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  4. Google is indexing wordpress attachment pages

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Google is indexing wordpress attachment pages

Intermediate & Advanced SEO
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  • TauriU
    TauriU last edited by Feb 9, 2012, 1:36 PM

    Hey,

    I have a bit of a problem/issue what is freaking me out a bit. I hope you can help me. If i do site:www.somesitename.com search in Google i see that Google is indexing my attachment pages. I want to redirect attachment URL's to parent post and stop google from indexing them.

    I have used different redirect plugins in hope that i can fix it myself but plugins don't work. I get a error:"too many redirects occurred trying to open www.somesitename.com/?attachment_id=1982 ".

    Do i need to change something in my attachment.php fail? Any idea what is causing this problem?

    get_header(); ?>

    /* Run the loop to output the attachment. * If you want to overload this in a child theme then include a file * called loop-attachment.php and that will be used instead. */ get_template_part( 'loop', 'attachment' ); ?>

    1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
    • David_ODonnell
      David_ODonnell last edited by May 14, 2013, 1:32 PM May 14, 2013, 1:32 PM

      This plugin automatically 301 redirects image attachment pages to the parent post, simply install and activate, done:

      http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/attachment-pages-redirect/

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • topic:timeago_earlier,9 days
      • yeagerd
        yeagerd @Chad.Agrawal last edited by May 5, 2013, 10:13 AM May 5, 2013, 10:13 AM

        Just because you make it yourself and it doesn't install from the control panel.....  doesn't mean it is not a plugin.

        However, it is a very specialized plugin that will do the job without cluttering anything else up.

        Make sure you save a copy out to the side in case you loose it in updates.

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • topic:timeago_earlier,4 months
        • Chad.Agrawal
          Chad.Agrawal last edited by Jan 14, 2013, 1:24 PM Jan 14, 2013, 1:24 PM

          I found a great solution for this without using a plugin:

          http://www.lancelhoff.com/wordpress-disable-image-attachment-page-links/

          It works for me on my site 🙂

          Chad

          yeagerd 1 Reply Last reply May 5, 2013, 10:13 AM Reply Quote 0
          • topic:timeago_earlier,4 months
          • RijoAbraham
            RijoAbraham last edited by Sep 16, 2012, 4:25 AM Sep 16, 2012, 3:45 AM

            Having same problem, i have so many duplicate pages (more than 350) and all them caused by wordpress attachments. All i can do as keri said link images to direct image url or dont link at all.

            Right now i'm going to remove all hyper-links from images. Easy way.

            No wait  i used this option in yoast plugin and it redirects attachments. I don't know why its not working for "TauriU "

            Tick: Redirect attachment URL's to parent post URL.

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • topic:timeago_earlier,about a month
            • KeriMorgret
              KeriMorgret @JohnTulley last edited by Aug 7, 2012, 1:45 PM Aug 7, 2012, 1:45 PM

              I insert the image via the image icon, then I put the link in as the URL of the image itself. There's a button that talks about which to link to, can't remember exactly what it's called, but look for that option in the link page.

              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • JohnTulley
                JohnTulley @KeriMorgret last edited by Aug 7, 2012, 7:45 AM Aug 7, 2012, 7:45 AM

                Hi Keri, I'm also having problems dozens of Wordpress attachment pages being indexed in google. When you say you link directly to the image do you mean that  when you add an image you use the add 'from URL' option?

                KeriMorgret 1 Reply Last reply Aug 7, 2012, 1:45 PM Reply Quote 0
                • topic:timeago_earlier,6 months
                • KeriMorgret
                  KeriMorgret last edited by Feb 9, 2012, 3:21 PM Feb 9, 2012, 3:21 PM

                  What I have done on my wordpress site is to make sure I'm linking directly to the image and not to the attachment page. If someone clicks on the image, they get a nice large (2000 pixel wide) image by itself, no attachment page or anything. I don't know if that will work for you, but it does work in my case.

                  JohnTulley 1 Reply Last reply Aug 7, 2012, 7:45 AM Reply Quote 0
                  • TauriU
                    TauriU @TauriU last edited by Feb 16, 2012, 2:34 PM Feb 9, 2012, 3:17 PM

                    I wasn't able to figure out how this plugin works exactly:( lack of knowledge, on my part.

                    My site url is   if this is any help. And if you click here http://tinyurl.com/8x55yh8 you see what google site:domainname.com search bring out. All those attachment pages should redirect to parent post URL's.

                    i hope this is at least a bit helpful information

                    1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                    • ClickConsult
                      ClickConsult @TauriU last edited by Feb 9, 2012, 2:49 PM Feb 9, 2012, 2:49 PM

                      OK, do you happen to have Live HTTP Headers for FireFox (or any other tool/plug-in that'd be able to record all http headers) so you can see what exactly is happening with the redirects?

