Why Is Metadata Important?
When people think about aligning their content marketing efforts with proper SEO practices, they often focus on using keywords that have a high search volume and low competition. They may also attempt to improve their search engine rankings by making their content easily navigable, scannable, and digestible. And that’s great! Both of these objectives are necessary for ranking well in search engines.
However, one crucial aspect that is often overlooked is metadata. Many neglect the significance of metadata in their content marketing strategies, which can have a negative impact on their SEO efforts.
Below, we break down all the technical data there is to know about metadata and discuss how you can optimize it to increase your chances of being discovered within search engine results. Read on to find out!
What is Metadata?
In its simplest form, metadata refers to a set of data that provides information about other data. It's a summary of what is on your webpage that makes it easier for people to find and understand what your webpage is about and how it can help them.
Metadata is often confused with data itself, but it’s not the same thing. Data are facts or numbers that have been recorded from an experiment or study through “data collection,” while metadata describes how data should be interpreted, organized, and shared.
Why You Should Prioritize Effective Metadata Management
In addition to enabling users to find your web pages, metadata plays an important part in delivering concrete value to your business.
Metadata allows for personalization
Adapting your metadata across marketing channels allows you to personalize the delivery of its content. For example, if an Instagram user enjoys video content over image-based content, algorithms will prioritize video recommendations to create personalized video playlists on their Instagram feed.
Metadata provides data management to help you organize your content.
Because metadata summarizes basic information, it can help you organize your content by categorizing and classifying the data to easily manage it.
Metadata allows you to be easily found within search engines
Perhaps one of the more attractive reasons to utilize metadata, search engines are able to read your data to gain a better understanding of what your content is about and offer it to users. No search engine optimization strategy is complete without high quality metadata.
What Are the Different Types of Metadata?
There is all sorts of content on the internet so it makes sense that there are also different types of metadata. Metadata is stored within a metadata repository where a database stores all of the information about your webpage, from its title and description to its keywords and other various data elements. Within the repository, you'll most frequently find the following three types of metadata:
Descriptive Metadata
The most common type of data asset, descriptive metadata describes page items or content for search engines and people to find; essentially it is discoverable metadata.
Let's say that you're working on a paper about the French Revolution and are looking for a book about Charlotte Corday’s assassination of Jean-Paul Marat. You go to the librarian and describe what you need. She considers for a moment, then prints out a list of possible resources for you. The list contains the author, the book title, the length, and any other identifying information. This is descriptive metadata. From the metadata provided, you are then able to choose the book that best meets your needs.
Descriptive metadata works similarly online. It allows users to search for and find the information they need. You can use descriptive metadata to create a list of keywords that can be used by search engines and other metadata tools.
Structural Metadata
If descriptive metadata is used for the discovery of metadata, then structural metadata is used to help store it within a metadata repository and then present it. In simpler terms, structural metadata explains how a data set is connected. Structural metadata helps you to connect your data and find the relationships between different kinds of content. It also allows you to create a hierarchy of information for easier navigation. Structural metadata is often used for libraries, museums, archives, and other repositories that have vast amounts of data stored in multiple formats.
Administrative Metadata
Administrative metadata is used to describe the structure of a database. It includes information such as the table names, creation date, column names, and data types. This is often referred to as low-level metadata, because it refers only to the data itself, not how it’s used or what it means. Administrative metadata helps individuals understand how data is organized within a repository, so they can access and use it easily.
Less Common Types of Metadata
In addition to the above three, you may also find yourself faced with:
Technical Metadata
Preservation Metadata
Document Metadata
Statistical Metadata
Reference Metadata
Business Metadata
Geospatial Metadata
Process Metadata
Social Media Metadata
and Legal Metadata
These metadata structures are often used to organize, describe, and name data resources to find content in a variety of contexts.
Metadata and Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
We've established that there are a lot of different forms of metadata and that they all help organize information for both easy access and document management. But how does metadata work within an SEO framework? And how does it help your web pages become more visible and accessible to users? The answer lies in SEO.
What is SEO?
SEO is the practice of improving a website's visibility and ranking in search engine results pages (SERPs). In essence, SEO increases the organic (non-paid) traffic to a website by optimizing various on-page and off-page factors that affect search engine rankings.
Search engines like Google, Bing, and Yahoo use complex algorithms to determine the relevance and quality of websites and web pages in response to user search queries. SEO makes a website more favorable to search engines, ultimately enhancing its chances of appearing higher in search results.
There are two main types of SEO techniques: on-page SEO and off-page SEO. On-page SEO mainly focuses on optimizing elements on a website itself, such as content, meta tags, headers, internal linking, site structure, and URL structure. It makes the website more user-friendly, keyword-rich, and easily understandable for search engines.
Off-page SEO, on the other hand, involves building a website's reputation and authority through activities outside the website itself. This includes earning backlinks from reputable and relevant websites, social media marketing, influencer outreach, and online reputation management.
How Does Metadata Use SEO?
When you optimize your metadata, you provide context to search engines about what your website is about and the quality of data assets on your website. The more an algorithm is able to understand and classify data, the more likely it will be able to share your website with relevant users, thus driving traffic to your site and increasing profitability and conversions.
There are three important SEO-focused metadata structures to optimize.
Title Tags
A title tag is a form of metadata that presents the title of your page within the search engine results.
Within HTML, it is displayed as,
<head><title>This is the Title Tag</title></head>
and often appears within raw code as,
<title>This is the Title Tag </title><meta name="description" content="This title tag element describes what your webpage is titled to improve user experience and searchability. Title tags are displayed in search engines and when shared.">
Title tags are important because they help users understand what your page is about before they click on it. If you have a long title or meta tag that is difficult to read or understand, then users may skip over your search result. Sometimes you may find title tags also referred to as "meta titles", "meta tags," or "meta title tags.”
