Content Marketing
AI Meta Description Guide + 4 Tips for Optimizing Meta Descriptions
Learn how to use AI to optimize meta descriptions. Improve click-through rate (CTR) and create engaging, SEO-friendly content for search engines and visitors.
The meta description — that all-important piece of HTML code that once held a great deal of sway over how (or even if) your page made it into the search engines. While many people might see it as a relic from a bygone era, the meta description still has a place in today’s SEO world.
Given how AI innovations are playing an increasingly interwoven role in search engine optimization, it’s old-meets-new in the ongoing challenge for web publishers to ensure content stays relevant, engaging, and informed.
Here’s how to use AI to optimize your meta descriptions, plus tips and strategies to increase your click-through rate (CTR) so that you can get to — and stay — at the top of the rankings.
Meta tags, including the keyword and description tags, came about as a way to provide detailed information about web pages.
Initially, leading search engines used them to help categorize a page, and so they played a role in page rankings. Additionally, they’re beneficial for users to quickly read a couple of lines to see what the content is about.
So, naturally, it wasn’t long before web publishers saw they could influence search engine rankings by optimizing their meta descriptions and keywords. Some resorted to keyword stuffing, which led to poor-quality search results.
Not long after keyword stuffing started happening, Google began to try to take back control of the rankings by focusing on quality over quantity.
According to Search Engine Journal, Google hasn’t included meta descriptions as part of its ranking algorithm since 1999-2004.
That being said, meta descriptions are still used to provide context about a page.
So, the strategy became more about optimizing click-through rate (CTR) via the meta description than using it to try and influence rankings directly.
According to another article by Search Engine Journal, Google also often steps in to rewrite meta descriptions about 70% of the time.
These days, these short, powerful lines still hold an important role. A properly-optimized meta description can increase click-through rates, which, in turn, signals to Google that it’s a quality page with relevant information.
Obviously, the meta description itself doesn’t do all of the heavy lifting. Rather it’s one of many factors of creating people-first content that feeds into the Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness and Trust that Google leverages.
If you’re struggling with a low CTR, there are ways that AI innovations can help you create a compelling meta description that works alongside Google’s requirements and takes advantage of search intent signals.
AI provides an excellent opportunity to streamline workflow for drafting meta descriptions.
Manually writing meta descriptions for every page (particularly if you have a lot of content) can be time-consuming. AI can quickly scan content and write compelling descriptions based on its topic in seconds.
Then, to ensure your content is high quality, you can review and edit it to ensure it adheres to your brand tone and aligns with the cohesive style of your pages.
Plus, AI can also be prompted to include keywords based on your keyword research in a way that flows naturally to help you rank better and increase organic search traffic.
In order to “write” a meta description (or any other content), AI leverages natural language processing or NLP. This allows it to understand the context of what you write and generate suggestions for meta descriptions.
A meta description may seem like a small part of your overall content optimization strategy, but taking the time to get it right and then applying that same brand tone and voice to all of your page’s meta descriptions can make a significant difference in clickthrough rates.
Follow these strategies to get the best possible results when working with AI to generate your meta descriptions.
Help AI help you by giving it relevant information about your business, niche, or product.
When creating a prompt:
Example: If the page is a product review, the AI description should include the pros and cons of the product. If it’s a how-to guide, it should incorporate the value the user will get from reading it.
Although meta descriptions don’t directly affect your search engine rankings, including keywords that are related to the user’s search (such as long-tail keywords) can help boost your CTR.
Keep in mind that while AI tools can add keywords to the meta description, it’s best practice to have a human review and edit the copy to make sure it’s optimized, the keywords flow naturally, and it aligns with the brand tone.
According to Moz, the best practice for a meta description is to aim for a length of 50 to 160 characters. Ideally, you want to strike a balance between informing the user and piquing their curiosity to click while staying within optimal character count.
AI tools can also work to create a meta description of this length when prompted, although again, you’ll want to review the generated result to ensure the description still sounds compelling.
You’ll want to avoid duplicate meta descriptions. Not only can similar meta descriptions confuse users, but search engines as well. If you’re using an AI tool for meta descriptions, make sure to review it so that you publish unique descriptions for each page.
Use the free Originality.ai Meta Description Generator to help you create targeted meta descriptions.
This unique AI tool also lets you adjust the tone of voice, incorporate your own keywords, and target your meta description to a specific audience.
Here’s an example: For this example, we input a sample description of a page that provides insight into improving time management for content marketers.
After clicking ‘Generate,’ the generator creates a meta description that you can further tailor as needed. Optionally, you can click ‘Finetune’ to refine the description.
For our example prompt, it produced the following meta description:
‘Boost your productivity with the best time management apps for content marketers. Discover effective strategies to optimize your workflow and achieve your goals!’
Try the Originality.ai Meta Description Generator here.
AI is an innovative way to save time and brainstorm meta descriptions for your content. Incorporating a Meta Description Generator into your workflow can help you generate engaging meta descriptions that boost clicks.
Yet, it’s still important to keep a human in the loop to review AI-generated meta descriptions and optimize them for brand voice.
Looking for more ways to improve your content marketing strategies? Check out our top guides!