                      If so, could you again paste that over to pastebin.com?

                      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                      • TauriU
                        TauriU @TauriU last edited by Feb 9, 2012, 2:44 PM Feb 9, 2012, 2:44 PM

                        I tried your suggestion, but it doesn't work unfortunately

                        i m using custom permalink structure. /%postname%

                        is there any possibility that issue lays in " /%postname% " structure.

                        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                        • TauriU
                          TauriU @mad2k last edited by Feb 9, 2012, 2:31 PM Feb 9, 2012, 2:31 PM

                          i have already done lots of optimization in Yoast plugin:) don't want to change plugins now. but i try it out when nothing else doesn't work

                          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                          • ClickConsult
                            ClickConsult @TauriU last edited by Feb 9, 2012, 2:29 PM Feb 9, 2012, 2:29 PM

                            OK, there's nothing strange with the htaccess.

                            I'd suggest that you now disable all of the plug-ins expect for Yoast's just so you can debug if the issue is due to any other plug-ins installed.

                            I know it sounds strange, but I'd also suggest that you go to the permalinks section of the WordPress admin and update the settings - don't change anything at the moment, just update. Sometimes that can reset any issues with the permalinks.

                            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                            • TauriU
                              TauriU @TauriU last edited by Feb 9, 2012, 2:25 PM Feb 9, 2012, 2:24 PM

                              i posted my site .htaccess file to pastebin.com. ulr http://pastebin.com/cLVNNCkb

                              List of active plug-ins.

                              AdRotate

                              Better Tag Cloud

                              Cleanup Wordpress

                              Contact Form 7

                              Featured Page Widget

                              Flexi Pages Widget

                              Link Carousel

                              MailChimp Widget

                              WordPress Importer

                              WordPress SEO by Yoast's

                              WP-Table Reloaded

                              WP SlimStat

                              WP SlimStat ShortCodes

                              I hope it help:) those freaking attachment pages are messing up my rankings:)

                              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                              • mad2k
                                mad2k last edited by Feb 9, 2012, 2:09 PM Feb 9, 2012, 2:09 PM

                                For more than 2 months I'd been tested another SEO plugin - SEO Ultimate. IMHO it is the best plugin for WP at the time. It is very flexible and it is possible to decide about almost every element of a page. It has follow/nofollow and index/noindex manager and tons of other features.

                                SEO Ultimate

                                I don't have attachment pages indexed 🙂

                                TauriU 1 Reply Last reply Feb 9, 2012, 2:31 PM Reply Quote 0
                                • ClickConsult
                                  ClickConsult @TauriU last edited by Feb 9, 2012, 1:59 PM Feb 9, 2012, 1:59 PM

                                  Hmm, that's pretty strange. It sounds like you could have an issue with your htaccess file.

                                  Could you paste your .htaccess file to pastebin.com?

                                  You also said that you've attempted to use a few different plug-ins to achieve this - I'd suggest that you double check that the other plug-ins aren't active. Would you be able to send over a list of the plug-ins that are active too, in addition to the .htaccess file contents?

                                  1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                  • TauriU
                                    TauriU @ClickConsult last edited by Feb 9, 2012, 1:55 PM Feb 9, 2012, 1:55 PM

                                    Thank you for a quick answer.

                                    Yoast's SEO plug-in is my main SEO plugin. I have tried option in the plugin that should Redirect attachment URL's to parent post URL's.  Unfortunately it doesn't work.

                                    I get a error: "too many redirects occurred trying to open www.somesitename.com/?attachment_id=1982 ".

                                    ClickConsult TauriU 6 Replies Last reply Feb 9, 2012, 3:17 PM Reply Quote 0
                                    • ClickConsult
                                      ClickConsult last edited by Feb 9, 2012, 1:42 PM Feb 9, 2012, 1:42 PM

                                      Hi there,

                                      This is common with WordPress, attatchments by default have their own pages.

                                      Have you heard of Yoast's SEO plug-in before?

                                      http://yoast.com/wordpress/seo/

                                      I'd recommend that you install Yoast's SEO plug-in, it has the ability to redirect attachment pages back to the main page which is what you're trying to achieve.

                                      If you do use Yoast's SEO plug-in, let me know how you get on.

                                      Good luck!

                                      TauriU 1 Reply Last reply Feb 9, 2012, 1:55 PM Reply Quote 0
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