Metadata Tags
Metadata tags are another form of metadata that appear within search engine results pages (SERPs) and can be used to describe what the page is about. They appear under the title tag.
Within HTML code, it can appear as
<meta name="description" content="This is the meta description. A meta description provides context for what the webpage is about">
If the title tag is the title that is displayed within search engines, then the metadata tags are what comes underneath it. They are a short description of what the page is about. It’s important to create good meta descriptions because they can help improve click-through rates for your website.
Alt-Text Tags
Finally, we have alt-text tags. Alt-text tags, also called alt-tags and alt-descriptions, are the descriptions of an image that display when the digital image on a webpage is not fully visible to a user. The alt-text is an important part of SEO, because it helps search engines understand what the images are about and which words should be used for their algorithms.
An alt-text tag appears in html as
<area alt="this is the alt text description of the image">
In practice, the text within the alt text will show up where the image failed to load.
Best Metadata Practices
Don't let the code above scare you; implementing metadata is easier than you think! In fact, your content management system (CMS) and website most likely have user-friendly SEO input options. In most cases, you’ll see an option to optimize metadata fields such as title tags, meta descriptions, header tags, and image alt tags. Simply navigate to the relevant settings or options in your CMS, and you'll be able to input and customize the metadata for each page of your website. This way, you can ensure that search engines understand and display your website's content accurately, ultimately improving your visibility and attracting more organic traffic.
While any metadata is better than no metadata at all, there are a few best practices to keep in mind to ensure that your content rockets to the top of the search engine results page.
Title Tags
1. Your title should contain relevant keywords.
Titles matter. Many search engines use the title of your web page to determine its topic and relevance. So it's important that your title contains keywords that your users are searching for…but remember not to overdo it. Titles that contain too many keywords can appear spammy and will be penalized. In general, it's always a safe bet to contain your highest priority keyword in the title and only your highest priority keyword.
2. Try to keep the length of your title between 60–70 characters.
Titles that are too long will be truncated by search engines, so it's important to keep them short and sweet. Webpages like WordCounter can help you keep track of how long your titles are.
3. Remember that algorithms give more weight to words at the beginning.
To maximize the impact, consider that search engines prioritize the words at the beginning of a page title. Structure your page titles by leading with relevant keyword phrases, followed by your company name when appropriate. This approach allows search engines to better recognize and rank your content for the targeted keywords, while maintaining brand recognition.
4. Keep the user in mind.
Keep in mind who you're writing for, and think of how they would search for this content. Remember that titles are often the first thing a user sees when looking at search results, so it's important to keep them short and sweet.
Metadata Tags
1. Be concise and compelling.
Keep your meta title and description tags brief while accurately summarizing the content. Make it enticing to encourage users to click through to your website.
2. Use relevant keywords.
As above, you'll want to incorporate relevant keywords that align with the content on the page. This helps search engines understand the topic and improves the page's visibility in search results.
3. Customize your metadata for each page.
Avoid using the same generic meta tags across all pages. Tailor the metadata to reflect the unique content and purpose of each page to maximize its effectiveness.
4. Prioritize user intent
Consider the search intent behind the keywords you choose for your metadata. Craft meta tags that align with what users are searching for to attract quality traffic to your site.
5. Don't forget about mobile.
With the majority of searches now happening on mobile devices, ensure your metadata tags are optimized for mobile displays. Keep them concise and impactful, so they are fully visible on smaller screens.
Alt-Text Tags
Stay true to the image of the picture.
Alt-text should accurately and concisely describe the content of the image for users who may not be able to see it. Avoid using generic phrases such as "image" or "picture" and instead provide specific details about what is shown in the image.
2. Remember to include relevant keywords.
Incorporate relevant keywords that align with the content on the page. This helps engines understand the context of the image and can improve the page's visibility in search results.
3. Keep it simple.
Alt-text should be brief and to the point, typically no longer than a sentence or two. Avoid lengthy descriptions or unnecessary information.
4. Don't stuff your caption.
While it's important to include relevant keywords, avoid overloading the alt-text with keywords. Write for the user, not for search engines.
5. When appropriate, add branding…but don't overdo it.
If the image includes your company's logo, add branding to the alt-text. However, use this sparingly and only when relevant to the image.
The Next Level of Metadata: Schema Markups
As search engines continue to expand their capabilities and offerings, it’s becoming more difficult to stand out from the crowd. However, metadata schema can help. We'll go more in-depth about schema in a separate blog post, because of its complexity and importance.
All that you need to know if you're just learning about schema now is that it’s an effective way to hack the SERP.
Metadata schema is a type of metadata that allows you to define how search engines display your content. It's made up of three different parts: OpenGraph, Twitter Cards, and Google Rich Snippets. Each of these types are useful in their own right, but when used together, they're even more powerful. Utilizing schema allows Google and other engines to provide rich search results that share even more context about what your website is about and helps drive more organic traffic.
Remember: Context is Key!
At the end of the day, you can have all of the metadata in the world on your website, but if it’s not relevant to users and Google, then it won’t do you any good. Remember to always think about your audience when creating metadata, and make sure that it's relevant to them and what you offer.
Looking to improve your website's visibility and boost its SEO performance? Our team at BitterRoot Content can help! Contact us today to learn more about how you can effectively incorporate metadata into your website's content and SEO strategy.