What Is a Website Title And How to Write a Perfect One?

Are you curious about website titles? Do you want to know how to write a perfect title for your website? If yes, then you’ve come to the right post.

A website title is a quick summary of your site’s content. Furthermore, it is the most noticeable element on your site when users view it in Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs). As a result, it turns your readers into potential customers.

Therefore, you must write the perfect site title.

In this article, we’ll look at:

  • What is a website title?
  • Why is a website title important for SEO?
  • Where can you find the page title?
  • How to write a well-optimized website title?
  • Some great website title examples

So, are you ready? Let’s get started!

What is a Website Title?

A website title, also known as a title tag, meta title, or page title, is the short description of a webpage that appears at the top of your browser and is the first line of text shown by search engines in the results.

These titles are the crux of relevance and conciseness, giving users and search engines a quick glimpse of a page’s content.

Below is the screenshot showing our site’s website title, Pickup WP.

Pickup WP Website Title Example

Moreover, social networking sites also display your website title when a user shares your site on social media. As a result, increasing its visibility across different platforms.

In addition, a website title can be used as an HTML element in the title tag of your HTML file.

Have a look:

HTML Title Tag

Website Title vs Article Title: What’s the Difference?

A website title describes your entire site. It helps search engines understand and ranks your content while giving users a snapshot of what your site offers.

In contrast, an article title focuses on a specific post, improving its visibility in search results and guiding users on what to expect from the article.

Optimizing both titles is crucial for SEO and user engagement.

For example, the title of our website, Pickup WP, is “WordPress Resources and Tutorials – Pickup WP”.

However, the article title of one of the popular blog posts in Pickup WP is “10 Free Blog Submission Sites List in 2024 [High DA]“.

Pickup WP Blog Post Title Example

Why is a Website Title Important for SEO?

A website title is crucial for SEO (Search Engine Optimization) for several reasons:

  • First Impressions: The website title is often the first thing users see in search engine results. A well-crafted title can attract clicks and drive traffic to your site.
  • Relevance and Ranking: Search engines use the title to know the content of a webpage. Adding relevant keywords in the page title helps search engines determine the page’s relevance to user search queries, improving its ranking potential.
  • User Experience: Clear, descriptive titles enhance user experience by accurately reflecting the page’s content. This decreases bounce rates and increases time spent on the site, which can positively influence SEO.
  • Click-Through Rate (CTR): An engaging and relevant article title can increase the CTR from search engine results pages (SERPs). Higher CTRs signal to search engines that your web page is valuable, which can improve rankings.
  • Social Sharing: Titles are often shown when blog posts are shared on social media. A compelling title can boost the likelihood of social sharing, driving more traffic to your site.
  • Internal Linking: When other pages on your site link to a page, they often use the page title as the anchor text. Clear and keyword-rich titles can enhance the effectiveness of internal linking, helping search engines understand the structure and importance of your content.

Overall, a well-optimized website title is a key element in improving visibility, relevance, and user engagement, all of which are essential components of effective SEO.

Where Can You Find the Website Title?

Here are some different places where you can find your website titles:

1. Top of Your Browser Window

When you open any website on your browser, its site title appears at the top of the browser window. However, because the browser tab is small, you cannot see the full site title. So, you can hover over the mouse to the browser window tab to see the full site title.

Title Tag in Browser Tabs

Furthermore, having the website title on the browser window is also advantageous. This is because it allows users to go to their preferred website when multiple tabs are open.

2. Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs)

When you search for a phrase on Google or any other search engine, the title of the website appears as a blue clickable headline in the results. It offers the user an overview of the page’s content. This headline is followed by your page’s URL and meta description.

Website Titles in SERPs

3. Page Source Code

Another way to find the website title is to check the page source code, which is the fundamental HTML programming that powers the website.

So, you can start by opening the website in a browser. Then, right-click anywhere on the website. Now, click on the View page source option.

View Page Source Code Option

This opens up the website page source code. Search for the title tag within the head tag. Under the title tag, you can find the website title.

Title Tag on Page Source Code

4. Social Media Platforms

Whenever you share any URL on social media networks like Facebook or Twitter, you can notice an automatically generated site preview.

