Social media metadata  allows us to optimize for sharing Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and Pinerest by defining exactly how titles, descriptions, images and more appear in social streams.

The implications for SEO are also significant. We know from experience and studies that the right data, including optimized images, helps content to spread, which often leads to increased links and mentions.

Knowing exactly which social meta tags to include can be confusing even to experienced webmasters. Consider the different structures supported by the major social platforms:

  • Twitter Cards: Summaries, Images, Galleries, Apps, Video, Audio, and Products
  • Pinterest Rich Pins: Products, Recipes, Movies, and Articles
  • Google+: Articles, Blog, Book, Event, Local Business, Organization, Person, Product, and Reviews
  • Facebook: Articles, Photos, Audio, Video, and more

How to use these templates

The first three of these templates are optimized using a typical “article” markup and data, ideal for blog posts and most written content. The final template contains markup for product pages. For other post types, such as book or recipes, refer to documentation linked at the end of this post for reference on what to customize.

1. The Minimal Template

This slimmed back version runs lean and fast. It contains a bare minimum of data for optimized sharing across Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and Pinterest.

Title tags and meta descriptions are included even though they aren’t technically social media meta tags. This is because they can be used by Google+ and other social media platforms, and it is best practice to include them on every page you publish.

Minimum Social Media Tag Template: Article

<!-- Place this data between the <head> tags of your website -->
 <title>Page Title. Maximum length 60-70 characters</title>
 <meta name="description" content="Page description. No longer than 155 characters." />
<!-- Twitter Card data -->
 <meta name="twitter:card" value="summary">
<!-- Open Graph data -->
 <meta property="og:title" content="Title Here" />
 <meta property="og:type" content="article" />
 <meta property="og:url" content="http://www.example.com/" />
 <meta property="og:image" content="http://example.com/image.jpg" />
 <meta property="og:description" content="Description Here" />

2: The Standard Template

The standard template represents a more robust implementation of social tags and is meant to work across all platforms. In addition to all of the features of the mimimal template above, the standard template includes the following:

  • The basic Twitter Summary card
  • Twitter thumbnail image
  • Facebook Page Insights

Standard Social Media Tag Template: Article

<!-- Twitter Card data -->
 <meta name="twitter:card" content="summary">
 <meta name="twitter:site" content="@publisher_handle">
 <meta name="twitter:title" content="Page Title">
 <meta name="twitter:description" content="Page description less than 200 characters">
 <meta name="twitter:creator" content="@author_handle">
 <-- Twitter Summary card images must be at least 120x120px -->
 <meta name="twitter:image" content="http://www.example.com/image.jpg">
<!-- Open Graph data -->
 <meta property="og:title" content="Title Here" />
 <meta property="og:type" content="article" />
 <meta property="og:url" content="http://www.example.com/" />
 <meta property="og:image" content="http://example.com/image.jpg" />
 <meta property="og:description" content="Description Here" />
 <meta property="og:site_name" content="Site Name, i.e. Moz" />
 <meta property="fb:admins" content="Facebook numeric ID" />

3: The Full Monty

This is the monster! In addition to all the data contained in the standard template, the full template contains:

  • Google Authorship and Publisher Markup. Although this data doesn’t change your content appearance in Google+, it potentially add links to your Google+ pages in search results.
  • Schema.org article markup
  • Twitter Summary card with large image
  • Expanded Open Graph article data

Full Social Media Tag Template: Article

<!-- Update your html tag to include the itemscope and itemtype attributes. -->
 <html itemscope itemtype="http://schema.org/Article">
<!-- Place this data between the <head> tags of your website -->
 <title>Page Title. Maximum length 60-70 characters</title>
 <meta name="description" content="Page description. No longer than 155 characters." />
<!-- Schema.org markup for Google+ -->
 <meta itemprop="name" content="The Name or Title Here">
 <meta itemprop="description" content="This is the page description">
 <meta itemprop="image" content="http://www.example.com/image.jpg">
<!-- Twitter Card data -->
 <meta name="twitter:card" content="summary_large_image">
 <meta name="twitter:site" content="@publisher_handle">
 <meta name="twitter:title" content="Page Title">
 <meta name="twitter:description" content="Page description less than 200 characters">
 <meta name="twitter:creator" content="@author_handle">
 <!-- Twitter summary card with large image must be at least 280x150px -->
 <meta name="twitter:image:src" content="http://www.example.com/image.jpg">
<!-- Open Graph data -->
 <meta property="og:title" content="Title Here" />
 <meta property="og:type" content="article" />
 <meta property="og:url" content="http://www.example.com/" />
 <meta property="og:image" content="http://example.com/image.jpg" />
 <meta property="og:description" content="Description Here" />
 <meta property="og:site_name" content="Site Name, i.e. Moz" />
 <meta property="article:published_time" content="2013-09-17T05:59:00+01:00" />
 <meta property="article:modified_time" content="2013-09-16T19:08:47+01:00" />
 <meta property="article:section" content="Article Section" />
 <meta property="article:tag" content="Article Tag" />
 <meta property="fb:admins" content="Facebook numberic ID" />

