How Important is the WordPress Tagline

Posted in Random Stuff, Wordpress How To

I love it when I install a new blog.   Not only do I get the sense that I’m on the path to achieving something but I also like the new tagline message “just another wordpress blog”.

You’ve probably all noticed the tagline “just another wordpress blog”.    What I often find amusing is when I’m surfing the net how many people leave the default tagline there.

A tagline should give some further information about your site, add some seo love or be something memorable like a slogan.

Rather than waste this valuable space think about how you can improve your tagline.

Here’s some great taglines that you might already know:

“Don’t leave home without it”

“just do it”

“finger licking good”

“coke is it”  – I’d love to know what “it” is!

You can see that these taglines all have absolutely nothing to do with SEO but they are all memorable and automatically associate you with the brand.

You can also use a tagline to reinstate the core values or your intention of your site like:

“fast friendly service”

One of the best things that you can do with your tagline is to add some seo love for your site by using this to insert some keywords.    For example; say you have got a great domain name but it doesn’t really have any seo value.    Well, that’s automatically going to make things a little more difficult for you because it’s so easy to get top rankings with a keyword domain name.   Here’s where your tagline comes in handy to insert those precious keywords.

If your name is:   “bargaintvsets.com”    but your keywords are “high definition lcd tvs” then the title of your blog will be Bargain TV Sets and your tagline could be something like:    Huge Range of High Definition LCD TVS in Stock” so you are still getting seo love on each page of your site.

If you don’t know how to change the tag line on your site just go to Settings/General and change your tagline.   Remember to save your changes.

Now, that you have a tagline why not have multiple taglines?    You can have multiple taglines that either randomly display or sequentially display throughout the site.     All it needs is the simple Advanced Tagline plugin.  What I really like about this plugin is that you can upload a csv of all your taglines to display throughout the site.   You could use this to add some unique content to an autoblog by adding random quotes, tips or article snippets.     You can also use this plugin as a widget as well if you want to keep your header area clean.

Speaking of keeping your header area clean you will probably notice that I don’t have a tagline …. well I don’t have a tagline that is displayed because I have a pretty header graphic.      I still do have a tagline but I’ve hidden it from displaying so it still is visible to the search engines but just not the visitors.     If you want to hide your tagline or title on your site you need to have a little hack with your theme.

Usually, you will need to go to your header.php file in your theme files.    Before you start to play with the file you should always take a copy of it (in case of accidents).   Next, in your header.php file you will need to find the code that refers to “description” for the tagline. Once you have found that comment out the code.  Upload your  new header.php file and overwrite the existing one on your web host.   Go check your site – it should all work now.    If you have css knowledge you can also hide the description from displaying in your stylesheet.
If it is not working or you may have made a mistake then you still have your original header.php file that you can upload.

Have fun with WP :)