Meta Description Being Picked up from another site!?

[danieldunn10]

Hi, when we search for a phrase (which is the most searched for phrase for our company) the meta description which is displayed isnt the one we set, and it hasnt picked it up from any text on the page.

The description is incorrect, it says we have an office in a city that we dont, and it just isnt a very good description generally.

What has been suggested to us by our website developers is that the description is being picked up by google from a website which lists companies details.

The description which is displayed on that website, is the same as the description which is shown for our company in the search results.

But is it possible for Google to ignore the meta description which is set in our homepage and the other text on the home page, and pickup the text from another website and use it as our description?

Many Thanks

[Everett]

I have seen this happen with sites that have been redirected. For example, I redirected site A to site B once - including all of the content from site A - and site B inherited the Titles and descriptions from site A for several months. It was very irritating because I didn't use the words anywhere on the page, and I was using NOODP and NOYDIR tags. I even told Google the site had moved in GWT.

Eventually it sorted itself out, but it made me see how difficult it must be fore Google to keep everything straight on so many sites with so many different site elements, especially when redirects are involved.

Both sites had content and were in the the same niche. Site A had stronger signals, and was a year older than site B. However, I wanted to redirect to site B for branding reasons.

I suggest you do some digging around to find out if any other site has been 301 redirected to your site. If so, did that content ever appear on it?

Good luck and let us know what you find out!

[Dr-Pete]

Yeah, I'd just go easy on directory links going forward. There's no clear sign you need to start cutting. I was just observing the pattern, for the most part.

[MichaelC-15022]

If you're not under a Google penalty, I wouldn't bother getting the links & listings removed.  I don't think they're hurting you.  I expect that once you add NOODP NOYDIR the problem will go away in a matter of days.

[danieldunn10]

Thanks for your replies,

I did think that, because all of the directories are picking up the same thing it must be somewhere, but I cant see it anywhere. Its not on our Google+ page as we have only recently set that up.

I will try the NOODP and NOYDIR

Should I contact these directories and ask to be removed? We've not asked to be on them.

Is it worth having the links from them?

Thanks for your help

[MichaelC-15022]

You're also here with that description:

• http://www.top20.md/int/info/raworthscouk
• http://uk-directory.co.uk/United_Kingdom/England/North_Yorkshire/Harrogate/Business_and_Economy/Legal_Services/index.html
• http://www.the-arena.com/matrix_smartlist.aspx?sid=1164145
• http://www.inonesearch.com/?cid=00000522741
• http://www.lawyersdirectory.co.uk/law_links/Find-a-Solicitors/North-Yorkshire-Solicitors/index.html

FYI it'll probably help a lot if you add NOODP, NOYDIR to your meta robots like Pete says

Michael

[Dr-Pete]

I'm only speculating, because directories are the only place I seem to be able to find the text Google is using. It begs the question, though - if directories are all picking up that text, is it possible they're getting it somewhere? For example, your Google+ business listing?

I've never seen a description pulled from another site outside of DMOZ/ODP. I've seen rewrites by Google, but usually using content somewhere on the page. So, this is definitely odd.

You could try the NOODP meta directive. I have heard cases where it helps prevent rewrites (even if the source isn't the ODP).

[danieldunn10]

Thanks for taking the time to have a look, its causing us a real problem. The description appears in the number one search term we want to rank for.

We haven't intentionally asked to be setup on any directories, I've asked to be removed form the best of yorkshire website but we've had no response and nobody seems to be keeping the website upto date.

Apart from changing the meta description to one which is more natural, what else can we do? How can we remove ourselves from directories if they dont reply?

Is it possible for the meta description to be picked up from that best of yorkshire website?

Thanks very much.

[Dr-Pete]

Huh... yeah, that text doesn't seem to appear anywhere on your site, and it's not on DMOZ, that I can find. You do have some directory links to your site using that description in the profile:

http://www.bestofyorkshire.com/category/services/

...but I've never seen Google go looking that far. Your META description is honestly a bit keyword loaded (it just looks like a string of keywords with commas to me) - if you made it more targeted and included your main keywords naturally, Google would be more likely to use it as is. For some reason, they're just not wanting to pick up your main copy.

You've got a mountain of directory links that all seem to be using some mix of your home-page copy, too. It could be that these are starting to look like near-duplicates and are devaluing your home-page content somehow. I'd diversify some of that and lay off the directories a bit, personally. That's probably not the primary cause, though.

[danieldunn10]

Thanks for your help.

The search phrase in Google is 'Solicitors Harrogate'

You will notice that the description for our site is:

'Solicitors with offices in Harrogate and Knaresborough. Site details the available services, gives contact details, and includes a company history.'

But we don't have an office in Knaresborough, and I cant see anywhere that this text is in the website!

Thanks v much

[Martijn_Scheijbeler]

Hi Daniel,

It happened that Google ignored the META description on a page and the text itself and used the text from the Yahoo Directory Project and another directory. But I haven't seen that happen for a while. Can you give some more insights in what URL we're talking about and what the keyword is?