[Wikia-l] MediaWiki:Description

[Brian Grove]

Thanks John -- looking forward to learning more.

BG

On May 20, 2008, at 2:52 PM, JohnQ wrote:

> I like the idea to make this linkable from Special:WebTools... that  
> makes it more accessible for admins. As for seo, we've heard the  
> main benefit is increasing click-thru rate on a wiki's links on a  
> search result page (rather than raising a wiki's position in the  
> results) ... but we'll know more soon as we get our own measurements  
> on this.
>
> Thanks,
> John Q.
>
>
> Brian Grove wrote:
>> This is awesome -- I wonder how we "productize" it.
>>
>> Here's a couple thoughts.
>>
>> Maybe once we learn SEO tips we suggest an optimized set of  
>> keywords to include. We also link to this MediaWiki:Description in  
>> the WebTools report.
>>
>> We take an active/inactive role in getting this changed:
>>
>> 1) Inactive Wikis with many pages: we go ahead and change the  
>> description based upon SEO best practices.
>> 2) Active wikis with many pages: suggest changes to this file with  
>> SEO best practices.
>> 3) New Wikis: make this a first suggestion
>>
>> All wikis -- add the ability to change this file. Have link within  
>> the WebTools SEO report. http://hotrod.wikia.com/wiki/Special:Webtools
>>
>> I'm assuming this is highly SEO valuable. I'm also assuming adding  
>> more keywords+readable does more good than harm in helping the rank  
>> plus search users to choose your wiki vs. other results in search.
>>
>> BG
>>
>> Danny Horn wrote:
>>
>>> I should explain the MediaWiki:Description feature -- it's a cool  
>>> new thing, but it's a lot better if people customize it.
>>>
>>> When main pages show up in Google results, they sometimes have odd  
>>> text showing as the description. Keywords for the topic of the  
>>> wiki sometimes appear in boxes and templates on the main page,  
>>> rather than plain text, so what Google shows can be somewhat random.
>>>
>>> MediaWiki:Description is a way for wikis to customize what Google  
>>> uses as the description for the main page. Right now, it's set to  
>>> a bland default: "{{SITENAME}} is a database that anyone can edit."
>>>
>>> Admins can edit that page to expand the description, up to 150  
>>> characters. It would be great if the description included search  
>>> terms that you'd expect people to use when they're looking for  
>>> your site.
>>>
>>> Here's a few examples:
>>>
>>> * Doctor Who Wiki is a database that anyone can edit, covering  
>>> Doctor Who episodes, characters and monsters, including the Daleks  
>>> and Cybermen.
>>>
>>> * Muppet Wiki is a database about Jim Henson's work that anyone  
>>> can edit, including episode and character guides to The Muppet  
>>> Show and Sesame Street.
>>>
>>> * Dofus Wiki is a database that anyone can edit, with articles on  
>>> quests, guilds, and everything Dofus!
>>>
>>> So folks can go ahead and edit that on your wikis, and make it  
>>> interesting or useful or whatever you'd like.
>>>
>>> Unfortunately, I can't help with the question about non-ASCII  
>>> characters... Maybe someone else can?
>>>
>>>
>>> -- Danny
>>>
>>>
>>> On Sat, May 17, 2008 at 6:28 AM, Jesús Martínez <martineznovo at gmail.c 
>>> om <mailto:martineznovo at gmail.com>> wrote:
>>>
>>>    I found a new feature: The contents of  
>>> [[MediaWiki:Description]] will
>>>    be placed inside the content of the <meta  
>>> name="description" ... > tag
>>>    of the main page of a Wiki. That description should be shown on  
>>> search
>>>    engines, but only when the main page appears in the results.
>>>
>>>    But, it doesn't support non-ASCII characters so non-english wikis
>>>    would probably have strange characters on it.
>>>
>>>    As an example, "é" turns into é�¾, and "ñ" into á�¾
>>>
>>>    Encoding such characters as entities -- like &eacute; or  
>>> &ntilde; --
>>>    does not work because they are double-encoded: &eacute; turns  
>>> into
>>>    &amp;eacute;
>>>
>>>    A fix for that would be greatly appreciated!
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>

Brian Grove
brian at wikia.com