Description too short issue means that meta tag description on some pages is shorter than 70 characters.
Why it is important
Meta descriptions that shorter than 70 characters aren’t necessarily bad. This alone shouldn’t affect the page rank, especially when meta descriptions are well-written, include the desired keywords, and describe page content with high fidelity. Problems might arise when keywords are missing or meta descriptions are poorly written, in which case these should be edited or reformulated.
How to check the issue
Look into the source code of the page either by using this online instrument https://codebeautify.org/source-code-viewer or the code-viewer in your browser. In the Chrome browser, just right-click anywhere on the page (apart from links, images, etc.) and pick “View page source”.
Once the code opens, look for <meta name=description.
Detect not only URLs where description meta tag is too short but also other kind of technical issue on your site!
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How to fix the issue
Create a unique meta description of more than 70 characters in length.
Here’s an example of meta description from Sitechecker.pro:
<meta name=description content="Get FREE SEO report by 100+ parameters with the best website checker. Detailed SEO analysis for a website will help to find technical issues and calculate SEO score."/>The following rules and guidelines should be followed in the process:
- Your meta descriptions should be appealing to the reader and should efficiently advertise the content of the respective page.
- Write meta descriptions using full sentences – making them easily readable and good sounding is essential.
- Each meta description must convey the content found on the respective page, not the entire site.
- Anticipate what content is expected by users on your page and make references to such content in the meta description.
- Ensure that targeted keywords are included in the meta description. One key reason is that such keywords are highlighted with the bold font on the SERP if they happen to match user queries.
- Limit the number of keywords – overusing them can be detrimental.
- Ensure the uniqueness of each meta description on a given site.
- Don’t exceed 160 characters in length if you want to avoid truncation.
- Avoid non-alphanumeric characters (such as double quotes) – search engines might occasionally omit any content that follows them.
Check your website for short description tags
Audit your website to detect pages that have too short meta description tags