This preview shows the website title along with the meta description and website URL.

Pickup WP Twitter Example

Now that you know what a website title is and how to find a website title, let’s discuss how to write a perfect website title for your site.

How to Write a Well-Optimized Website Title?

Here are some best practices for crafting an engaging website title:

1. Write it Under the Right Length

First and foremost, you must keep your website title to the right length. Not too short or long.

Google does not specify how long the title tag should be. However, most SEO plugins recommend 50-60 characters (about 10-13 words). This is because most desktop and mobile browsers support up to 70 characters. So, 60 characters is a safe bet.

That is the ideal website title length. If you write a long site title, it will be cut off in search results.

For example, the website title of WPExplorer is longer than usual. As a result, you will not see the complete site title in the search results.

WPExplorer Truncate Website Title

Hence, you must avoid this while writing a title for your new website.

2. Add Target Keywords

Next, to improve your website’s search engine ranking, add target keywords in the title.

Here are some best practices for adding keywords in page titles:

  • Put your keyword at the start of your title so that search engines and users can immediately understand what your page is about.
  • Don’t overuse the keyword in the site title, making it useless.
  • The keyword should be relevant to the content on your website. In most cases, the homepage’s keyword is the site name. So it’s easy to include it.

This Backlinko website article title ticks all the above boxes:

Backlinko Page Title

3. Add Your Brand Name

Third, your title tag may be used for both SEO and branding.

How?

Add your brand’s name to the website title. Searchers will know who is behind the content they will read. Assuming your content is excellent when readers see the name of a company that publishes excellent content, they will be more likely to trust your brand.

After a while, they’ll click your links intuitively when they see your name since they believe your brand has authority.

4. Use Proper Spelling and Capitalization

Have you ever seen a search engine result with a website title in all capital letters? It’s rare to see site names in capital letters ranking high.

Furthermore, there’s nothing wrong with putting the site title in capital letters. However, it may have an effect on reading, resulting in a low ranking.

As a result, it is recommended to write the first letter of each word in capital letters. The words can be nouns, verbs, pronouns, or any word with three or more words. Not others.

For example, the website title of WordPress.com is ‘WordPress.com: Build a Site, Sell Your Stuff, Start a Blog & More’. Here, all the words describe above start with a capital letter.

WordPress.com Website Title Example

Furthermore, because the website title is very important, make sure to use correct spelling.

5. Be Descriptive and Clear

When users type their search queries, they are not looking for generic answers.

They are looking for specific answers that perfectly match their search intent.

To make your title more descriptive, use these tips:

  • Be Descriptive: The more specific your title, the more accurate it will be. For example, you can tell browsers what types of users your content is meant for. Is it suitable for beginners, intermediates, or advanced users? Users will make their own choices. You will only get clicks from your ideal readers.
  • Add Numbers: Using numbers in your titles shows readers that your sites are hyper-specific. As a result, you will provide them with specific answers rather than general recommendations.
  • Include the Current Year: Today, content quickly becomes obsolete. Including the year on your page informs visitors that you are providing them with up-to-date information rather than outdated stuff. Google also has a freshness algorithm, so search robots will like your content as well.

Here is an example from one of our title tags:

Descriptive Page Title Example

It works great because it includes the year and shows that this is a beginner’s guide targeting first-timers.

6. Write For Humans, Not Search Engines

Next, write for humans, not search engines.

To attract human users, add the following to your website titles:

  • Benefits: People are self-centered. They want to know what is in it for them before clicking through to your page. So, persuade them to click by offering juicy rewards for your page content.
  • Action Words: Use action words like read, see, discover, learn, etc., to encourage searchers to take immediate action.
  • Evoke Emotion: While people are rational, emotions have a greater influence on them. Therefore, if you tease their emotions, you will get a click.

Below is an example of an effective people-focused title tag from Search Engine Land:

Search Engine Land Title Tag Example

7. Create Unique Titles for Each Page

Finally, as a title page accurately describes a web page’s content, each page should have a unique title.

Unique titles help Google differentiate between the pages on your website.

Using the same title for several pages confuses search engines. It becomes tough to categorize and index your pages. That’s why each page should have a unique title.

