are only visible to search engines.

It is much better if your web pages contain good content that is also visible to your regular website visitors.

2. Improve the meta descriptions of your web pages

Do not use the same meta description across multiple pages. It also does not make sense to include off-topic, low quality, or outright spammy meta descriptions on your web pages. Google will ignore them.

A good meta description contains the following:

  • an accurate and precise description of the web page content
  • a benefit to the website visitor
  • a call to action that entices users to click

Each page should have its own meta description. Although there is no character limit for meta descriptions, Google will truncate the descriptions as needed, typically to fit the device width.

Don't forget that the title of a web page will also be displayed on the search results page. The title sparks interest and the meta description contains additional information to convince the user.

better use a good snippet

You need more than good snippets

A good snippet won't help you if your website is not listed on the first search results page. The tools in SEOprofiler help you to get your web pages on the first results page. If you haven't done it yet, create your SEOprofiler account now:

Try SEOprofiler now

2. Internet marketing news of the week

Which content is king? How to analyze your competitors to improve your own website.

"Great content is the key to high rankings on Google. This is easier said than done. If you do not know which content you should create, this advice doesn’t help you at all. Which keywords are good? Which content is good for high rankings? Which pages attract visitors? [...]

This is a proven concept that is very easy to do with the competitive intelligence tools in SEOprofiler. Here’s how to do it."


Gary IllyesGoogle: we penalize egregious link manipulation schemes

"Some weeks ago, Google’s John Mueller said that Google makes a difference between unnatural links and spammy links.

Gary Illyes has confirmed on Twitter that Google ignores unnatural links as long as it does not look like an ‘egregious link manipulation scheme’."


Google: we can also ignore links from Forbes and Entrepreneur.com

"On Twitter, Google’s Gary Illyes said that they can also ignore links from Forbes and Entrepreneur.com if these links are artificial. [...]

If you know about a paid link scheme, chances are that Google with its thousands of employees also knows about this paid link scheme."


John MuellerGoogle: a low crawl rate is not a bad thing

"In a video on YouTube, Google’s John Mueller said that a higher crawl rate does not mean that a website gets higher rankings on Google. You can get high rankings even if your website does not have a high crawl frequency.

Now John Mueller confirmed on Twitter that it does not have to be a bad thing if your website has a low crawl rate."

+++ SEARCH +++ ENGINE +++ NEWS +++ TICKER +++

  • Google's John Mueller: the order of language values in hreflang doesn't matter.
  • Google is testing another search result page design.
  • Wallstreet Journal ends Google users free ride: fewer visitors, more subscriptions.
  • Google quietly shutters AdWords targeting for airports and universities.
  • Google is testing carousel in hotel local packs.
  • Better do not try to sell links to Google.

3. Previous articles