Is the " meta content tag" important?

[AubbiefromAubenRealty]

I am currently trying to optimize my companies website and I noticed that meta content is exactly the same for all of the pages on our website. Isn't this problematic? The actual content on the webpage is not the same and a lot of the pages don't have these keywords in the content.

[SEOAndy]

can you post a link so we can see what exactly you are meaning - or post an example of the offending tag

[Mike.Goracke]

Hi Chad,

I think you are asking if it is problematic for all of the pages on your website to be using the same meta keywords and meta description tags.

These tags look like this:

The "content" of these tags, and actually your title tags as well, is duplicated across all of the pages on your website (I am referring to the website listed in your profile - Auben Realty).

The title tag is extremely important and provides search engines with a quick glimpse of what a page is about prior to even viewing the page. These should be unique to each page on your website as they are a page ranking factor.

The meta description tag is not important for search engines, but it is for visitors. This is the description visitors will see when your web pages appear in a search engine's results page. Although this tag is not part of a ranking factor, it is good marketing to have these descriptions be unique to each page.

The meta keywords tag can be removed from all of your website's pages. This tag is not used in any way with Google. I have read that Bing uses this tag to look for basic keyword stuffing. And while other search engines may use the keywords tag for some ranking factor - more than likely you are not getting traffic from those search engines, because they are not used nearly as much.

If you check out the SEOmoz Guide to SEO, you will find additional information on these tags and a bunch of general SEO tips.

Hope this helps.

Mike

[AubbiefromAubenRealty]

Yes, Mike

You hit hammer right on the nail. This is what I was asking.

http://aubenrealty.com/

Here it is the code:

<title>Auben Realty - real estate brokerage specializing in property management and sales throughout the Central Savannah River Area (CSRA).</title>

This code is identical for every page of our website. I know the title and description should be unique to the content on the webpage. My question is about the keyword tag. Should I fret over this. My web developer said that because of the way that our website was originally set-up, we can't make the keywords unique to each page. They all have to be identical.

[Mike.Goracke]

My recommendation would be to remove the tag altogether if possible OR leave the tag blank if that is not possible.

The other "problem" a keyword tag can pose if you are utilizing it correctly is that competitors can EASILY see what keywords/phrases you are targeting.

Hope this helps.

Mike

[inhouseninja]

I believe the meta description is a hugely underrated and valuable tool you can use. Especially once you get your on page SEO and link building set on a good course.

An example would be my company wanted to be on first page of SERP for benchmarking. and the change in Meta Description in title tag allowing me to mention member names has improved click through rates dramatically and gotten us to page #1.

I always try to tie in my company's biggest selling point in the title tag. I talked to the sales staff and asked, "What's your closing move to sell so you don't finish second and win a set of steak knives?"

It's been huge help.