Every web site in existence is built on what is called HTML code. Within a HTML based web page is the ability to use what are called meta tags. How these tags are used has become a major part of most web site optimizing efforts. Whether or not the use of these tags actually has helped these companies or individuals in their efforts is another story all together. In the majority of cases, it probably did not. Actually, the use of meta tags in the area of web site optimization is the most abused, most misunderstood and most talked about. Over the last five years, meta tags have been sold as a magical solution to high rankings by many confused web developers and "snake oil" salesman.

The truth is that meta tags do play an important role in the game of web site optimization if used properly. The effectiveness meta tags is limited to their involvement with the rest of your web sites' elements. To reach high rankings, you need to pull all of the available optimizing resources together. I decided early that it was best to research what everyone else was teaching or preaching about website optimization - including meta tags - before I began writing. I wanted to get an idea of how far behind our current experts were, and who was teaching proper methods. I downloaded over 500 pages on the subject via the Internet and began to read through all of it. I quickly realized that virtually every single published report was similar to all of the rest. Every single company, individual or consultant was copying his report from another and putting a new spin on it to make it appear to be original.

After reading about one third of the documents, I threw them all away. I saw no value in reading on. Every page and report was identical. What we now have is thousands of experts sharing and stealing the same material. One example that really blew me away was a published book on search engine optimization that I recently scanned through. It was nothing more then all of the same reports available online in a printed form. I could immediately tell by the way many topics were labeled. It also read like a series of reports. There was no real beginning and no real end. The whole book was a jumbled mess of repetitive nonsense. The two incompetent authors apparently just downloaded hundreds of reports and decided to compile them into a book.

The finished product covers the same topics over and over again. The worst part is that much of it is inaccurate. Its like a story that is told 100 times by 100 different people. It always changes and evolves into something further away from the truth each time. These so called experts that are writing reports (and books) have no clue as to what they are writing about. With web site optimization, it cant change every other day. It has to stay the way it is until the search engines decide to put a new spin on it. When they change the criteria of a spider, the optimization methods must change with them.

How to view your title tag and meta tags

Your title tag and your meta tags exists in the HTML code of a web site. Their function is to direct your web browser on a number of different topics. The HTML code of a web site is like a cars engine -nothing could even begin to work without it and its all under the hood, out of sight. What we are going to do is walk through each of the tags and explain exactly how each functions, both to search engine and site users.

The first thing we need to do though is learn how to view your source code.
This will allow you to see all your HTML tags, including your title tag and your meta tags. Here is what you do. First, point you mouse at the web page you want to view and click the right button. Earlier, I showed you how to view any image on a web page. In that example, you would point the cursor at an image and right click.

To view your pages' source code, you do not want your mouse cursor on any links or graphics. On some web pages, this can be a challenge. Some pages have so many graphics and links that everywhere you point your mouse, the page contains an image or link. Just try to point it in an area where there is nothing but background color. After you right click, scroll down to "view source" and left click. What you will see next should be a note pad that will display your HTML source code.

You are now examining the HTML code of the web page that you are on. You can do this on any page that you choose on anybody’s web site, including your own. You can examine their code and determine how their site is set up. Now that you can view the HTML, we are going to move on and discuss what these tags should say to begin optimizing your web pages.