Internal search and meta tags

[nka]

Is there a way to get the site search engine to pick up on meta tags? I want to use them to classify some different products but it doesn't seem to be an option.

It does seem rather strange for the search engine not to use these, am I right in thinking it doesn't?

[wjcampbe]

Meta tags have been abused by so many scammers and get rich quick merchant, that most SE (not all) now ignore them completely. The best way to classify a different product is give it its own page - you can then optimise that page for the visitor, and incidentally the SE at the same time.

[nka]

I don't think i explained myself very well - I was referring to the search internal to my site. Surely that should take notice of meta tags since it only searches my own site where all the meta tags are set by me so the only person I could try to scam would be myself

I know that external search engines generally ignore them now which is why some people use them for internal classification purposes now. Just wondering (and hoping!) that this is possible in Actinic.

[NormanRouxel]

I think the Actinic ethos is to only index visible product page text. That way customers aren't confused by being directed to products that don't seem to contain the words they searched on.

There are other techniques available if you really want to index hidden content. I.e. using the extended info page; adding !!<<noscript>hidden words</noscript>>!! to the description; creating a hidden attribute containing the keywords as choices; etc.

A bit of searching should find more on these topics..

[pinbrook]

I was referring to the search internal to my site. Surely that should take notice of meta tags

Unfortunately not, actinic uses product name and description.

It is abit of a battle to work out where to incorporate mis spellings etc, but in fact by not using meta tags you are actually forced into making good descriptions that will please SEO too

[nka]

Ok, thanks. I think I'll give the hidden attribute a try

One other thing I've noticed when playing around with the search - we use duplicate products throughout the site to include the different sizes available for garments in each section but tell the search not to index duplicates. If we sell out of stock of the "product parent" then we hide it on the site but leave the children (not sure what the correct terms are for that but hopefully you get what I mean!). Unfortunately, this seems to have the effect of hiding that product from the search as well.

From this I assume that actinic indexes all the products, hidden and live, and if the parent is hidden then it wont show in search. I don't suppose anyone has come across a way around this?