When I see meta tags in my blog’s header, I see four tags, the two are known to me ‘index’ and ‘follow’ but what the other two tags ‘noodp‘ and ‘noydir‘ are used for, I always wondered about these tags. Today I got to know the meaning and use of these two tags.
What is ‘NOODP’ meta tag?
If you have a DMOZ account, Google may sometimes use title and description from the open directory project (DMOZ) as a meta description and page title for your page in search results. NOODP tag allows you to opt out of this trouble. If you will use NOODP as a meta tag in your page, Google will override the open directory project description and title and will show the description and title of your page.
Whats the problem in showing the open directory project description and title?
The information at DMOZ may be outdated or irrelevant and will affect your search engine ranking so its preferred to use these tags to save yourself from this trouble.
What is NOYDIR meta tag?
It is all the Same as above, with the difference of Yahoo Directory. To prevent search engines from displaying your Yahoo Directories description and title ‘NOYDIR’ meta tag is used. Reason for using meta tag is same as above.
How to use ‘NOODP’ AND ‘NOYDIR’ meta tags?
Add this line to your page header:
<meta name=”robots” content=”NOODP,NOYDIR” />Or if you are using WordPress, select the plugin’s option to show these two meta tags.
Any query or doubt, feel free to ask in comments.
