Automatic Meta tags generation

17 Jun 2008, 05:35

#1

New Zenner

Join Date:: Jun 2008
Posts:: 15
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Automatic Meta tags generation

Greetings,

this is killing me. Zen cart automatically puts the categories, the product names inside the meta description and keywords. So when i edit the meta_tags.php somwhere at includes/languages i can only add some info to 'Title' otherwise it will all duplicate and bloat up the lines to 500 letters or more with lots of repetitive keywords.

The tag 'site tagline' seems useless since zen cart puts this in the title anyway and that will blow it up beyond acceptable text number.

the tag 'custom keyword': i cannot use anything here because Zen will spam it full with his generated keywords and i cannot switch that off. When i check with some tags checker i have 570 letters there but there should be only 200 max. 570 letters, thats just the tags zen generates on this.. :no:

So is there any guide on this? or should i just enter nothing except the title in the meta_tags.php? should i just leave it as it is but it seems the zen tag generation spams the whole tags and will not be good to use with seo and google ranking.. ??

any input or experience on this highly appreciated. :frusty:

thanks
Mike

17 Jun 2008, 08:19

#2

kobra

Black Belt

Join Date:: Aug 2005
Posts:: 31,500
Plugin Contributions:: 4

Re: Automatic Meta tags generation

What have you defined to allow ZC to bloat this up to +500 characters?

17 Jun 2008, 08:50

#3

kdnmiller

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Join Date:: Jun 2008
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Re: Automatic Meta tags generation

I have around 20 categries with few products in each, so the zen carts puts the categories and the products in the meta tags, thats what makes it so much text..

17 Jun 2008, 11:54

#4

kobra

Black Belt

Join Date:: Aug 2005
Posts:: 31,500
Plugin Contributions:: 4

Re: Automatic Meta tags generation

You can edit the selectors in includes/modules/meta_tags.php

17 Jun 2008, 17:43

#5

kdnmiller

New Zenner

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Re: Automatic Meta tags generation

Thanks ! I'll check

27 Jun 2008, 16:24

#6

badvoc

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Re: Automatic Meta tags generation

how do you change the selectors to stop them from doing this?

I have a similar problem,I have a huge list of keywords and a huge site description (basically all my categories)

I want to remove that and to just be able to manually enter my own keywords and my own site description.

27 Jun 2008, 16:36

#7

badvoc

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Join Date:: Feb 2008
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Re: Automatic Meta tags generation

btw I'm using 1.3.7

and I don't have the following in my includes\language\english\metatags...

define('HOME_PAGE_META_DESCRIPTION', ');

define('HOME_PAGE_META_KEYWORDS'

I know other people just edit those two lines and it appears to work for them but they don't exist for poor me *sob*

in fact this is my entire file:

<?php
/**
* @package languageDefines
* @copyright Copyright 2003-2005 Zen Cart Development Team
* @copyright Portions Copyright 2003 osCommerce
* @license http://www.zen-cart.com/license/2_0.txt GNU Public License V2.0
* @version $Id: meta_tags.php 4273 2006-08-26 03:13:52Z drbyte $
*/

// page title
define('TITLE', 'Gothic Magic');

// Site Tagline
define('SITE_TAGLINE', 'Pagan, Wiccan, New Age - shop');

// Custom Keywords
define('CUSTOM_KEYWORDS', 'Pagan, Wiccan, New Age, Gothic, shop, Jewellery, Reiki, Spells');

// Review Page can have a lead in:
define('META_TAGS_REVIEW', 'Reviews: ');

// separators for meta tag definitions
// Define Primary Section Output
define('PRIMARY_SECTION', ' : ');

// Define Secondary Section Output
define('SECONDARY_SECTION', ' - ');

// Define Tertiary Section Output
define('TERTIARY_SECTION', ', ');

// Define divider ... usually just a space or a comma plus a space
define('METATAGS_DIVIDER', ' ');

// Define which pages to tell robots/spiders not to index
// This is generally used for account-management pages or typical SSL pages, and usually doesn't need to be touched.
define('ROBOTS_PAGES_TO_SKIP','login,logoff,create_account,account,account_edit,account_history,account_history_info,account_newsletters,account_notifications,account_password,address_book,advanced_search,advanced_search_result,checkout_success,checkout_process,checkout_shipping,checkout_payment,checkout_confirmation,cookie_usage,create_account_success,contact_us,download,download_timeout,customers_authorization,down_for_maintenance,password_forgotten,time_out,unsubscribe');

// favicon setting
// There is usually NO need to enable this unless you wish to specify a path and/or a different filename
// define('FAVICON','favicon.ico');

?>

27 Jun 2008, 19:30

#8

momokui

New Zenner

Join Date:: Jan 2007
Posts:: 32
Plugin Contributions:: 0

Re: Automatic Meta tags generation

copy this:
includes/templates/template_default/common/html_header.php

to:
includes/templates/your_template/common/html_header.php

replace the red text with your own text:

<meta name="keywords" content="<?php echo META_TAG_KEYWORDS; ?>" />
<meta name="description" content="<?php echo META_TAG_DESCRIPTION; ?>" />

29 Jun 2008, 04:06

#9

kdnmiller

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Re: Automatic Meta tags generation

Sorry, i dont have the answer for the selectors yet since i had other serious trouble, but for the tags i can tell you that Zen does name them

define('HOME_PAGE_META_DESCRIPTION', ');

define('HOME_PAGE_META_KEYWORDS'

However the standard tags exist as you expect, if you go to your site with IE and check View->source.

Just its so annoying that zen spams the tags with its own generated keywords and possibly makes it difficult for search engines.

