1 MUN Libraries: Web Metadata Standards| August 2009 Web Metadata Standards: Improving Website Visibility Lisa Goddard Memorial University Libraries Web Team August 2009 Librarians are well aware that most users will begin their information search not at the library website, but in a major search engine like Google. It is vital that the library website be well‐indexed in search engines, that our hit list results are well formatted and contain useful information, and that our pages receive high rankings when they are particularly relevant to an information need. Metadata and tag structure is also used by screen readers and other accessibility tools. Finally, the way in which a web site is structured will greatly impact its ability to incorporate emerging metadata standards, and the availability of applications which can parse and re‐format data for export to other types of applications. When we talk about metadata on a website, we are talking about much more than simply meta tags. Many things will affect the ability of a third party application to parse, harvest, or re‐use website data, including the structure of the page, the tags used, the text in title and H1 tags, class names, and compliance with web standards. The topic of web metadata is therefore rather broad in scope. This report attempts to outline the existing standards that impact the parsing and indexing of web sites. Where appropriate I also note some of the modules in Drupal and Joomla that may be useful for improving page structure, semantic interoperability, and search engine optimization. Semantic HTML Semantic HTML refers to the practice of creating documents with HTML that contain only the author's intended meaning, without any reference to how this meaning is presented. Semantic HTML gives search engines and screen readers more accurate metadata from which to draw conclusions about the meaning of a site’s content. The list below comprises some of the major principles of Semantic HTML. Make your structure clear Resist the temptation to lay your page out in non‐standard ways: you want it to be very clear to the search engine where the navigation is, where the content is, and where the headings are. As a rule, put navigation first in your page. Search engines cull most of their information from the title and <h1> tags. Always use the heading tags (h1, h2, etc.) for headings and sub‐headings. Header tags go from h1 to h6, in order of importance, with the h1 being the most important. The core block elements in HTML are: div, h1 – h6, p, blockquote