If you don’t know what a title tag is, be sure to read the Page Structure Overview, and download the SEO Page Quick Reference.
Of all onsite, on-page elements, the title tag matters the most. But folks get it wrong, all of the time. I mean, constantly.
Here’s my checklist for a great title tag:
Don’t lead with your brand
First off, never start a title tag with your own brand name. Well, almost never. Two reasons:
First, search engines weight the terms at the beginning of a title tag far more than those at the end:
Anatomy of a title tag
Second, unless your name is “Nikes hardware” or “Target Products”, it should be easy to rank for your brand or company name. You don’t need to use the choicest space in your code to boost your brand name rankings.
Put the brand name last, if you want to. Just don’t put it first. On my site, for example, I have stuff like <title>Internet marketing strategies - Conversation Marketing</title>.
Put the target phrase first
Look at your keyword map. Whatever you’re targeting for this page should go first in the title tag. If you’re optimizing one page for multiple terms (something you should almost never end up doing), pick the phrase for which you have the best sub-number-one ranking right now. Might as well boost your strongest stuff.
So, if I run a store called T-shirts Galore and am trying to rank for ‘GibbleGibbet T-shirts’, the title tag for my target page would be:
<title>GibbleGibbet T-shirts - T-shirts Galore</title>
Write something descriptive
Use the Blank Sheet Rule: If you write the title tag on a blank sheet of paper and show it to a stranger, will they know what that web page is about?
In some ways, this is the most important rule. Yes, optimizing your title tag (following the first 2 rules on this page) is important. But what’s even more important is a title tag that’ll get folks clicking. In most cases, the title tag heads your search listing in the search results:
The title tag is the 'headline' of this search result
This title tag does not follow the blank sheet rule:
<title>T-shirts and great T-shirts plus GibbleGibbet T-shirts - T-shirts Galore</title>
Don’t laugh. I’ll bet you’ve seen a few title tags like that.
This title tag does follow the blank sheet rule:
<title>GibbleGibbet T-shirts: Buy online from T-shirts Galore</title>
Maximum number of characters in a title tag
I usually shoot for 75 characters or less. That’s including spaces, punctuation, everything.
Some folks say to keep your title tag below 65 characters.
You have to choose the one that makes the most sense. In my experience, though, anything between 50 and 75 characters will work pretty well.
Don’t spam
Don’t write a title tag that repeats your key phrase over and over. Don’t write a title tag that looks like a list of key phrases.
Use common sense. If repeating your key phrase once makes sense because your brand name is the same as the key phrase, that’s fine:
<title>GibbleGibbet T-shirts: Buy online from T-shirts Galore</title>
Otherwise, don’t do it.
Automating title tags
If you have a huge site with, say, 50,000 products, you don’t want to write every title tag by hand. In those cases, I create a title tag template. Use any format you want – for me it’s just an e-mail to the developer that says:
For all product pages, title tags should be
<title>[PRODUCT NAME]: [CATEGORY NAME] : T-shirts Galore</title>
Keep it simple. If the developer says that that’s impossible, well, nothing’s impossible. I’ve done this kind of title tag generation on every CMS and shopping cart you can imagine. Chances are they can figure it out, given time and resources. Find out if they need more of both, help them get it, and then let them work.