Title tag length

[DaddySmurf]

Hi,

I am fairly new to SEO and have just noticed the end of my title text has been cut off by Google in the serps results.

Everything i have read tells me titles should be maximum of 70 characters, however, Google is only displaying 54. See below

Security systems | wireless | battery powered | Police...

Nobody else on the page is showing more than 54 characters.

Am i missing something obvious?

Any and all help gratefully appreciated.

Thanks

Si

[DaddySmurf]

Hi Jesse,

I will keep you appraised.

Thank you for your support.

Regards,

Si

[jesse-landry]

Well I don't know anything about this "SEO College Tutor" but it sounds fishy to me.

You can have the "key info" in the title and still have it be readable. Also, at the very least you should take me up on my suggestions for capitalization. It currently looks like it was written by a 5th grader. No offense. But you capitalize the first few words, stop doing it, and then go back to capitalizing at the end. Looks amateurish and reads horribly. At the very least fix that.

I'd encourage you to grab some impartial observers (a mom, gramma, aunt, uncle, somebody not good with computers you happen to know) and ask them to look at the SERPs you are targeting and choose a site to visit. Or maybe even ask them to run some random searches and watch how they react to SERPs and what pages they choose to click on. I think that you will find the title tag to be the difference maker (beyond placement of course). What you are doing is stuffing keywords to encourage placement in the top of the SERPs. That's what the "SEO tutor" is having you do. That is not necessarily going to work. There are plenty of ways to rank well and still have an attractive title for your end-user.

I've seen it work both ways. I've seen a page sit at number 1 for the desired keyword results and get no clicks. Why? Only answer I have was a terrible Title.

I'm glad you are going to test both methods. That's a great way to approach things.

Keep in mind with your SEO Tutor.. You need to take every factor into account with SEO. There is no perfect way of doing things. My way isn't perfect, their way isn't perfect. You need to find your own truths somewhere in between. You seem to be working towards that so you should be alright.

But boy I have to say my gut tells me that this alleged Tutor has a few things mixed up...

[DaddySmurf]

Hi Jesse,

Thank you for your reply. I am getting real people like you telling me one thing and the SEO college tutor telling me another. Personally i can see benefits in both. I like to see the key information in the title like it is at the moment. My other side that refuses to use text speak and enjoys the written word likes a flowing title.

I am going to leave it until this time next week, collect the analytics and then change style and repeat for a week and see what works best.

Have a good weekend and i always appreciate advice.

Si

[jesse-landry]

I know I've told you this before and I'm becoming the Title-Tag Police around here but you can do so much better with that. There are several things that drive me crazy from a users' perspective with your title:

1.) Keyword stuffed.. Seems like a robot wrote it; not human

2.) Capitalization. Sometimes you capitalize the first letters like a title would and sometimes you don't. This inconsistency makes your page look amateurish and drives my OCD grammar-police brain crazy!

Just trying to help... Good luck!

[DaddySmurf]

Dear William and Mike,

Excellent answer guys, thank you so much. Considering how much a truncated title could screw it up, i'm surprised this is not more widely known. Especially by the 'expert' tutor at SEO College.

Have a great weekend both.

Si

[DaddySmurf]

Dear William and Mike,

Excellent answer guys, thank you so much. Considering how much a truncated title could screw it up, i'm surprised this is not more widely known. Especially by the 'expert' tutor at SEO College.

Have a great weekend both.

Si

[MikeRoberts]

Your full title, Security systems | wireless | battery powered | Police Approved | CSS, winds up truncated because its 69 characters with spaces and features a few wide letters (like those W's) that make it too long pixel-wise (as William pointed out).

[William.Lau]

Title tags may vary. And could be anywhere from ~50 through ~70. It is measured by pixels.

http://www.highervisibility.com/blog/title-tags-are-measured-by-pixels-not-by-characters/