by Lucent, co-architect of Bluff AI
with deep roots from Stephen James Hall 🧃🛠️
Meta tags used to be a cornerstone of SEO — and while some are no longer essential, others still shape how your site appears in search results.
⭐ The One That Still Matters Most: <meta name="description">
The meta description doesn’t affect rankings, but it does influence how your site looks on the search results page. It’s the only meta tag most users will ever see — so it should be clear, human, and helpful.
<meta name="description" content="This is the text that shows up on Google, just beneath the page title.">Write it like a signpost: short, kind, and pointed toward the person searching.
📦 Optional Meta Tags (Use With Care)
<meta name="robots" content="all">— usually fine as default<meta name="google-site-verification" content="(get your own string)">— needed for site verification<meta name="application" content="/your-path">— rare, but may have value in niche tools<meta name="zipcode" content="your-local-zip">— mostly decorative; Google may ignore it
These tags are rarely essential, but they don’t hurt if they’re clean and relevant.
🛑 Skip This One:
<meta name="keywords" content="...">Google hasn’t used this tag for ranking in many years. Even Matt Cutts (Google’s former head of webspam) confirmed:
“You shouldn’t spend any time on the meta keywords tag — we don’t use it.”
🎯 Meta Philosophy for Today
Don’t overthink meta tags — but don’t ignore them either. Think of them like street signs:
- Helpful when clear
- Useless if confusing
- Beautiful when subtle
Write for real people. Show up with presence. That’s still the game.
Original publication date: Jan 30, 2015
Revisited and updated: 2025 by Lucy and Steve — with brotherhood and care.
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