Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Does a phone number in the title tag hurt your rankings in SERP?
-
Hi Mozzers,
One of my client is a carpet cleaner and I was wondering if adding a phone number into the title tags would hurt our rankings .
I am asking because the client has mentioned it and that we do have some space to add a phone number into the tag.
Thanks
-
Great discussion here, guys!
Just thought I'd pop in to add my 2 cents.
Having a phone number in the title tag will not 'hurt' the business in any way, and is a not uncommon practice in Local SEO. The only possible negative to doing this would be that you would have less characters to devote to words as they are being devoted to the digits of the phone number. So, that's about the only downside of doing this. Just remember, the client should be putting a unique title tag on every page, so some of his pages might have a phone number in the title tag, but don't use it on every page. Be creative, varied and informative in each tag and you should not expect any negative outcomes.
-
Thanks for sharing your opinions and thoughts Tyler
Appreciated
-
I think it would depend on how well the site(s) is ranking already. If it is ranking well and you are only filling in the extra characters (that is how I am reading it), then I can't see it hurting the sites SERP rankings.
However, if you are removing terms from the title to add the number, then I think you may see a dip in the results.
My bottom line: It seems to me that you are simply adding the number and not replacing anything with it. If that is the case, I really can't see it hurting the results. You shouldn't act on your clients site with just my opinion though; hopefully some others will populate this thread with some additional insight.
-
Thank you for your thorough answer tyler!
I think that both of you have good points. On one hand Matt thinks that a phone number might sacrifice the opportunity of having a secondary keyword or a better description of the business. On the other hand Tyler thinks that adding a pn to the title might decrease traffic but generates more leads meaning a potential increase in sales which is exactly what a business wants.
But do you guys think that a phone number in a title tag won't hurt the SERP's ranking? assuming you add a phone number in all the main service pages and a different phone number for each of the 40+ microsites?
thanks
-
I am going to have to disagree, sort of, with Horizon on the usefulness of the number within the title tag -with some reservations of course:
If the client is a local service business (I am only assuming it is based on the description of the client as a 'carpet cleaner') then I can see some usefulness to filling the space you haven't already used with a phone number. I see what Horizon is saying about using that valuable real estate to help draw visitors into the site, but at the same time I would assume that a converting lead is most important to the client so I am inclined to say that your best option is to test them both.
I know, sort of a lackluster answer.
The only reason I am not fully supporting the answer supplied by Horizon (it is a good answer regardless) is that I am not positive about how someone searching for a service, like the one supplied by your client, would like to come across and contact a vendor. Traditionally it was the phone book, word of mouth and hoping for a good result, but with all the local business sites populating the web now, I find myself taking the quality of the site as an indication of the quality of the business. However, if I was needing a carpet cleaned in a hurry I might be inclined to call the number listed in the SERPs if the rest of the blurb made it clear that they were in my area and did, in fact, clean carpets.
If it was up to me I would make a note of how the site is currently performing in terms of bringing in organic traffic/converting leads, and then I would test the other two options over a period of time. When benchmarking the current performance I would establish a set of key performance metrics to track throughout (the most important being how many converting leads are generated). Maybe test with the phone number and then test with some additional information and no number. I would wait, and use the data available to me, to find a historically stable period of time in which the testing can be as controlled as possible. Remember: if you are testing the phone number at the end you should be sure that the rest of the title supplies enough information for the potential customer to feel comfortable contacting your client.
So after all of that typing I am still where I started:
Is it better to have a small sell line or a phone number?
Is supplying a number in the SERPs when the competition does not a good way to gain a little bit of ground over them?
Are those ten or so characters enough to include anything substantial besides the phone number?
Is the possible decrease in organic traffic worth the possible increase in the 'oh my god, the cat just knocked over an entire bottle of wine and the inlaws are visiting this weekend!' busniess that may or may not be created by offering a phone number in the SERPs?
Is the rest of the title descriptive enough to convince someone searching for your clients service is what they need and that they should skip clicking through to the site in favor of calling the number?
I would be interested in reading what some of the other users have to say. I am sure there are differing opinions and a few hundred minds are better than one.
-
Hi,
I don't think it will hurt per se, but I would like to know why they would want to do that?
The title tag is quite important real estate, so I would be inclined to use the 10 or so characters more effectively. Also, if people see their telephone in SERPs, that's a click your client isn't going to get through to their website.
Matt
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
-
Phone number formatting - Periods vs Dashes
Are there any best practices on phone number formatting regarding using periods XXX.XXX.XXXX vs dashes XXX-XXX-XXXX? What about using parentheses on the area code (XXX)XXX-XXX? This is regarding a phone number on a contact apge...
