You know when someone shares a link on WhatsApp and a nice preview pops up with an image, a title and a short text? That's Open Graph. It's a small setting on your website that controls what your page looks like when someone shares it on social media.
Why does this matter?
If your page has no Open Graph:
- On LinkedIn/Facebook: a bare link without an image, which looks amateurish
- On WhatsApp: just the URL, no preview to spark curiosity
- On X (Twitter): no 'card', just a link
- Chance of a click: low. People keep scrolling.
With Open Graph:
- An attractive preview with image, title and summary, automatically
- Looks professional
- Chance of a click: considerably higher (2-3x according to studies)
What do you need to set up?
The basic Open Graph tags:
- og:title is the title that's shown (can differ from your SEO title)
- og:description is the short summary underneath
- og:image is the preview image (ideally 1200x630 pixels)
- og:url is the URL of the page
- og:type is usually 'website' or 'article'
What can your web developer do?
For WordPress with an SEO plugin (Yoast, Rank Math): set up by default based on your meta title/description. You can override it per page with a separate preview image if you like.
Without a plugin: it has to be added to the HTML by hand. Not much work, but it does need attention once.
Bonus: X (Twitter) Cards
Twitter has its own version: 'Twitter Cards'. Also a set of tags (twitter:card, twitter:title, etc.). Usually set up automatically by the same SEO plugin.
How do you test what your link looks like?
Paste your URL into one of these tools, click 'scrape', and you'll instantly see what the preview will look like.