The Product Template

For merchants, product markup is very popular, and usually easy for developers to implement in their shopping cart software. The product template differs from article markup in only a few ways:

  • Modified <html> tag to reflect schema.org product data
  • Twitter Product Card includes required data labels
  • Open Graph data includes price and currency data

Product Social Media Tag Template

<!-- Update your html tag to include the itemscope and itemtype attributes. -->
 <html itemscope itemtype="http://schema.org/Product">
<!-- Place this data between the <head> tags of your website -->
 <title>Page Title. Maximum length 60-70 characters</title>
 <meta name="description" content="Page description. No longer than 155 characters." />
<!-- Schema.org markup for Google+ -->
 <meta itemprop="name" content="The Name or Title Here">
 <meta itemprop="description" content="This is the page description">
 <meta itemprop="image" content="http://www.example.com/image.jpg">
<!-- Twitter Card data -->
 <meta name="twitter:card" content="product">
 <meta name="twitter:site" content="@publisher_handle">
 <meta name="twitter:title" content="Page Title">
 <meta name="twitter:description" content="Page description less than 200 characters">
 <meta name="twitter:creator" content="@author_handle">
 <meta name="twitter:image" content="http://www.example.com/image.jpg">
 <meta name="twitter:data1" content="$3">
 <meta name="twitter:label1" content="Price">
 <meta name="twitter:data2" content="Black">
 <meta name="twitter:label2" content="Color">
<!-- Open Graph data -->
 <meta property="og:title" content="Title Here" />
 <meta property="og:type" content="article" />
 <meta property="og:url" content="http://www.example.com/" />
 <meta property="og:image" content="http://example.com/image.jpg" />
 <meta property="og:description" content="Description Here" />
 <meta property="og:site_name" content="Site Name, i.e. Moz" />
 <meta property="og:price:amount" content="15.00" />
 <meta property="og:price:currency" content="USD" />

Tools for testing and approval

 

A. Twitter Validation Tool

https://dev.twitter.com/docs/cards/validation/validator
Before your cards show on Twitter, you must first have your domain approved. Fortunately, it’s a super-easy process. After you implement your cards, simply enter your sample URL into the validation tool. After checking your markup, select the “Submit for Approval” button.

B. Facebook Debugger

https://developers.facebook.com/tools/debug
You don’t need prior approval for your meta information to show on Facebook, but the debugging tool they offer gives you a wealth of information about all your tags and can also analyze your Twitter tags.

C. Google Structured Data Testing Tool

http://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/richsnippets
Webmasters traditionally use the structured data testing tool to test authorship markup and preview how snippets will appear in search results, but you can also use see what other types of meta data Google is able to extract from each page.

D. Pinterest Rich Pins Validator

http://developers.pinterest.com/rich_pins/validator/
Like Twitter, Pinterest requires an approval process to enable Rich Pin functionality. Use the Rich Pin Validator tool to test your data markup and apply for approval at the same time.

Tips and best practices

Optimizing for images

The image you link to in your social data does not actually have to be on the page, but it should represent your content well. The image allows you to controll what people see when they share your content, so it’s important to use quality images.

Every social platform has different standards for sizing. Typically, it’s easier to keep it simple and choose one image size that will work for all services.

  • Twitter thumbnail: 120x120px
  • Twitter large image: 280x150px
  • Facebook: Standards vary, but an image at least 200x200px works best. Facebook recommends large images up to 1200x630px wide.

In short, larger images offer you the most flexibility.

Source: Moz.com