Not a bug No default meta description

[Ian Hitt]

Affected version

All

There is not a default meta description being used. I see that the board option for meta description is used on forum_list and forum_new_posts, but that is it. If no meta description is set, I think it should use the default board meta description.

I imagine there should also be a way to set a meta description on a page without adding a p-description to the markup, but that is maybe more a feature request than a bug.

 

[Harvey]

I don't think using the default meta description gets you anything.

 

[Dad.]

I suppose there could be some options added to set per page. Or maybe a standard or something, similar how there is a standard for <title> already.

I wonder if Google expects a custom meta description these days for every (or at least key) page.

 

[Mike]

Realistically, I don't think setting a default (repeated) meta description on each page is the correct way to go. The description entered in the option is unlikely to be particularly relevant to the content of the page in question, so it's not likely to be particularly helpful. In general, where we have relevant options (a description for the section we're in, snippet of the primary contnet on the page, etc), we do auto generate a meta description. These are also more likely to be the pages that people will come to via SERPs anyway. So I don't think this is something we are planning on changing (it would be possible to change through templates I believe).

I imagine there should also be a way to set a meta description on a page without adding a p-description to the markup, but that is maybe more a feature request than a bug.

This is already possible via the metadata_macros::description (or metadata_macros::metadata).

 

[Kevin]

There is not a default meta description being used. I see that the board option for meta description is used on forum_list and forum_new_posts, but that is it. If no meta description is set, I think it should use the default board meta description.

I imagine there should also be a way to set a meta description on a page without adding a p-description to the markup, but that is maybe more a feature request than a bug.

The same problem exists for any pages of threads where the first post of the page doesn't contain non-bbcode text. Instead of a default meta description of something it just omits it.

XF 2.2 - Meta 'description' missing on some pages within a thread

I just noticed this on my own sites (2.1) but have found it happening here as well (XF 2.2.0 B x).... on a thread with multiple pages some of the subsequent pages don't have the meta 'description' tags. I get the same results in different browsers and is reproduceable. For example...

xenforo.com

I wonder if Google expects a custom meta description these days for every (or at least key) page.

Google's Lighthouse expects a meta description along with some social "share" methods.

 

[djbaxter]

Meta description may or may not (at Google's discretion) display as a snippet in search listings. Google often substitutes its own snippet if it thinks it is a better fit for the search query.

It has zero effect on ranking.

 

[Mouth]

I don't think using the default meta description gets you anything.

I wonder if Google expects a custom meta description these days for every (or at least key) page.

Realistically, I don't think setting a default (repeated) meta description on each page is the correct way to go.

Google's Lighthouse expects a meta description along with some social "share" methods.

https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/35624?hl=en says ...

We use a number of different sources for this information, including descriptive information in the title and meta tags for each page.
[...]
Meta description tags: Google sometimes uses <meta> tag content to generate snippets, if we think they give users a more accurate description than can be taken directly from the page content.
[...]
Make sure that every page on your site has a meta description. (emphasis from Google!)

I think it's fairly obvious that not having a meta description on all pages is deficient and problematic.
Unless, of course, we know better than Google themselves do?

 

[djbaxter]

That support note isn't dated and I'm pretty sure that it would be worded differently if updated to day.

In practice, the meta description is ignored by Google more often than it is used.

Good page title is essential. Meta description is not very important especially on a forum home page.

How Often Does Google Rewrite Meta Descriptions? (New Data Study)

For anyone wondering, the Spearman correlation here is 0.28, which is considered weak.

Google truncates meta descriptions that are too long.

So at best meta descriptions only shown as snippets only 37% of the time. And that would be more important for specific threads rather than the home page.

 

[Mouth]

That support note isn't dated and I'm pretty sure that it would be worded differently if updated to day.

In practice, the meta description is ignored by Google more often than it is used.

Good page title is essential. Meta description is not very important especially on a forum home page.

Unless, of course, we know better than Google themselves do?

I guess that answers that then!

 

[Dad.]

I guess that answers that then!

I think @djbaxter makes a good point though, you both do. I think its better safe than sorry. But I do not think its hurting SEO tbh. I mean as long as your key landing pages and focal points have meta descriptions (landing pages, forum lists and indeces, forum nodes, etc.) having a few pages that do not I do not know if (today) Google would care.

But ultimately I suppose the concept of "the more content the better" could be at play here again. Im sure adding meta descriptions to lesser pages certainly would only help if anything, I obviously doubt they hurt.

 

[Mouth]

Im sure adding meta descriptions to lesser pages certainly would only help if anything, I obviously doubt they hurt.

