Skip to content
    Moz logo Menu open Menu close
    • Products
      • Moz Pro
      • Moz Pro Home
      • Moz Local
      • Moz Local Home
      • STAT
      • Moz API
      • Moz API Home
      • Compare SEO Products
      • Moz Data
    • Free SEO Tools
      • Domain Analysis
      • Keyword Explorer
      • Link Explorer
      • Competitive Research
      • MozBar
      • More Free SEO Tools
    • Learn SEO
      • Beginner's Guide to SEO
      • SEO Learning Center
      • Moz Academy
      • MozCon
      • Webinars, Whitepapers, & Guides
    • Blog
    • Why Moz
      • Digital Marketers
      • Agency Solutions
      • Enterprise Solutions
      • Small Business Solutions
      • The Moz Story
      • New Releases
    • Log in
    • Log out
    • Products
      • Moz Pro

        Your all-in-one suite of SEO essentials.

      • Moz Local

        Raise your local SEO visibility with complete local SEO management.

      • STAT

        SERP tracking and analytics for enterprise SEO experts.

      • Moz API

        Power your SEO with our index of over 44 trillion links.

      • Compare SEO Products

        See which Moz SEO solution best meets your business needs.

      • Moz Data

        Power your SEO strategy & AI models with custom data solutions.

      Track AI Overviews in Keyword Research
      Moz Pro

      Track AI Overviews in Keyword Research

      Try it free!
    • Free SEO Tools
      • Domain Analysis

        Get top competitive SEO metrics like DA, top pages and more.

      • Keyword Explorer

        Find traffic-driving keywords with our 1.25 billion+ keyword index.

      • Link Explorer

        Explore over 40 trillion links for powerful backlink data.

      • Competitive Research

        Uncover valuable insights on your organic search competitors.

      • MozBar

        See top SEO metrics for free as you browse the web.

      • More Free SEO Tools

        Explore all the free SEO tools Moz has to offer.

      NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic
      Moz Pro

      NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic

      Learn more
    • Learn SEO
      • Beginner's Guide to SEO

        The #1 most popular introduction to SEO, trusted by millions.

      • SEO Learning Center

        Broaden your knowledge with SEO resources for all skill levels.

      • On-Demand Webinars

        Learn modern SEO best practices from industry experts.

      • How-To Guides

        Step-by-step guides to search success from the authority on SEO.

      • Moz Academy

        Upskill and get certified with on-demand courses & certifications.

      • MozCon

        Save on Early Bird tickets and join us in London or New York City

      Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints
      Moz API

      Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints

      Find your plan
    • Blog
    • Why Moz
      • Digital Marketers

        Simplify SEO tasks to save time and grow your traffic.

      • Small Business Solutions

        Uncover insights to make smarter marketing decisions in less time.

      • Agency Solutions

        Earn & keep valuable clients with unparalleled data & insights.

      • Enterprise Solutions

        Gain a competitive edge in the ever-changing world of search.

      • The Moz Story

        Moz was the first & remains the most trusted SEO company.

      • New Releases

        Get the scoop on the latest and greatest from Moz.

      Surface actionable competitive intel
      New Feature

      Surface actionable competitive intel

      Learn More
    • Log in
      • Moz Pro
      • Moz Local
      • Moz Local Dashboard
      • Moz API
      • Moz API Dashboard
      • Moz Academy
    • Avatar
      • Moz Home
      • Notifications
      • Account & Billing
      • Manage Users
      • Community Profile
      • My Q&A
      • My Videos
      • Log Out

    The Moz Q&A Forum

    • Forum
    • Questions
    • Users
    • Ask the Community

    Welcome to the Q&A Forum

    Browse the forum for helpful insights and fresh discussions about all things SEO.

    1. Home
    2. SEO Tactics
    3. Intermediate & Advanced SEO
    4. What would cause the wrong category page to come up?

    Moz Q&A is closed.

    After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.

    What would cause the wrong category page to come up?

    Intermediate & Advanced SEO
    6
    12
    1370
    Loading More Posts
    • Oldest to Newest
    • Newest to Oldest
    • Most Votes
    Reply
    • Reply as question
    Log in to reply
    This topic has been deleted. Only users with question management privileges can see it.
    • EcommerceSite
      EcommerceSite last edited by

      I am trying to figure out why the wrong thing is coming up in the serps. For example, we are trying to rank for used widgets. But when you type in used widgets in google the primary widget page doesn't come up, one of the secondary categories under used widgets comes up. What would cause this? What are things I should check?

