WCM tip #15: Use standard SharePoint SEO fields with catalogs to leverage the standard SharePoint SEO capabilities


When working with content catalogs which are published on the Internet use standard SharePoint SEO fields to add search metadata to your catalog items and optimize them for Internet search engines.

One of the steps in publishing content catalogs on the Internet is optimizing their contents for Internet search engines. Although SharePoint 2013 provides standard support for this, it is by default available only for Publishing Pages. If your content catalogs are based on custom lists, you will need to implement support for managing and publishing Internet search metadata yourself. By reusing the existing SEO fields you can leverage standard SharePoint 2013 SEO capabilities and have the SEO metadata automatically included on the website where catalog content is published. Unfortunately before you will be able to use those fields, you will need to customize them as by default, they are hidden on the New and Edit Forms. An alternative approach is to use custom SEO columns and have them mapped to the standard SharePoint 2013 SEO Managed Properties which will also allow you to leverage the standard functionality for rendering Internet search metadata.

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