SEO Titles & Meta Descriptions

Adding SEO titles and Meta Descriptions to your Showit and WordPress pages - Moreno Collective

In this post, I will be showing you what SEO titles and meta descriptions are, how to format them, and how to add them to your Showit website and WordPress posts.

If applying good SEO (Search Engine Optimization) to your website can bring you in even one client that otherwise would not have found you, isn’t it worth it?

For most wedding professions (photographers, florists, designers, planners, and venue owners) this means thousands of dollars. And often, those clients will recommend you to their friends and so on.

SEO for wedding photographers is really important no matter where you are at in your business. And if done well, it should bring you in more than one extra client per year!

A large following on Instagram is great, but when the Instagram algorithm changes or your account gets hacked and you lose everything you’d built on that platform, you’ll want to know that you can still book weddings another way.

If you’re just starting out with SEO, this is a great place to start. Updating your SEO titles and meta descriptions for each of your Showit and WordPress website’s pages is really easy, and best of all, it really helps your SEO.

What are SEO Titles?

SEO titles are not actually visible titles on your website or blog. These are title tags that are inside the code of your website. But don’t worry, you don’t have to edit the code to add them to your Showit or WordPress website.

Both Showit and WordPress make it really easy to update the SEO title and meta description.

SEO titles are the titles that show up in search engine results pages like Google. They are important to the search engine and the person using the search engine.

example of SEO titles and meta descriptions - Showit SEO - Moreno Collective

Ideal SEO title format

When creating your SEO titles it’s best to stick to the same format for each page. Using keywords or keyphrases inside your titles will tell Google and the user what the page is about.

Keyword 1 (Primary) – Keyword 2 (Secondary and optional) – Brand Name

The first part of any SEO title should be your primary keywords/keyphrases. Google puts the most SEO weight on the beginning of the title.

Adding your Company name at the end of every SEO title is the best way to build a reputation with Google. It is highly recommended.

Your Keywords and Keyphrases should be what you think your clients are searching on google to find serves you offer. Google is smart and doesn’t rely on the exact term, but will match with pages using similar phrases.

Showit SEO titles and meta descriptions in Google - Moreno Collective

Using venue and city names is a great way to get found by someone looking for services in a specific location. Using terms like “Gorgeous wedding photography at {venue location}” lets google and the user know that the post or page is about wedding photos shot at a specific venue.

The example below shows what a bride looking to get married at a venue in the Algarve, Portugal called “Os Agostos” would typically search for inspiration.

SEO titles and meta descriptions for a venue specific search - moreno collective

Using Client’s names in your SEO titles is not a great idea. Most people will not search for “Jack + Jill” expecting to find wedding photography. It takes up space where you could be utilizing relevant keywords.

Remember, your SEO title is not your blog post title, so feel free to add the names of clients in your post title. Just make sure to update the SEO title to something more search effective!

Example blog post SEO title:

  1. Gorgeous Sunset Wedding Photos | Castello Di Potentino | Brand Name
  2. Stunning White and Gold Wedding | Bay Harbor, Michigan | Brand Name

The first example uses a scenic description, the words “wedding photos”, and targets a specific location (and venue).

The second example uses a color pallet and targets a specific location.

Example Page SEO title:

  1. About page: Meet {Your Name} | Houston Wedding Photography | Brand Name
  2. Info page: Wedding Photography Info for Brides in Houston | Brand Name

The first part of any SEO title should be your primary keywords/keyphrases.

What are your brides searching for online? Write content for these keywords and use them in your SEO titles!

Where do SEO titles show up?

  • Search engine results pages (Google)
  • Web browser tabs
  • Social media posts
  • Messaging apps like iMessage, Facebook Messanger, and WhatsApp.

Keep in mind while creating SEO titles

  • Don’t “Keyword-stuff” it (let it be organic)
  • Make it sound interesting
  • Keep it short (50-70 characters)
  • Make sure every page is unique (Do not use the SEO title twice)
  • Add your Brand name!

Meta Descriptions

Meta Descriptions are the short, usually light grey, page descriptions that come after your SEO title in any search engine result.

example of SEO titles and meta descriptions - Showit SEO - Moreno collective

The purpose of a meta description is to add more value and, well more description, to the results listed. It’s a brief summary of the page.

On every page, you’ll want to use these descriptions to advertise the purpose of the page even more. They are very important as they allow you to organically add more keywords to the search listing and they are sometimes the deciding factor whether someone clicks on your listing in Google!

One thing to keep in mind is that Google will bold any text in the meta description if it matches the keywords in the actual search. This is why it’s important to continue to think about what your clients are searching for when writing your meta descriptions.

SEO titles and meta descriptions bold from search result - moreno collective

Where do Meta Descriptions show up?

  • Search engine results pages (Google)
  • Social media posts
  • Often times in messaging apps

Keep in mind while creating Meta Descriptions

  • Use keywords appropriately and organically
  • You’re advertising your business, be creative and catchy
  • Don’t use the same description on two different pages
  • Only use alphanumeric characters

Adding SEO titles and meta descriptions in Showit

  1. In Showit, select the page that you’d like to edit on the left-hand side.
  2. Select the “PAGE” tab in the top left corner of Showit.
  3. Make sure that no canvas is selected. To make sure, click on the page’s title in the top left (under the “PAGE” tab)
  4. Select the “SEO SETTINGS” tab on the right-hand side of Showit
  5. Add your SEO Title (Page Title) and Meta Description
  6. Add a Share Image as well. This will be the image that shows when you or someone else post this page to social media.