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • Tom-Anthony
        Tom-Anthony last edited by

        Is it possible for you to give a clearer description of the categories? You say they are different products but that one is a second category of the other

        Does the page you want to rank show up for any other searches? In your analytics are you getting any traffic from Google to that page?

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • EcommerceSite
          EcommerceSite @Alick300 last edited by

          I did the site search that you suggest- site:www.site.com widgets and it was in the correct order.

          When I added the word used to the search it came up in the wrong order. They both have the word used, used the same amount of time. It makes no sense to me.

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • EcommerceSite
            EcommerceSite @MonicaOConnor last edited by

            They actually are two separate types of items so I don't think I can canonical because I still want people to find the other category if that is what they are looking for. The names are so similar it is a problem.

            I have an x category, y category, and xy category. Even though the names are the same, they are very different products.

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • Alick300
              Alick300 last edited by

              Hi,

              The best way I find to see what the search engines thinks is the best page from your site for a term is to do a site search with the term you are checking.

              E.g.

              site:yousite.com + Term

              In your case : yousite.com + used widgets

              This shows you the pages in order that Googles ranks them. Also its a good way to identify duplicated title tags.

              Now there is an article published by Rand Fishkin on this issue to know what could be the possible reason to showing wrong category pages and how you can correct them  .Please check once below article

              http://moz.com/blog/wrong-page-ranking-in-the-results-6-common-causes-5-solutions

              I hope it helps

              Thanks

              EcommerceSite 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • MonicaOConnor
                MonicaOConnor @EcommerceSite last edited by

                You could use a canonical tag to tell google which page is the desired page. Unless the other page also had targeted key terms on it. Then I would avoid the canonical tag and try to find a better way to optimize the other page for key terms not so closely related.

                EcommerceSite 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                • EcommerceSite
                  EcommerceSite @EGOL last edited by

                  It is unfortunate, but they have almost the exact same name. I don't know how to differentiate them.

                  MonicaOConnor 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                  • EGOL
                    EGOL @EcommerceSite last edited by

                    These titles are so close that google is probably flipping a coin.

                    EcommerceSite 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 3
                    • EcommerceSite
                      EcommerceSite @EGOL last edited by

                      For the term "used widget" ,the title for the page I want to rank is "used widget for sale". For the page I do not want it to rank for this term it is "used widget - type for sale".

                      EGOL 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                      • EcommerceSite
                        EcommerceSite @ofw12387 last edited by

                        It It has breadcrumbs and it shows the category in the level up mechanism for the category sort.

                        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                        • EGOL
                          EGOL last edited by

                          What are things I should check?

                          Proofread the title tags.   Be sure that the one that you want to rank is the best optimized.

                          EcommerceSite 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                          • ofw12387
                            ofw12387 last edited by

                            it can be that both pages are semantically similar and the robot is not sure which one from both should it rank

                            You could try to create an internal link in secondary category "url" to the url you want to rank, using the keyword as anchor. It may helps 😉

                            EcommerceSite 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                            • 1 / 1
                            • First post
                              Last post

                            Got a burning SEO question?

                            Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.


                            Start my free trial


                            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.

                            • See all categories

                            Related Questions

                            • yaelslater

                              Images on their own page?

                              Hi Mozers, We have images on their own separate pages that are then pulled onto content pages. Should the standalone pages be indexable? On the one hand, it seems good to have an image on it's own page, with it's own title. On the other hand, it may be better SEO for crawler to find the image on a content page dedicated to that topic. Unsure. Would appreciate any guidance! Yael

                              Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | yaelslater
                              1
                            • viatrading1

                              Merging Pages and SEO

                              Hi, We are redesigning our website the following way: Before: Page A with Content A, Page B with Content B, Page C with Content C, etc
                              e.g. one page for each Customer Returns, Overstocks, Master Case, etc
                              Now: Page D with content A + B + C etc.
                              e.g. one long page containing all Product Conditions, one after the other So we are merging multiples pages into one.
                              What is the best way to do so, so we don't lose traffic? (or we lose the minimum possible) e.g. should we 301 Redirect A/B/C to D...?
                              Is it likely that we lose significant traffic with this change? Thank you,

                              Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | viatrading1
                              0
                            • AshShep1

                              Should my back links go to home page or internal pages

                              Right now we rank on page 2 for many KWs, so should i now focus my attention on getting links to my home page to build domain authority or continue to direct links to the internal pages for specific KWs? I am about to write some articles for several good ranking sites and want to know whether to link my company name (same as domain name) or KW to the home page or use individual KWs to the internal pages - I am only allowed one link per article to my site. Thanks Ash

                              Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | AshShep1
                              0
                            • MBASydney

                              Date of page first indexed or age of a page?

