For better SEO and to make your website searchable on Google and other search engines, You need to optimize every blog post. It starts with a catchy headline, high-quality original content, optimized images, a keyword in the post title, URL, body content and meta description.
In this post, I am going to explain Meta Description in WordPress. It is very easy to write an effective meta description in WordPress. Yoast SEO, All in One SEO pack, Rank math, and other plugins makes it is easy to write a meta description for each page.
Meta description is an HTML tag. web developer and bloggers use Meta descriptions attribute to provide concise explanations of the contents of the web page.
Meta descriptions are commonly used on search engine result pages (SERPs) to display preview snippets for a given page. You can see Meta Title, URL, and Description example in the following screenshot.
Once you have written a catchy headline for your blog post, you also need to optimize your meta description.
How To Write Meta Description In WordPress?
Meta Description tag goes in the head section of the web page. WordPress does not have a feature to write a meta description for posts and pages.
But You can use free SEO Plugins like Yoast SEO, All in One SEO and many others to write a custom meta description for each blog post and page. With these SEO plugins, You can write a unique Meta Description, Title for SEO, slug and focus keyword for each blog post.
How to write a meta description in WordPress using the Yoast SEO plugin?
Install and activate Yoast SEO plugin. Write a new post and below the content editor, you can see Yoast Snippet Editor. To add Meta Description click on Edit Snippet button.
Here you can see the Yoast SEO screenshot.
Write a catchy title for search engines and effective meta description for your post. After writing meta description click close snippet editor button. You can see a live snippet preview.
How To Write a Great Meta Description?
Your focus has to be on persuading the searcher to click on your link. Always write meta description manually. Here are few tips to write effective meta Descriptions.
Meta Description should explain to the reader exactly what they can find on your webpage if they click. Don’t deceive searchers remember they can click back button.
Consider starting your meta descriptions with verbs like “Learn,” “Discover,” or “Grab,”, and follow it up with specifics of what exactly they’ll get if they click.
HubSpot
Generally, a meta description should be under 155 characters. If you will try to write a lengthy meta description, Yoast will change the text color from black to red.
How To Add Meta Description In WordPress Home Page With Yoast SEO?
Yoast SEO is a very powerful and advanced plugin, Under Titles & Metas section, You can write a hand-crafted meta description for Homepage, Post Types, Taxonomies, and Archives.
Click on the Search Appearance link in the Yoast Menu. Under the General tab, You can write a custom title and powerful meta description of your website homepage. You can see the screenshot below for details.
To learn more about Home Page Meta Description, click on the small ? symbol, which reveals hidden information. You can watch the video tutorials, search the knowledge base, read template explanation and learn about basic and advanced variables.
Yoast has also published many free video tutorials about all Yoast plugin settings. Watch the following video to learn more about Homepage titles and Meta Description.
Easy WP Meta Description WordPress Plugin
This is a free and very simple Meta Description plugin, which allows you to write a separate description for each post, page or custom post type. which is added as a meta description to the HTML head.
The individual description for a post or page is typed and edited in a separate text field just below the text field for editing the post text.
This free plugin also allows you to write a meta description for category, tag, and custom taxonomy archive as well as front page.
To add a description to a category, go to Dashboard > Posts > Categories. Select a category in the table to the right or create a new category.
Type the description in the text field Description, Weather or not this description will be viewed for visitors on the site is up to each theme.
To edit a front page meta description, go to WordPress Dashboard > Settings > General and edit Tagline.
WordPress Meta Description with Rankmath SEO plugin
RankMath is another free SEO plugin for WordPress, It has a lot of features to optimize WordPress for search engines.
After installing and activating this plugin, Go to Rank Math > Titles and Meta > Homepage to set the meta description for the front page of your website or blog.
To write the custom meta description for each blog post or page, scroll down the post or page and you will see Rank Math SEO settings tab. hover your mouse over the title, URL or click on the Edit Snippet button.
Add necessary information and save your changes.
How to write meta description in WordPress with All in One SEO Pack Plugin?
After installing and activating this plugin, Go to All in One > General Settings page. Under the Home Page Settings tab, You can write the custom title and meta description for the front page of your blog or website.
If you are using the static home or enable static front page option, Checking this option uses the title, description, and keywords set on your static Front Page.
You can very easily write the custom title and meta description for each blog post or page with All in One SEO pack.
Other Resources
How to Write an Effective Meta Description is a great article at HubSpot Written by Ramesh Ranjan.
Read this detailed article about Meta Description at Moz Blog. Learn how to Write SEO Friendly Blog Post Title.
Read our step by step article to learn how Create Google friendly websites with WordPress.