Title displays differently depending on search query?
-
Hi,
I have seen this a few times but maybe someone can shed some light as to why this happens?
If I search for a generic keyword im targeting in the title tag it shows the actual title tag placed in the code.
But if I search for the brand name, the title tag changes to show just the brand name, so completely different to the default title tag.
Any ideas why it does this? And is this bad, is Google saying the content on the site is not relevant and therefore decides to change it?
Cheers
-
Thanks.
Seems Google will change the title tag to increase CTR, so that's why Google is switching generic tag for brand only tag when a brand name search is performed.
Makes sense.
-
Hi,
Hope below link help you out from Google webmaster central:
http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.in/2012/01/better-page-titles-in-search-results.html
-
If your title tag is too long, its also possible that Google is displaying a truncated version of the tag with the emphasis on the matching keyword.
Does the tag actually change or does Google just display a different part of it?
-
I have redirects on for the root domain.
Google has only indexed one version of the root.
Thanks for trying to help problem solve though.
-
Perhaps google is pulling different versions of your site.. Do you have a url of www.homepage.com and www.homepage.com/index
Try running your site here: http://www.virante.org/seo-tools/duplicate-content
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Do I need title elements on all my forum pages?
I have a forum that I'm working on and there are a lot of pages that don't need to be found in search. In fact, I'm even thinking of de-indexing some of them such as the following pages: Registration Login Member Cancellation Member Billing There are also a lot of pages that are only viewable to paid members. Do they all need title tags and meta descriptions?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | BroDino0 -
Informational query
Hello, In an informational query can the answer people are looking for have multiple intent or will it always have 1 intent ? For example New York, the intent is probably where ? On a longer query such as "Provence bike tour" what is the intent ? Where, what, Why, How to, when ? Thank you,
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | seoanalytics0 -
Different content on different mobile browsers
Is it ok to run different html & different content on different mobile browsers even though the url is same. or the site can get penalize ?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | vivekrathore0 -
How should be a perfect SEO Title, Description, H1 and H2?
Hello friends, i have a very good question. In a website of coupon codes, how should be a perfect Title, Description, H1 and H2? For example: If our main keyword is "Promo codes Amazon" but we we want to get good results with "Coupon codes Amazon", "Discounts Amazon" and "Coupons Amazon", how should be a perfect SEO? In some sites, people we use some tactics like month or year in title and descriptions or number of coupons and offers. Thanks so much.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | pompero990 -
Brand queries as a ranking signal?
Hi folks, I may be shooting WAY off the mark here for it to be laughable, but I wondered if anyone else was thinking about this. I was trying to get to sleep last night, but was thinking about rankings (as you do... You DO think about rankings instead of counting sheep don't you... I'm not weird or anything am I... AM I?) and it occurred to me that maybe Google uses frequency of brand queries as a ranking signal - was wondering if anyone had done any research into this? Assuming that if more people are searching for a brand name, then there must be an outside influence on this behaviour (offline ads or editorial for example) - and this all points to a site or company being popular or interesting - maybe Google looks at the growth in brand name queries, and boosts based on this... I have done no research into this (I was just thinking about it instead of counting sheep last night... because I probably AM weird...) but was wondering what people here thought of this. Also, I don't have time (or intelligence TBH) to run an experiment on this, but maybe one of you bright sparks would? Best wishes, Amelia PS - if I'm being STOOPID please be gentle with me 😉
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | CommT0 -
Company Blog at a different URL
Ok, I have been doing a lot of work over the past 6 months, disavowing low quality links from spammy directories to our company website, etc. However, my efforts seem to have had a negative, not positive effect. This has brought me back to reconsidering what we are doing as we have lost a good amount of traction on the nationwide Google rankings specifically. Considering our company blog - platinumcctv(dot)net - we have used this blog for a long time to inform customers of new products, software developments and then to provide them links to purchase those components. Last week, I revamped the nearly default wordpress theme to another on a piece of advice. However, someone told me that all of our links should be nofollow, even though it is a company blog because we have many links coming from this domain, and it could be found as spammy. Potato/Potato - But before I start the tedious task of changing every link to no follow on a whim, i searched a lot, but have found no CLEAR substantiation of this. Any ideas? Other recommendations appreciated as well! Platinum-CCTV(dot)com
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | PTCCTV0 -
Similar page titles but not quite duplicate
Howdy Mozzers, I have a problem with the way Google now tries not to show more than one search result per site on the first page. As in it is a lot harder to be ranked number 1 - 10 twice with different pages. Some of my pages have similar yet different page titles so they use the same first two keywords and then a variable such as '(keyword) (keyword) installations' '(keyword) (keyword) surveys'. Then when I search for '(keyword) (keyword)' they all appear at the start of page two with only ever one of them moving onto the end of page one. Now, it could just be that they are not quite optimised for page 1 but I think it would be more holding back of pages so they don't flood page 1. Any help on this? And also is there a problem with having similar page titles for pages? Cheers
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Hughescov0 -
Sudden drop in ranking for major search terms
Site bumpbabyandbeyond com au. Help! We have been operating for six years and had steadily built up our ranking for major terms like maternity clothes, maternity clothing, maternity wear, reaching highs of 6, 8 and 10 respectively for AU sites AU wide about six months ago that we have steadily maintained. All of a sudden we have dropped away. A week ago I noticed we had dropped from 6 to 12 for maternity clothes. This morning we are 21! I can't see any obvious reason for this, but believe the eCommerce module of our inventory/pos software has had a recent update - I'm awaiting answers on this. We haven't actively had anyone link building or working on SEO after being badly bitten and shelling out a small fortune for an AU company to do very little over six months - rankings improved rapidly when I sacked them and did some on page minor work myself. But I don't have the time or knowledge to look after the seo, and am on the hunt for reputable white hat assistance. Is there anything obviously wrong that I need to fix ASAP? Any help would be much appreciated 🙂
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | catfree0