Title Tag issue

[TrinityPower]

Hello,

This is a weird one.  I am hoping someone can point me in the right direction.

A couple months ago, we updated trinitypower.com and it was back then that I first noticed this issue, but because the home page title tag was okay and contained the primary terms for that page, I told myself I would circle back.

The problem is that even though Google crawls the site everyday, it does not update the title tag text in it's index.

1. Google:  "Trinity Power Rentals" and you will see the title in the index as "Trinity Power:  Temporary Power Rentals".

2. Go to trinitypower.com and view source.  You will see the title tag in the code as "Temporary Power Rentals - Trinity Power"

The desc tag has been updated correctly, but I can't figure out why not the Title tag.  You can look at the cache version in the index of Google.  It is showing the latest version of that tag, so I really do not understand what has happened here.

I am using WP Super Cache... maybe a conflict with that?  I have dumped it's cache numerous times though.

Please let me know what you think.

Thanks,

Jarrett

[max.favilli]

Check my comments here: http://moz.com/community/q/has-google-changed-how-it-displays-metatitles-for-business-listings

Analyze your homepage with your preferred keyword density analyzer, and you will find out the top 2 words keyword is "temporary power" and your top 3 words keyword is "temporary power rentals".

Now guess what google think is the most appropriate title in SERP?

[RobertJakobson]

Hi,  rest assured. It has nothing to do with your site or your site's cache. I have seen this happen on my sites as well.

Search Engine Land wrote about this at http://searchengineland.com/advanced-seo-learning-experiments-using-googles-title-tag-changes-example-189850 they link to a Google Support page that states the following:

_If we’ve detected that a particular result has [...] issues with its title, we may try to generate an improved title from anchors, on-page text, or other sources. However, sometimes even pages with well-formulated, concise, descriptive titles will end up with different titles in our search results to better indicate their relevance to the query. _

There’s a simple reason for this: the title tag as specified by a webmaster is limited to being static, fixed regardless of the query. Once we know the user’s query, we can often find alternative text from a page that better explains why that result is relevant. Using this alternative text as a title helps the user, and it also can help your site. Users are scanning for their query terms or other signs of relevance in the results, and a title that is tailored for the query can increase the chances that they will click through.

There's also this video from Google Webmaster Tools YouTube channel where Matt Cutts goes over the "Why would Google do that?" question: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3HX_8BAhB4

[RangeMarketing]

Hi Jarrett,

Max and Robert are both correct. Google sometimes displays different titles based on what they believe is the user's intent. In your case specifically, I think Google is displaying a title tag that makes sense.

Think about it, if someone is using a query that includes your **brand name **they are likely trying to find your website as quickly as possible. By pushing your brand name to the beginning of the title tag it may be easier for the user to recognize that the 1st result is in fact your website.

You can always try different variations of your title tag to see if Google will change it (for example, "Temporary Power Rentals | Trinity Power" or "Temporary Power Rentals by Trinity Power") but in my opinion, because it is a branded search term, Google will probably display your brand name first no matter what.

I personally wouldn't be overly concerned about this specific occurrence.

Hope this clears things up a bit!

[TrinityPower]

Great, thanks for feedback guys, much appreciated.  I was not really that concerned as the Title Google has chosen to use, works.  Nice to know that it is not an issue with the code or a plugin conflict.

Thanks again,

J

[RangeMarketing]

Np!