Title Tag To Long

[tkobrien]

In the initial review of my site, I have 38 warnings of title tags to long. It also says these warnings are often penalized by search engines. In Google webmaster tools, It says I have no problems with long title tags. So am I getting penalized and do I need to shorten them? I would already have shortened them but in the past, everytime I have changed my title tag I have been penalized by the search engines. I usually get my rankings back but it can take up to a month and a half to get back to where I was.

[AlanBleiweiss]

unless your title tags are stuffed with dozens of keywords. I wouldn't be so concerned about the length. The reason you might want to limit the length of your title tags has to do with a combination of factors.

First, the longer the title tag. The more challenging it is for search engines to determine an individual page's topical focus. When comparing the contents of the title tag to other factors. Next, search engines only display the first 65 to 70 characters from your title and even then, only when they are evaluation process determines that your chosen title tag truly does represent the topical focus of that page.

So based on those concepts, best practices SEOwould dictate cleaning up all page titles accordingly.

[TheARKlady]

I've just cleaned up about 250 titles for a client site. They were WAY too long but sometimes it might just be one character--so with some creative focus you can tighten things up and still get your term or phrases in.

When it comes to software tools, they can only do so much and so you have to take that into consideration. I tend to err on the site of caution and still with the parameters. My goal is between 60-65 characters in titles.

If you are using a CMS (content management system) that also lists the blog name in the title by default, this could put you over as well--so take that into consideration.

[SuperJeweler]

hi:

would you be interested in working with us to improve our titles, across all the site we sell?

ANdrew Fox

Superjeweler

af@hansa-usa.com