SEO copywriting – Are meta tags dead?

Listen to some SEO commentators and you’d be forgiven for assuming that meta tags are no longer a factor in the way search engines rank websites.  Following a recent Google declaration, greater  emphasis is now placed on the number of quality, inbound links which point to a site.

It’s obvious that this will be a good indicator of the ‘importance’ of a site but, it should be said, meta tags will always remain as the signposts which indicate relevance of content.  That in turn must surely mean that  meta tags will always be an important part of on-page SEO.

Fortunately, the search engine robots can now identify ‘natural’ language patterns in online copy.  The death of ‘keyword stuffing’ is not only good news for the readers of websites who now no longer have to endure unreadable and repetitive text.  It also frees up copywriters to write in the way they prefer – in real sentences that concentrate on the flow of ideas and information, rather than including as many keywords as possible.  

Keywords are still important, of course.  The difference now is that they should be used carefully – in <h1> tags certainly, and also in introductory sentences. They also have a place in <title> tags – the nearer the beginning of the line the better.  (And if you can also include main keywords in a page URL, this too will help with ranking.)

The conclusion to all this is that mega tags are alive and well but – in an increasingly c0mpetitive web environment – the search engines have been forced to look at inbound links to sort the wheat from the chaff. 

And yet, this is far from being a perfect science – even with all the powerful semantic analysis tools at the search engines’ disposal.  Generating links from online articles and PR, for example, is a process that is still open to abuse by automated submission software but, here again, search engines are ‘on the case’ with their increased awareness (and intolerance) of duplicate content.

It’s important for online copywriters (and those who brief them) to remember that search engines exist solely to provide the most relevant search results for their punters.  Quality content will bring its own rewards in increased uptake among the online community.  Meta tags, similarly, will always be needed to invite the search engines to ‘come see about me’.