Google is extracting my sites desc. from DMOZ

[SEOTico]

Ever since DMOZ approved my sites submission - and therefore added our URL to their directory - Google has displayed the description used for submission purposes at DMOZ for their (Google's) results upon searching for a variety of targeted key terms.

Whilst I was very happy to see DMOZ approve my listing (for many obvious SEM related reasons) I'm now at the mercy of their editors/directory when it comes updating the description displayed at Google.

I've made multiple posts at their resource center - only to receive VERY negative feedback from their editors who all seem like a bunch of preMadonna’s who dare not to address any one in a friendly manner when it comes to issues pertaining to their HUMAN powered directory (in terms of SE, I prefer spiders/bots ). In any event, I'm at a total loss. How in the world do I get my Google description to update based on the changes I make to my Meta tags. DMOZ says I should speak to Google. Google says I should visit DMOZ and submit a "site description change" request.

Has this happened to anyone? I've spent literally the past 6 months staring at the same meta-description indexed at Google - needless to say many many tag changes have been made for SEO maintenance purposes yet Google seems not to update.

Thanks in advance for taking the time to read my post.

Looking forward to feedback.

SEO Tico

[PhilC]

...their editors who all seem like a bunch of preMadonna’s

You mean they all older than Madonna??? (j/k - sorry )

Google (and Yahoo!) display which Title and Description they programmatically think is best. For the 'description' part of the listing, Google usually displays one or more snippets from the page itself. If there isn't anything suitable in the page's body text, they will display a description from somewhere else like the page's Description tag or a DMOZ description.

You won't get DMOZ to change the description to what you want, because what you want is highly unlikely to be a suitable description. So you need to look at your page and make sure that suitable snippets for the particular searchterm are available in the body text, and also in the Description tag. They need to contain the particular searchterm if you want them displayed in the serps.

[SEOTico]

I concur, however, what's odd is that for a variety of other terms - currently in my page 1 key phrase inventory - Google does in fact "by-pass" the sites' DMOZ description and takes whatever is manually inserted (by me) within my meta-tags.

The sites content is relevant and its copy reads well - far from keyword stuffing or any other black-hat seo tactics which would prompt Google to say " Um, no way pal - we'll use DMOZ's description instead of what you've manually inserted into your tags". There is bound to be a way I can get this issue resolved.

[bhartzer]

Google has displayed the description used for submission purposes at DMOZ

Actually, to be technical about it, I believe the description that Google shows is taken from the Google Directory, not directly from DMOZ. However, you need to get your description changed in DMOZ because Google's data for their directory comes from DMOZ.

[Robert_Charlton]

SEOTico - PhilC is right. It sounds like you don't have a good meta description, or sufficiently rich content on your page to include some of the search terms you're ranking on, and that Google, in trying to deliver a description that is relevant to the search query, is pulling the DMOZ (or Google Directory) description.

See this thread on the topic...
Proposed Search Engine Standard For Titles & Descriptions
http://forums.searchenginewatch.com/...ead.php?t=5759

The topic was recently discussed at SES as well...
Session Five: Day Two: Indexing Summit 2: Redirects, Titles & Descriptions
http://forums.searchenginewatch.com/...ead.php?t=7276

[SEOTico]

Thank you. I'll read both threads carefully.