What happens is that for example your tag:

// Custom Keywords
define('CUSTOM_KEYWORDS', 'Pagan, Wiccan, New Age, Gothic, shop, Jewellery, Reiki, Spells');

Thats nice, but zen takes that and adds all the product headlines to it, and all the categories. That will bolster it up to double the characters and duplicate some aswell. This is NOT a good thing.

I also wonder this is not a known problem here and nobody screaming out earlier, since the SEO optimizing is probably the most important thing if you want to sell something...

29 Jun 2008, 04:38

#10

kobra

Black Belt

Join Date:: Aug 2005
Posts:: 31,500
Plugin Contributions:: 4

Re: Automatic Meta tags generation

Refer you back to my post #4 in this thread

29 Jun 2008, 04:44

#11

website_rob

Inactive

Join Date:: Oct 2006
Posts:: 4,572
Plugin Contributions:: 0

Re: Automatic Meta tags generation

Admin > Configuration > Product Info

You have some Meta Tag options that should help.

02 Jul 2008, 14:05

#12

chrisroge

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Join Date:: Oct 2007
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Re: Automatic Meta tags generation

I like zen-cart a whole lot.

I would LOVE zen-cart a whole lot if things like this

You can edit the selectors in includes/modules/meta_tags.php

Were editable from the admin. There are so many variables like this that are hard wired into the code. Would be really nice to have this all handled in Admin instead so it was all in one place.

03 Jul 2008, 15:51

#13

qwert302

Zen Follower

Join Date:: Mar 2008
Posts:: 148
Plugin Contributions:: 0

Re: Automatic Meta tags generation

// Per-Page meta-tags. Follow this pattern for individual pages you wish to override. This is useful mainly for additional pages.
// replace "page_name" with the UPPERCASE name of your main_page= value, such as ABOUT_US or SHIPPINGINFO etc.
// repeat pattern as necessary
  define('META_TAG_DESCRIPTION_page_name','');
  define('META_TAG_KEYWORDS_PAGE_page_name','');
  define('META_TAG_TITLE_PAGE_page_name', '');

You can set them per page with this code.

03 Jul 2008, 16:05

#14

qwert302

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Join Date:: Mar 2008
Posts:: 148
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Re: Automatic Meta tags generation

Hmm, my site seems unresponsive to the changes I make in admin>configuration>product info regarding meta tags. I set the maximum generated words to 0 but it still spams it full. Interesting.

06 Jul 2008, 05:28

#15

craft_magick

Zen Follower

Join Date:: Nov 2007
Posts:: 166
Plugin Contributions:: 0

Re: Automatic Meta tags generation

kobra:
You can edit the selectors in includes/modules/meta_tags.php

I have no idea WHICH part of the meta_tags.php file to edit or what I should edit it to be.

Any help would be very much appreciated.

Thank you.

Zencart ROCKS!

06 Jul 2008, 15:25

#16

vandiermen

Totally Zenned

Join Date:: Feb 2007
Posts:: 518
Plugin Contributions:: 0

Re: Automatic Meta tags generation

meta_tags.php
1.3.7

i WANTED TO REMOVE THE AUTO CATEGORY ADDINS ON THE PAGES, SO I FOUND THE FIRST ONE OF THESE:

else {
define('META_TAG_TITLE', str_replace('"','',$category_metatags->fields['categories_name'] . PRIMARY_SECTION . TITLE . TAGLINE));
define('META_TAG_DESCRIPTION', str_replace('"','',TITLE . PRIMARY_SECTION . $category_metatags->fields['categories_name'] . SECONDARY_SECTION . KEYWORDS));
define('META_TAG_KEYWORDS', str_replace('"','',KEYWORDS . METATAGS_DIVIDER . $category_metatags->fields['categories_name']));
} // EOF

REMOVING ' . KEYWORDS' FROM THE 'META_TAG_DESCRIPTION’ REMOVED THE CATEGORY ADDINS AND THE KEY WORDS FROM THE PAGE HTML meta tag description

but I wanted to leave in the key words in and just remove the category addins, I got stuck finding where to remove the category addins so I placed the keywords into the meta_tags.php in quotes

07 Jul 2008, 13:10

#17

qwert302

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Join Date:: Mar 2008
Posts:: 148
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Re: Automatic Meta tags generation

vandiermen, so did you kill th automatic generation and it only adds the keywords you add from meta_tags.php? Do products still have the product info in the meta tag?

Does anyone think this will cause an issue with duplicate content if all the meta tags for your site are the same?

07 Jul 2008, 14:47

#18

vandiermen

Totally Zenned

Join Date:: Feb 2007
Posts:: 518
Plugin Contributions:: 0

Re: Automatic Meta tags generation

Yes killed the automatic generation
and yes products have the product info but they also have all the key words (I think they should but dont know)
the site is http://www.gotanyblacker.com.au/

I would just try if its your last resort, you can always undo it

07 Jul 2008, 15:31

#19

qwert302

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Join Date:: Mar 2008
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Re: Automatic Meta tags generation

I'm just clarifying here.

You still have a huge string of meta keywords. Did you put those in on purpose from the meta_tags.php?

I would like it to automatically generate about 10 keywords, or not generate any at all and I'll set custom keywords for each page.

I just realized that you're 1.3.7, and that's why your meta_tags.php doesn't look like mine.

Thanks anyway

08 Jul 2008, 10:36

#20

kdnmiller

New Zenner

Join Date:: Jun 2008
Posts:: 15
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Re: Automatic Meta tags generation

Hi, i found the solutions was posted here before:

http://www.zen-cart.com/forum/showthread.php?t=69667

you have to include 2 code additions to the file html_header.php and that will fix the automatic output in "meta name keywords" and "meta name description" on the index page.

after that define meta tags for every other site, that will eliminate the automatic generation on these sites aswell. After that youre ready for #1 google, just hire 50 bulgarians to get you 2000 backlinks from spam boards..

:lamo: