Why is Google Reporting big increase in duplicate content after Canonicalization update?
-
Our web hosting company recently applied a update to our site that should have rectified Canonicalized URLs. Webmaster tools had been reporting duplicate content on pages that had a query string on the end.
After the update there has been a massive jump in Webmaster tools reporting now over 800 pages of duplicate content, Up from about 100 prior to the update plus it reporting some very odd pages (see attached image)
They claim they have implement Canonicalization in line with Google Panda & Penguin, but surely something is not right here and it's going to cause us a big problem with traffic.
Can anyone shed any light on the situation???
-
Hi All,
I finally got to the bottom of the problem and it is that they have not applied canonicalization across the site, only to certain pages which is not my understanding when they implemented the update a few weeks back.
So they are preparing a hot fix as part of a service pack to our site which will rectify this issue and apply canonicalization to all pages that contain query strings. This should clear that problem up once and for all.
Thank you both for your input, a great help.
-
Hi Deb... I have nice blogpost from seomoz blog for you written by Lindsey in which she has explained it very nicely about it.
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/serious-robotstxt-misuse-high-impact-solutions
In this post check the example of digg.com. Digg.com has blocked "submit" in robots.txt but still Google has indexed URLs. Check screenshot in the Blog post. Hope this help.
-
_Those URLs will be crawled by Google, but will not be Indexed. And that being said, there will be no more duplicate content issue. I hope I have made myself clear over here. _
-
Deb, even if you block those URLs in Robots.txt, Google will going to index those URLs because those URLs are interlink with website. The best way is to put canonical tag so that you will get inter linking benefits as well.
-
Fraser,
Till now they have not implemented Canonicalization in your website. After Canonicalization implementation also you will duplication errors in your webmaster account but it will not harm your ranking. Because Canonicalization helps Google in selecting the page from multiple version of similar page that has to displayed in SERP. In above example, First URL is the original URL but the second URL has some parameters in URLs so your preferred version of URL should be first one. After proper Canonicalization implementation you will only see URLs that you have submitted in your sitemap via Google Webmaster Tool.
And about two webmaster codes, I don't think we have setup two separate accounts, you can provide view or admin access from your webmaster account to them.
-
Either you will have to block these pages via Google Webmaster Tools by Using URL parameter or else you need to block them via robots.txt file like this –
To block this URL: http://www.towelsrus.co.uk/towels/baby-towels/prodlist_ct493.htm?dir=1&size=100
You need to use this tag in robots.txt file – Disallow: /.htm?dir=
-
Hi,
Here are a couple of examples for you.
Duplication issue is showing because of below type of URLs:
http://www.towelsrus.co.uk/towels/baby-towels/prodlist_ct493.htm
http://www.towelsrus.co.uk/towels/baby-towels/prodlist_ct493.htm?dir=1&size=100 ```
-
The Canonical URL updates were supposed to have been implement some weeks back.
I have asked why there are 2 webmaster tools codes, I expect this is my account plus they have one to monitor things there end.
Query string parameters have been setup, but I am unsure if they are configured correctly as this is all a bit new to me and i am in there hands to deal with this really.
The URLs without query strings are submitted to Webmaster tools via site maps and they are the URLs we want indexed.
-
Can you please share the URL and some example pages where the problem of duplicate content is appearing?
-
Hi Fraser,
Are you talking about towelsrus.co.uk ? I didn't find any canonical tag in any source page of your website. Are they sure about implementation ? or they will implement it in future. And one more interesting point, why there are two webmaster code in your website's source page. Below are those to webmaster codes:
<meta name="<a class="attribute-value">google-site-verification</a>" content="<a class="attribute-value">BJ6cDrRRB2iS4fMx2zkZTouKTPTpECs2tw-3OAvIgh4</a>" />
<meta name="<a class="attribute-value">google-site-verification</a>" content="<a class="attribute-value">SjaHRLJh00aeQY9xJ81lorL_07UXcCDFgDFgG8lBqCk</a>" />
Have you blocked querystring parameters in "URL parameters" in Google webmaster
Tools ?