That's the point here
We can all go find articles and colourful graphs on the web to support whatever point of view you support, and claim ourselves or the article authors know better than Google does, but when a primary support article from Google themselves emphasises in bold to ensure we have a meta description on all pages, then that would obviously be best practice. And it's disappointing that xF chooses not to go with that.

 

[djbaxter]

That's the point here
We can all go find articles and colourful graphs on the web to support whatever point of view you support, and claim ourselves or the article authors know better than Google does, but when a primary support article from Google themselves emphasises in bold to ensure we have a meta description on all pages, then that would obviously be best practice. And it's disappointing that xF chooses not to go with that.

What I posted is from a large study from https://ahrefs.com - not just any images and opinions scraped from Google.

Have you not heard of them? Unless you've blocked them (not a great idea), they are probably crawling your sites right now.

 

[Mr Lucky]

forum_list and forum_new_posts,

I also wonder how many sites actually get those pages indexed very highly unless they form part of a home page portal with some added content. They are both just lists of links.

As a forum your threads stand the best chance of being the pages that get indexed for specific searched keywords that somehow end up shining like beacons through a mass of useless user generated banter and jibes.

Change your thread titles to something relevant, and ideally edit the first post to make it more readable (but your users may hate you for that)

In general, where we have relevant options (a description for the section we're in, snippet of the primary contnet on the page, etc), we do auto generate a meta description.. These are also more likely to be the pages that people will come to via SERPs anyway.

Exactly.

 

[Kevin]

I mean as long as your key landing pages and focal points have meta descriptions (landing pages, forum lists and indeces, forum nodes, etc.) having a few pages that do not I do not know if (today) Google would care.

Personally I prefer the 'better-safe-then-sorry' approach since Google's own tools like Lighthouse gives a ding for not having a meta description. It'd have to be a leap of faith to accept that Google takes the extra step of "Yeah, this page doesn't have a meta description but if we stop and take a minute to examine what type of page it is then it doesn't really matter so we won't affect the ranking of it even though we show it as a negative in our tools and in our best practices documentation.". It'd also have to be a bit of leap of faith to accept that a site's overall ranking is not affected by the analysis of the individual pages of the site if even by a little bit. Besides Google the other consideration is "social" sharing tools that default to using a pages meta description as the default text to be shared.

Fortunately, though, the XF templates can be modified easily enough. It'd just be a nice little time saver (and a trivial thing) if the opposite was true; that XF always had some value present as the description and then used smart snippets on pages where possible.

 

[Mouth]

Unless you've blocked them (not a great idea), they are probably crawling your sites right now.

Making it easier/better for commercial research bots that use my sites data and resources to make money for people/corporates who are not me is way low down on my concern or interest list. Ensuring my site is best placed for potential visitors to find it through search engines and engage is though. That's why I'm far more interested in what Google says is best practice, than graphs from marketers with vested interests.

 

[Mr Lucky]

https://ahrefs.com - ...... they are probably crawling your sites right now.

And sending me lots of spam in spite of unsubscribing after the week trial.

 

[Ian Hitt]

@Mike is certainly correct in saying that having an unuseful meta description isn't helping the page from any SEO description standpoint. My issue really is only that Lighthouse is scoring your page SEO value based on the existence of a meta description, regardless of whether it is useful or not. And if they use their base Lighthouse SEO score for anything at all, having less than a 100 is probably not ideal. Again, I don't know if they are actually using that score for anything on their end, or if it is very specifically a helper tool and that is all, but in either case I'd just feel cozier with the higher score

 

[Kevin]

@Mike is certainly correct in saying that having an unuseful meta description isn't helping the page from any SEO description standpoint. My issue really is only that Lighthouse is scoring your page SEO value based on the existence of a meta description, regardless of whether it is useful or not. And if they use their base Lighthouse SEO score for anything at all, having less than a 100 is probably not ideal. Again, I don't know if they are actually using that score for anything on their end, or if it is very specifically a helper tool and that is all, but in either case I'd just feel cozier with the higher score

As I said, to assume that they aren't using the missing tags as part of the scores takes a bit of faith and, if nothing else, some social "share" methods default to the tag.

The only surprising part, really, is that it's pretty trivial to always include the tag (if even a default value is used) so it doesn't make much sense to purposely omit it when there is no harm in always including it but there is potential harm in not (which is why I submitted my linked thread as a 'bug' also; it got moved to 'troubleshooting').

But, c'est la vie, this thread today was a good reminder for me that I need to go tweak a certain template conditional.

 

[Harvey]

Make sure that every page on your site has a meta description. (emphasis from Google!)

I believe Google is assuming you know they mean "unique and descriptive."

Personally I take any control Google gives me. I think meta descriptions are important. The phrase below is estimated at 500 searches a month. That's an opportunity.