Learn about Actor description and meta description. Where to set them and best practices for both content and length.
First impressions are important, especially when it comes to tools. Actor descriptions are the first connections the potential users have with your Actor. There are two kinds of descriptions you can set: regular description (in Apify Store) and SEO description (on Google search), along with their respective names: regular name and SEO name.
<aside> đź’ˇ Apify tip: you can change descriptions and names as many times as you want.
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<aside> đź’ˇ **Actor name and description are the text bits visible in Store.
Name: 40-50 characters Description: 300 characters**
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<aside> đź’ˇ **SEO name and SEO description are the text bits visible on Google.
Name: 40-50 characters Description: 145-155 characters**
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Actor description is what users see on the Actor's web page in Apify Store, along with the Actor's name and URL. When creating an Actor description, a “warm” visitor experience is prioritized (more on that later).
Actor description is also present in Apify Console and across Apify Store.
Actor SEO description is a tool description visible on Google. It is shorter and SEO-optimized (keywords matter here). When creating the SEO description, a “cold” visitor experience is prioritized.
So usually the way the potential user interacts with both these descriptions goes like this: SEO first, regular description second. So is there any benefit in them being different?
Different descriptions give you a chance to target different stages of user acquisition. And make sure the acquisition takes place.
SEO description (and SEO name) is targeting a “cold” potential user who knows nothing about your tool yet and just came across it on Google search. They’re searching to solve a problem or use case. The goal of the meta description is to convince that visitor to click on your tool's page among other similar search results on Google. While it's shorter, SEO description is also the space to SEO-optimize your language to the max to attract the most matching search intent.