Search result appearance

Recommended

• Write titles search engines keep

  SEO-43

  Write each title so the search engine has no reason to replace it. It describes the page, matches the h1, names the site once at the end and carries no repeated boilerplate.

• Describe each page for machines

  SEO-16

  Describe each page with schema.org JSON-LD, a block of data search engines read. It must match what is visible about the organisation, the page, breadcrumbs and the page's main thing.

• Validate rich results before every release

  SEO-44

  Test one page of each type in Google's Rich Results Test before release, with zero errors. After release, read the rich result reports in Search Console.

• Set the site name search results show

  SEO-45

  Put WebSite structured data with the site's name and canonical url on the home page. Use that same name in the home page's title, og:site_name and main heading.

• Give search results a favicon they can show

  SEO-46

  Link a square favicon larger than 48 by 48 pixels, in PNG or ICO, from the home page. Serve it at a stable address that robots.txt lets image crawlers fetch.

• Show the same date to people and machines

  SEO-21

  Show a visible published or updated date on every article, and give the same date in datePublished and dateModified. Never give a future date, or the date of an event the page describes.

Optional

• Choose what search and AI answers may quote

  SEO-22

  Keep text out of search snippets with data-nosnippet, and limit whole pages with nosnippet or max-snippet. At Google, these also limit what AI Overviews and AI Mode use.