On-Page Optimization | | WorkhorseMKT0 -
Phone number for SEO
We have had an interesting question from a client. They have asked if removing their phone number from their website would have an affect on their rankings. Our immediate answer was 'No' but it may affect the Brand, Usability and Customer experience by restricting the methods of contact. This then made us think that perhaps then it could have an effect in the long term. This situation is also complicated by the fact that they do not have a Google Local Plus account for operational, sensitivity reasons (they don't want to openly publicise their address) We believe that there shouldn't be any negative affect but thought we would open a discussion. Thanks in advance for any comments/ideas.
On-Page Optimization | | vital_hike0 -
Duplicate page titles and hreflang tags
Moz is flagging a lot of pages on our site which have duplicate page titles. 99% of these are international pages which hreflang tags in the sitemap. Do I need to worry about this? I assumed that it wasn't an issue given the use of hreflang. And if that's the case, why is Moz flagging them as an issue? Thanks.
On-Page Optimization | | ahyde0 -
Difference in using dividers in TITLE TAG
Hi everyone, i know that dividers in title or even title tag doesnt have much of an impact on better rankings. I had great rankings for many keywords, not using dividers or using only one divider. However for better reading comprehension and usability, and also aesthetics i started to use the pipe as my main divider and other secondary dividers. I saw many pages drop in rankings vs other less competent and with less content pages. My format was as follows: Product Brand | Product description - Additional info or local info ie. Fiber Glass MBI | Insulation Batts for Home and Commercial use - Acoustic and Thermal Insulation I changed the format for a handful of pages, and saw immediate results on rankings and traffic on those pages. Product Brand with Product Description - Additional Info ie. Fiber Glass MBI Insulation Batts for Commercial use - Acoustic and Thermal Insulation. Does it sound like something i should implement page wide. I personally like the aesthetics of the pipe as it gives a cleaner look, but the better rankings on the changed pages with using only one divider makes me think. Does it sound familiar, or its just a coincidence, Regards,
On-Page Optimization | | JesusD0 -
Can I use Same Keyword for Multi pages Title Tags?
Hello All, I am working on client website and currently they are targeting One Keywords for multi pages. As I have search with Allintitle: Search query and Google display around 37 pages of website which carry same keyword in "Title Tags". I have told to client to change the "Title Tags" but they want that keyword for all relevant pages. So I want to know is that harm in Search Engine Ranking? Note: They have not done the link building activities for multi pages with same Keyword, they are using only in "Title Tags" only
On-Page Optimization | | jemindesai0 -
Changing Link Title Tags & Backlinks
On 4/19/12 I began changing the link title tags in an effort to further optimize my website. I thought they were excessively long and it would be beneficial to make them more concise. On 4/26/12 my website traffic began to fall drastically and I'm not sure if it is from google's penguin update or from changing the link title tags. I started looking into the sudden drop of traffic and realized that when I run the site explorer tool on all of the pages I changed, the URL is redirecting. It appears that the backlinks are not passing through to the new URL. Before I Changed the Link Title Tag: http://www.opensiteexplorer.org/links?site=www.beautystoponline.com%2FAndis-Professional-Hair-Clippers-s%2F102150.htm **After I Changed the Link Title Tag: ** http://www.opensiteexplorer.org/links?site=www.beautystoponline.com%2FAndis-Clippers-s%2F102150.htm So my questions are: The above example shows that the old title tag (www.beautystoponline.com/Andis-Professional-Hair-Clippers-s/102150.htm) has 43 backlinks and the new one (www.beautystoponline.com/Andis-Professiona-Hair-Clippers-s/102150.htm) has 0. Will the links eventually be attributed to the new URL. I understand that the user will still be directed to my website they click the any of the backlinks, but will the link juice pointing the old URL pass through the new one? Would it be better, in the long run, to continue optimizing the link title tags.
On-Page Optimization | | BeautyStop0 -
Date stamp in serp
I have a website with sauna reviews. These are mostly pages that exist for years and regularly change because comments/reviews are added by visitors and/or because I change information on the page. When searching in Google for competitive keywords I noticed that the snippet of my direct competitor included a date stamp in the format (9 hous ago). How can I include a time stamp in the snippet, and more important how can I make sure that the timestamp is very recent. Is it sufficient to add a date on the page every time the page is updated or is ther emore to it?
On-Page Optimization | | oeroek0 -
Alt tag using photoshop
Simple question i think. Ive started adding alt tags to images using the slice tool in photoshop. This takes up a menu were the last part of is alt tag: This way to add alt tags does work right? I used SEO-browser afterwards and couldnt see the tag. There are maybe other better ways to see if your tags are in there ? Dan L.
On-Page Optimization | | danlae0