Bars Verus Hyphens in Title Tags
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It has been quite a while since I have seen an article really talk about this and I am wondering if this even matters anymore? I prefer the look of a - rather than a | but just wondering if this is still a thing... If you know of a recent article going into findings on this supporting one or the other it would be appreciated.
Thanks!
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Use a colon. Requires one less space.
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Hi Thomas
It really does not matter anymore. If anything, there might be more reason to use a hyphen rather than a |.
Starting about a year ago, Google seemed to be rewriting the title tags of pages that looked like: "Keyword 1 | Keyword 2 | Brand.com" into "Brand.com: Keyword 1 | Keyword 2" - Here's an article on that. I've seen it happen with hyphens too but far less often.
But in any case, use whichever option you prefer. I like the hyphen too, but there's nothing right or wrong with either - just be sure to make your title tag designed for the user and for clicks rather than search engines (out with the example I used earlier, in with "Get Keyword 1 with free USA delivery - Brand" style title tags - and make sure it will show up in search and not be shortened. You can use Moz's title tag tool for that.
Hope this helps.
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The main thin I consider is that the maximum size of the title is defined by the pixel-width, not by the character count. For this reason, I prefer "|" as you can fit more on it. But for individual services on a brand with a short name, "-" can be preferable.
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