                              Hi does anyone know any ways, tools to find when a page was first indexed/cached by Google? I remember a while back, around 2009 i had a firefox plugin which could check this, and gave you a exact date. Maybe this has changed since. I don't remember the plugin. Or any recommendations on finding the age of a page (not domain) for a website? This is for competitor research not my own website. Cheers, Paul

                              Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | MBASydney
                              0
                            • WizardOfMoz

                              Redirect Search Results to Category Pages

                              I am planning redirect the search results to it's matching category page to avoid having two indexed pages of essentially the same content. Example http://www.example.com/search/?kw=sunglasses
                              wil be redirected to
                              http://www.example.com/category/sunglasses/ Is this a good idea? What are the possible negative effect if I go this route? Thanks.

                              Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | WizardOfMoz
                              0
                            • fabioricotta-84038

                              How long takes to a page show up in Google results after removing noindex from a page?

                              Hi folks, A client of mine created a new page and used meta robots noindex to not show the page while they are not ready to launch it. The problem is that somehow Google "crawled" the page and now, after removing the meta robots noindex, the page does not show up in the results. We've tried to crawl it using Fetch as Googlebot, and then submit it using the button that appears. We've included the page in sitemap.xml and also used the old Google submit new page URL https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/submit-url Does anyone know how long will it take for Google to show the page AFTER removing meta robots noindex from the page? Any reliable references of the statement? I did not find any Google video/post  about this. I know that in some days it will appear but I'd like to have a good reference for the future. Thanks.

                              Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | fabioricotta-84038
                              0
                            • HD_Leona

                              Blocking Pages Via Robots, Can Images On Those Pages Be Included In Image Search

                              Hi! I have pages within my forum where visitors can upload photos.  When they upload photos they provide a simple statement about the photo but no real information about the image,definitely not enough for the page to be deemed worthy of being indexed.  The industry however is one that really leans on images and having the images in Google Image search is important to us. The url structure is like such:  domain.com/community/photos/~username~/picture111111.aspx I wish to block the whole folder from Googlebot to prevent these low quality pages from being added to Google's main SERP results.  This would be something like this: User-agent: googlebot Disallow: /community/photos/ Can  I disallow Googlebot specifically rather than just using User-agent:  * which would then allow googlebot-image to pick up the photos?  I plan on configuring a way to add meaningful alt attributes and image names to assist in visibility, but the actual act of blocking the pages and getting the images picked up... Is this possible? Thanks! Leona

                              Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | HD_Leona
                              0
                            • EricPacifico

                              Should the sitemap include just menu pages or all pages site wide?

                              I have a Drupal site that utilizes Solr, with 10 menu pages and about 4,000 pages of content. Redoing a few things and we'll need to revamp the sitemap. Typically I'd jam all pages into a single sitemap and that's it, but post-Panda, should I do anything different?

                              Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | EricPacifico
                              0

                            Get started with Moz Pro!

                            Unlock the power of advanced SEO tools and data-driven insights.

                            Start my free trial
                            Products
                            • Moz Pro
                            • Moz Local
                            • Moz API
                            • Moz Data
                            • STAT
                            • Product Updates
                            Moz Solutions
                            • SMB Solutions
                            • Agency Solutions
                            • Enterprise Solutions
                            • Digital Marketers
                            Free SEO Tools
                            • Domain Authority Checker
                            • Link Explorer
                            • Keyword Explorer
                            • Competitive Research
                            • Brand Authority Checker
                            • Local Citation Checker
                            • MozBar Extension
                            • MozCast
                            Resources
                            • Blog
                            • SEO Learning Center
                            • Help Hub
                            • Beginner's Guide to SEO
                            • How-to Guides
                            • Moz Academy
                            • API Docs
                            About Moz
                            • About
                            • Team
                            • Careers
                            • Contact
                            Why Moz
                            • Case Studies
                            • Testimonials
                            Get Involved
                            • Become an Affiliate
                            • MozCon
                            • Webinars
                            • Practical Marketer Series
                            • MozPod
                            Connect with us

                            Contact the Help team

                            Join our newsletter
                            Moz logo
                            © 2021 - 2025 SEOMoz, Inc., a Ziff Davis company. All rights reserved. Moz is a registered trademark of SEOMoz, Inc.
                            • Accessibility
                            • Terms of Use
                            • Privacy

                            Looks like your connection to Moz was lost, please wait while we try to reconnect.