You don’t have to add any Meta Keywords as google does not use keyword tags to rank a webpage anymore.

Adding SEO titles and meta descriptions in WordPress

Before you add your SEO titles and meta descriptions to your WordPress posts, you’ll want to make sure you have installed an SEO plugin. The most popular plugin is called Yoast SEO and it comes pre-installed on all tier-2 Showit accounts.

  1. Login to your WordPress dashboard
  2. Open the post editor of the post you’d like to start editing
  3. Scroll to the very bottom of the post and look for “Yoast SEO”
  4. Click “Edit Snippet” under the Snippet Preview
  5. Add your SEO title and meta description
SEO titles and meta descriptions in yoast wordpress for Showit users - moreno collective

Adding keywords will help the plugin know if your content aligns well with the SEO meta, but will not affect your ranking.

Final Thoughts

It’s important to take your Showit and WordPress website SEO titles and meta descriptions seriously. You’re advertising your webpage in a long list of other related webpages, so be unique and take your time creating the best possible version for each individual page.

Oct 13, 2019

Ryan Moreno

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Comments & Questions
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  1. Ashlie says:

    Thank you so much for this information! I have been searching for a while for someone to break it all down in such a straightforward manner. I really appreciated this post.

  2. Kristin S says:

    I have read repeatedly that WordPress is your best option for SEO and that you are pushed down in the search engine with other platforms. Is that outdated information? Did showit find a way to overcome this more successfully than square space and wix?

    • Ryan Moreno says:

      Hey Kristin! Showit actually uses WordPress for the blog pages, which is awesome. I dont think Google or other search engines are biased towards a specific platform, they are much more interested in valuable content and not so much the code used to present the information (as long as its modern like HTML and not flash). I rank on page 1 of google for “Showit vs WordPress” and have had no issues with other showit websites ranking well. I ultimately think it boils down to making great content! 🙂

  3. Dmitry says:

    When page title tags or meta description tags are too long, they are truncated In Google’s case. Page titles tend to be truncated somewhere between 55 and 70 characters (or 600 pixels). Meta descriptions actually don’t have a direct effect on your SEO ranking, yet Google still advises to create unique ones for each page of site. If you would like to test how your page title and description may appear in Google search engine results pages (SERP) then you can use this Meta title and description checker tool to get an idea as to how it may appear: https://www.serpure.com

    • Ryan Moreno says:

      Agreed! Meta descriptions do not have a direct effect on how Google ranks you, however, they do have a direct effect on the human user and can be the deciding factor whether someone clicks on your link or not. I always am recommending adding the most relevant information in the meta description because if its attractive, someone will click it over a dull, boring meta description. I also believe that google bolds keywords that match what was searched, which brings the human eye to your links. All good stuff! 🙂 thanks for sharing!

  4. Lauren says:

    This is all SO helpful! Now I need to work on the SEO titles of my blog and the slugs, I haven’t changed any of that! Two questions:
    1. On WordPress, under my “SEO Title” it has four bubbles: Title, Page, Separator, Site Title. In your photo example I just see the Title bubble. So should I always keep Title but delete the others and type in the SEO title?
    2. If I change the slug of a blog I’ve linked in other posts, will I have to go update that link in each blog post? Or does it somehow update automatically?
    Thanks!

    • Ryan Moreno says:

      Hey Lauren, I am so glad that you’re finding all of this information helpful 🙂 To answer your 2 questions:

      1.) you should delete the purple bubbles and write a totally custom SEO title. Be sure to follow the “ideal SEO title format” in this article and add your branding at the end of each title. Don’t worry if you go a little bit over in title length and Yoast turns red. Its not a problem at all and I see links on page 1 of google ALL the time with long SEO titles. Just remember to always put your most important keywords up front 🙂

      2.) You should always set up a 301 redirect if you are changing the slug of an existing blog post. You can do this very easily with a plugin called “Redirection”. This way you don’t have to go back and update every link in other posts. If someone tries to go to that link, it will redirect them to the new link. This is also VERY important because it tells Google to pass any ranking information to the new link, rather than losing it all.

      You can also set up this plugin to make the 301 redirects automatically. I’ll see if I can come up with a helpful post about this topic!

  5. I recently added a team member to my sleep consulting business and am wondering how to adjust (or if I should adjust) my website for SEO purposes. We work virtually with every family but I get many local clients (from Google, thanks to you!). Should I just keep the SEO on my site local for me/my business’s “home,” or can I or should I somehow incorporate her location, too, to widen our reach?

    • Ryan Moreno says:

      Hey Lauren! Good to hear from you and it was great seeing you at TONIC’s Launch Camp! I would leave your site mostly how it is. You can definitely add the other location to your homepage but what would be best is if you create a new page for that location with all the details. think of it like a service page for that location.

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