Some Best Website Titles Examples

Below are some of the best website title examples from popular WordPress blogs. So, let’s get to know them.

1. WPBeginner – Beginner’s Guide for WordPress

WPBeginner is a popular free WordPress resource site with over 2 million readers. It is aimed specifically at beginners who are learning to use WordPress. The same as the website’s title suggests.

Furthermore, it offers tutorials, tips, hacks, and other tools for small businesses, bloggers, and website owners. Plus, you’ll also find great deals and coupons for WordPress products.

2. Kinsta® – Fast, Secure, Feature-Rich WordPress Hosting

Kinsta is a WordPress hosting provider with a blog that regularly gets updated with WordPress resources and tutorials. A lot of their content is about optimizing your site, but there’s also WordPress news, industry advice, and information and troubleshooting articles.

3. WPKube: WordPress Themes, Plugins, Reviews, & Tutorials

WP Kube is a WordPress-related website that covers WordPress news, tutorials, themes, and plugins.

What’s great about this blog is that it prioritizes quality over quantity (something very few sites do), which is why you’ll find lots of excellent WordPress guides, tutorials, and ideas on this blog.

4. WPMU DEV – Your All-in-One WordPress Platform

Do you want to learn more about WordPress security, backups, and performance from the experts? Then, this WordPress blog is designed for you. It has hundreds of detailed articles on every WordPress topic.

5. WordPress Resources and Tutorials – Pickup WP

Pickup WP is a free online resource that offers everything you need for WordPress beginners.

It offers WordPress tips, tutorials, articles, etc, for creating and managing a WordPress website.

How to Add a Website Title in WordPress?

WordPress is a popular CMS used by over 43.2% of all websites on the internet.

Hence, if you are creating a WordPress site, you can use any of these methods to add the title of your site.

Method 1: Using General Settings

The first method is to use WordPress’s default dashboard settings.

Simply log into your WordPress admin dashboard and navigate to Settings » General. From here, you can find 2 options at the top: Site Title and Tagline.

Now, enter your website title in the Site Title field and click on the Save Changes button. That’s it!

Add Site Title in General Settings

Method 2: Using WordPress Theme Customizer

You can also add your site title using WordPress themes. Most WordPress themes have this feature on their theme customizer.

For this example, we’ll use the Astra theme. It is one of the fastest, lightweight, and highly customizable WordPress themes available. Learn more in our complete Astra theme review.

Once you have installed and activated the Astra theme, simply navigate to the Appearance » Customize menu to open the customizer. Now, click on the Site Identity menu. Then, click on the Site Title & Logo Settings option.

Astra Site Identity Settings

From here, you can see the Site Title option. Simply enter your site title in the Site Title field and click on the Publish button. That’s it!

Add Site title in Astra Theme

Using a WordPress Block Theme (Twenty Twenty-Four)

From the WordPress 5.9 version, users will get the Full Site Editing (FSE) feature. It allows you to edit and customize the entire website from the same place, Editor.

When using a block theme, the step for adding the website title is different from what we learned previously. Thus, we will look at the steps for block themes here.

For this method, we are using the most recent default WordPress theme with FSE features. It is the Twenty Twenty-Four theme.

First, navigate to the Appearance » Editor menu.

FSE Editor

Next, click the right side of the Editor to start the customizing process.

FSE Editor for Customization

Then, if your website navigation does not already have one, add the Site Title block. In the case of this default theme, one exists. So simply insert the site name.

Add Site Title in FSE

Once done, click on the Save button.

Final Thought On Website Title

A well-crafted website title is a cornerstone of effective SEO strategy and user engagement. It serves as the first impression for both search engines and visitors, setting the stage for your site’s relevance and appeal.

By adding primary keywords naturally, being concise, and ensuring clarity, your title will boost your search engine rankings and improve click-through rates.

Avoid common pitfalls like keyword stuffing, overly long titles, spelling errors, etc, to maintain a professional and user-friendly appearance.

Remember, a compelling website title is not just about SEO. It’s about connecting with your audience and encouraging them to explore your content further.

With these best practices, you can create titles that resonate with users and search engines alike, driving traffic and fostering engagement.

And that’s the end of this helpful article. We hope you learn everything about the site title.

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