Should we NOINDEX NOFOLLOW canonical pages?
-
Hi,
I was window shopping at Gemvara and noticed something interesting...
They rank very high for long-tail phrases such as "rose gold engagement rings" and in their pagination pages for that category not only they filled canonical to the main category page (which is logic) but also they "NOINDEX NOFOLLOW" the pages...
Is that recommended?
Thanks
-
100% agree with Alan here as the purpose of rel=canonical implementation is to hint Google about the non-preferred pages (the duplicate or near duplicate pages of their original versions or the preferred ones) and not to index them.
Best,
Devanur Rafi
-
Depends on how unique the pages are.
if the pages using params are quite unique then I would just leave them be, if they are no very unique then using the canonicals the best bet.
-
Dear Alan,
May I ask then what would you do with a shopping cart page?
It usually receives params in the URL so I generally add rel=canonical to the page without the params (which still holds some basic information like random testimonial, guarantee etc.).
Another option is to place everything in cookies (and therefore not using params and no need for canonical). But this is bit more complex and cookie dependent.
Thanks
-
Devanur is correct, the canonical will never be seen if you no index.
Also you should use noindex,follow not nofollow, using no follow means all link juice pointing to those pages will be lost, using follow means the link juice can flow back out of the pages
-
Hi, when you have the rel=canonical implementation in place, you don't need to bother about noindex or nofollow for those pages as they will not be indexed. When you have noindex with nofollow in place, you don't need the rel=canonical implemented as it does not make any sense. Hope that helps my friend.
Best regards,
Devanur Rafi
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
-
Wordpress pages posts
Say you have a WordPress website with reviews and lists. Would you use "post" or "page" type for them? Is there any SEO advantage in using pages/subpages instead of posts?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | fabx1 -
Specific page does not index
Hi, First question: Working on the indexation of all pages for a specific client, there's one page that refuses to index. Google Search console says there's a robots.txt file, but I can't seem to find any tracks of that in the backend, nor in the code itself. Could someone reach out to me and tell me why this is happening? The page: https://www.brody.be/nl/assistentiewoningen/ Second question: Google is showing another meta description than the one our client gave in in Yoast Premium snippet. Could it be there's another plugin overwriting this description? Or do we have to wait for it to change after a specific period of time? Hope you guys can help
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | conversal0 -
Is there an advantage to using rel=canonical rather than noindex on pages on my mobile site (m.company.com)?
Is there an advantage to using link rel=alternate (as recommended by Google) rather than noindex on pages on my mobile site (m.company.com)? The content on the mobile pages is very similar to the content on the desktop site. I see Google recommends canonical and alternate tags, but what are the benefits of using those rather than noindex?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | jennifer.new0 -
I currently have a canonical tag pointing to a different url for single page categories on eCommerce site. Is this wrong ?
Hi Mozzers, I have a query regarding canonical tags on my eCommerce site.. Basically on my category pages whereby I have more than 1 page, I currently use next/prev rel and also have a canonical tag pointing to the View all version of that page. This is believe is correct.(see example - http://goo.gl/2gz6LV However, from looking at the view source on my other pages, I have noticed I have canonical tags on all my category pages which are only a single page and these canonicaltag are pointing to a different url. I enclose an example . Please advise Category page - http://goo.gl/Pk4zYl This is where the canonical tag points to - http://goo.gl/EwKv26 Another example Category Page - http://goo.gl/4gWTdD This is where the canonical tag for that page points to http://goo.gl/qm4HV7 Should I either make sure that categories that are only 1 page , don't have a canonical tag at all ? or do I have a canonical tag on say every page on my website for safety pointing to the main url for that page. The later, I imagine would be a belt and braces approach but I don't want to screw up anything if it's not advised? Please help/ Kind regards Pete
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | PeteC120 -
Pagination Tag and Canonical
Once and for all - I would really like to get a few opinions regarding what is the best method working for you. For most of the all timers in here there's no need to introduce the pagination tag. The big question for me is regarding the canonical tag in those case. There are 2 options, as far as I consider: Options 1 will be implementing canonical tag directing to the main category page: For instance: example.com/shoes example.com/shoes?page=2 example.com/shoes?page=3 In this case all the three URL's will direct to the main category which is example.com/shoes Option 2 - using self-referral canonical for every page. In this case - example.com/shoes?page=2 will direct its canonical tag to example.com/shoes?page=2 and so on. What's the logic behind this? To make sure there are no floating pages onsite. If I'll use canonical that directs to the main category (option 1) then these pages won't get indexed and techniclly there won't be any indexed links to these pages. Your opinion?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | seoperad0 -
My landing page changed in google's serp. I used to have a product page now I have a pdf?
I have been optimizing this page for a few weeks now and and have seen our page for up from 23rd to 11th on the serp's. I come to work today and not only have I dropped to 15 but I've also had my relevant product page replaced by this page . Not to mention the second page is a pdf! I am not sure what happened here but any advice on how I could fix this would be great. My site is www.mynaturalmarket.com and the keyword I'm working on is Zyflamend.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | KenyonManu3-SEOSEM0 -
Backlinking from a Canonical Page to the Non-Canonical Doman - Wrong Signals?
Hi Mozzers, Let's say you have www.mysite.com/page, which is a duplicate of www.yoursite.com/page. www.yousite.com/page has a rel canonical link identifying www.mysite.com/page as the original source. www.mysite.com/page has a followed backlink going towards www.yousite.com/home-page. mysite.com has a DA of 44
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Travis-W
yoursite.com has a DA of 33 Google has chosen to index www.yoursite.com/page instead of www.mysite.com/page. Is the followed backlink responsible for the wrong page being indexed? Thanks!0 -
Problems with a NoIndex NoFollow Site
For legal reasons my website is going to launch non-branded websites. We do not have the capacity to make these site sufficiently unique from the main site so we are planning on having them be NoIndex NoFollow. Are there any potential SEO problems here? What will the implication be if in ~1-2 years from launching the NoIndex NoFollow we make the site unique, take away the tag and want to start promoting these sites organically. Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | theLotter0