Duplication issue is showing because of below type of URLs:
http://www.towelsrus.co.uk/towels/baby-towels/prodlist_ct493.htm
http://www.towelsrus.co.uk/towels/baby-towels/prodlist_ct493.htm?dir=1&size=100
No canonical tag found on above URLs as well.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Penalty for duplicate content on the same website?
Is it possible to get a penalty for duplicate content on the same website? I have a old custom-built site with a large number of filters that are pre-generated for speed. Basically the only difference is the meta title and H1 tag, with a few text differences here and there. Obviously I could no-follow all the filter links but it would take an enormous amount of work. The site is performing well in the search. I'm trying to decide whether if there is a risk of a penalty, if not I'm loath to do anything in case it causes other issues.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | seoman100 -
Does collapsing content impact Google SEO signals?
Recently I have been promoting custom long form content development for major brand clients. For UX reasons we collapse the content so only 2-3 sentences of the first paragraph are visible. However there is a "read more" link that expands the entire content piece.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | RosemaryB
I have believed that the searchbots would have no problem crawling, indexing and applying a positive SEO signal for this content. However I'm starting to wonder. Is there any evidence that the Google search algorithm could possible discount or even ignore collapsed content?1 -
Many pages small unique content vs 1 page with big content
Dear all, I am redesigning some areas of our website, eurasmus.com and we do not have clear what is the best
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Eurasmus.com
option to follow. In our site, we have a city area i.e: www.eurasmus.com/en/erasmus-sevilla which we are going
to redesign and a guide area where we explain about the city, etc...http://eurasmus.com/en/erasmus-sevilla/guide/
all with unique content. The thing is that at this point due to lack of resources, our guide is not really deep and we believe like this it does not
add extra value for users creating a page with 500 characters text for every area (transport...). It is not also really user friendly.
On the other hand, this pages, in long tail are getting some results though is not our keyword target (i.e. transport in sevilla)
our keyword target would be (erasmus sevilla). When redesigning the city, we have to choose between:
a)www.eurasmus.com/en/erasmus-sevilla -> with all the content one one page about 2500 characters unique.
b)www.eurasmus.com/en/erasmus-sevilla -> With better amount of content and a nice redesign but keeping
the guide pages. What would you choose? Let me know what you think. Thanks!0 -
How can a website have multiple pages of duplicate content - still rank?
Can you have a website with multiple pages of the exact same copy, (being different locations of a franchise business), and still be able to rank for each individual franchise? Is that possible?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | OhYeahSteve0 -
Is google rolling out a huge update this week?
I am seeing some huge shifts in SERPS at the moment, for some keywords such as web design. Nearly every single result on the homepage is a different company than 2 weeks ago. We are seeing some clients have huge jumps in ranks but also some are dropping. Seems like we could have a big Panda/Penguin like update rolling out.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | tempowebdesign1 -
Copying my Facebook content to website considered duplicate content?
I write career advice on Facebook on a daily basis. On my homepage users can see the most recent 4-5 feeds (using FB social media plugin). I am thinking to create a page on my website where visitors can see all my previous FB feeds. Would this be considered duplicate content if I copy paste the info, but if I use a Facebook social media plugin then it is not considered duplicate content? I am working on increasing content on my website and feel incorporating FB feeds would make sense. thank you
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | knielsen0 -
Duplicate Content Question
My client's website is for an organization that is part of a larger organization - which has it's own website. We were given permission to use content from the larger organization's site on my client's redesigned site. The SEs will deem this as duplicate content, right? I can "re-write" the content for the new site, but it will still be closely based on the original content from the larger organization's site, due to the scientific/medical nature of the subject material. Is there a way around this dilemma so I do not get penalized? Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Mills1 -
Cross-Domain Canonical and duplicate content
Hi Mozfans! I'm working on seo for one of my new clients and it's a job site (i call the site: Site A).
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | MaartenvandenBos
The thing is that the client has about 3 sites with the same Jobs on it. I'm pointing a duplicate content problem, only the thing is the jobs on the other sites must stay there. So the client doesn't want to remove them. There is a other (non ranking) reason why. Can i solve the duplicate content problem with a cross-domain canonical?
The client wants to rank well with the site i'm working on (Site A). Thanks! Rand did a whiteboard friday about Cross-Domain Canonical
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/cross-domain-canonical-the-new-301-whiteboard-friday0