Set Meta keywords and description

[hanakin]

given that I would completely remove as you really want to have google generate want for your topics anyway

[NeilUK]

... if no meta description is filled in it does penalise the page quite heavily in pageranking terms for not having one

Not true, says the Google man himself: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W4gr88oHb-k#t=27



There will be, im sure, tweaks/mods that help bring 1st topic content into description tag but that's another topic.

Guess it depends on who you read from google, all I can say is when I forgot a meta description on one of my site's pages my Google Webmaster Tools dashboard was almost flashing! Red errors everywhere, a message from Google pointing to one page without a Meta description. Yoast who used to work for google and is the creator of SEO for Wordpress also says that no meta description is one of the 10 big sins a webmaster can do.

Like I say, I guess it depends on which video or which article you read.

EDIT: Managed to remember what I read, basically the way it was explained to me is that when a user inputs a search term into Google (or any search engine as they all follow Google as much as they deny it) the first thing the googlebot does is search the meta title and description for matches. Once a match is found the algorithm then moves to the rest of the page and makes it's calculation. So if there is no description you are risking your site being missed completely. Googlebot may just move to another site, it may not and may then look further but it can often just move on. Especially for common search terms where there are a lot of results. As Yoast says "Why risk it? Add a meta description"

[Sumanai]

Meta description should be unique for each page, otherwise they will be ignored.

[NeilUK]

Meta description should be unique for each page, otherwise they will be ignored.

True! Yoast says the same, while he stresses that a Meta description is important, he calls it vital, he also insists that no meta description is better than duplicates. Case of lesser of two evils

[Volksdevil]

What about:
1/ Pull 'Forum Descriptions' added in ACP for meta desc.
2/ Pull 'Site description' from index page for meta desc.

<!-- IF SCRIPT_NAME eq 'viewforum' -->{FORUM_DESC}<!-- ENDIF -->
<!-- IF SCRIPT_NAME eq 'index' -->{SITE_DESCRIPTION}<!-- ENDIF -->

Which would look like (Messy I know but it's a start)
<meta name="description" content="<!-- IF SCRIPT_NAME eq 'index' -->{SITE_DESCRIPTION}<!-- ENDIF --><!-- IF SCRIPT_NAME eq 'viewforum' -->{FORUM_DESC}<!-- ENDIF -->" />

Forgive me if this is a way too simple/messy way of approaching this, but it's the sort of thing that currently works for me. In fact I have so many <IF> statements in my Meta desc it's crazy tbh...But! It works, and without duplicate descriptions too, as I also added page numbers in there with:
<!-- IF PREVIOUS_PAGE --> &#124; Page {ON_PAGE}<!-- ENDIF -->

I've even used the page numbers bit in page titles to stop duplicates there too, check out my sig to see it on 3.0.12.

But coming to other pages/extensions, could there be one like:
<!-- IF SCRIPT_NAME eq 'app' -->{APP_DESC}<!-- ENDIF -->
I'm not sure that would work at all (Haven't really delved into extensions yet), especially the URL rewriting.

EDIT: Just to add, even topics meta description can be quickly improved by adding the topic 'Title' followed by the 'Forum Description':
<!-- IF SCRIPT_NAME eq 'viewtopic' -->{PAGE_TITLE} &#124; {FORUM_DESC}<!-- IF PREVIOUS_PAGE --> &#124; Page {ON_PAGE}<!-- ENDIF --><!-- ENDIF -->

[spello]

Currently I use:

1) Index -> Site description {SITE_DESCRIPTION}
2) Forums -> Forum descriptions {FORUM_DESC}
3) Topics -> Simple Topic Description MOD (Extension here) {TOPIC_DESCRIPTION}

Code: Select all

<meta name="description" content="<!-- IF TOPIC_DESCRIPTION -->{TOPIC_DESCRIPTION}<!-- ELSEIF FORUM_DESC and SCRIPT_NAME == 'viewforum' -->{FORUM_DESC}<!-- ELSEIF S_DISPLAY_BIRTHDAY_LIST -->{SITE_DESCRIPTION}<!-- ELSEIF SCRIPT_NAME == 'mchat' -->Description to display on mchat page<!-- ENDIF -->" />

[Meis2M]

Currently I use:

1) Index -> Site description {SITE_DESCRIPTION}
2) Forums -> Forum descriptions {FORUM_DESC}
3) Topics -> Simple Topic Description MOD (Extension here) {TOPIC_DESCRIPTION}

Code: Select all

<meta name="description" content="<!-- IF TOPIC_DESCRIPTION -->{TOPIC_DESCRIPTION}<!-- ELSEIF FORUM_DESC and SCRIPT_NAME == 'viewforum' -->{FORUM_DESC}<!-- ELSEIF S_DISPLAY_BIRTHDAY_LIST -->{SITE_DESCRIPTION}<!-- ELSEIF SCRIPT_NAME == 'mchat' -->Description to display on mchat page<!-- ENDIF -->" />

very good idea... phpbb can use this in the core, with an event in this, for custom pages,