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.
How (or if) to apply re canonical tags to Shopify?
-
Anyone familiar with Shopify will understand the problems of their directory structure. Every time you add a product to a 'collection' it essentially creates a duplicate. For example...
- https://www.domain.com/products/product-slim-regular-bikini
may also appear as:
- https://www.domain.com/collections/all/products/product-slim-regular-bikini
- https://www.domain.com/collections/new-arrivals/products/product-slim-regular-bikini
- https://www.domain.com/collections/bikinis/products/product-slim-regular-bikini
- etc, etc
It's not uncommon to have up to six duplicates of each product.
So my question is twofold:
- Firstly, should I worry about this from an SEO point of view? I understand the desire to minimise potential duplicate content issues and also in focussing the 'juice' on just one page per product. But I also planned on trying to build the authority of the collection pages. If I request Google not to index the product pages which link off the collections, does this not devalue these collections pages?
- Secondly, I understand the correct way to fix these is using 'rel canonical' tags, but I'm not clear about HOW to actually do this. Shopify support has not been very helpful. They have provided two different instructions, so just added to the confusion (see below).
Shopify instruction #1: Add the following to the theme.liquid file...
<title><br />{{ page_title }}{% if current_tags %} – tagged "{{ current_tags | join: ', ' }}"{% endif %}{% if current_page != 1 %} – Page {{ current_page }}{% endif %}{% unless page_title contains shop.name %} – {{ shop.name }}{% endunless %}<br /></title>
{% if page_description %}{% endif %}
Shopify instruction #2: Add the following to each individual product page...
So, can anyone help clarify:
- The best strategic approach to this inherent SEO issue with Shopify (besides moving to another platform!)? and
- If 'rel canonical' tags is the way to go, exactly where and how to apply them?
Regards,
Murray
-
Howdy,
I assume that in your case it doesn't happen automatically. In this case you'll need to use an IF statements in the head/header file. Basically, it would be this:
IF current page url = url you want THEN display canonical tag with wanted url
Repeat that for all needed url and you are good.
If there are many of those, CASE might be better.
-
Good answer!
I have a question! If I just wanna add one or two canoncial tags on specific page(s), how I can do it on shopify coding?
-
How can I fix this problem with Shopify? Shopify does not seem like it is a problem. One of their solutions is to no index the other pages, but I want all the google juice and google love going to the main page.
Current Setup:
https://wrestlinggear.com/collections/wrestling-shoes rel canonical - https://wrestlinggear.com/collections/wrestling-shoes
https://wrestlinggear.com/collections/wrestling-shoes/accessory rel - https://wrestlinggear.com/collections/wrestling-shoes/accessory
https://wrestlinggear.com/collections/wrestling-shoes/adidas rel canonical - https://wrestlinggear.com/collections/wrestling-shoes/adidas
I want it like this:
https://wrestlinggear.com/collections/wrestling-shoes - rel canonical - https://wrestlinggear.com/collections/wrestling-shoes
https://wrestlinggear.com/collections/wrestling-shoes/accessory - rel canonical - https://wrestlinggear.com/collections/wrestling-shoes
https://wrestlinggear.com/collections/wrestling-shoes/adidas- rel canonical - https://wrestlinggear.com/collections/wrestling-shoes
Of course there are a lot more pages like this that I would like to rel cannoical back to the main collections pages.
-
Use tools like SEO Frog
-
Well, if it automatically doesn't work, then you gotta do it manually, right

-
I don't believe this is the answer. I have several other clients on Shopify who do not have goals for macro conversions, but we are seeing conversion data in GA.
Besides, I was always under the impression that if you have ecommerce enabled, it's better not to use goals for transactions as it might duplicate. Is this not the case?
-
I know how to check whether the code is there. But how do you check whether or not specific pages have been indexed by Google?
As far as I can see Google Search Console only reports on the number of pages indexed, not which pages have been indexed. Is there any way to get an actual list of indexed pages?
I know running a site: query will show up all the results, but I just want a list (eg CSV) of the URLs indexed.
-
Yes, I am. Here is a link with answers to your troubles: https://help.shopify.com/manual/reports-and-analytics/google-analytics/google-analytics-goals-and-funnels
-
Yes, it is supposed to. Try it, check it - it's pretty easy

-
Are you familiar with Shopify?
I have another issue where GA tracking code is not firing on the Thank_You page. I have double checked GA config with the GA implementation twice! But the problem seems to be with Shopify, since this page sites on their site (checkout.shopify.com) and they seem unable to fix it.
-
Thanks Dmitrii,
So will that one line of code fix the issue for ALL products and ALL collections?
-
Howdy.
Shopify does canonicals automatically. Basically all the collections products urls will have canonical to product url. Like this: https://www.domain.com/collections/all/products/product-slim-regular-bikini will have canonical to
https://www.domain.com/products/product-slim-regular-bikiniIf it doesn't happen for you automatically, simply insert this:
In the main theme.liquid file in the head section.
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
-
Rel canonical tag from shopify page to wordpress site page
We have pages on our shopify site example - https://shop.example.com/collections/cast-aluminum-plaques/products/cast-aluminum-address-plaque That we want to put a rel canonical tag on to direct to our wordpress site page - https://www.example.com/aluminum-plaques/ We have links form the wordpress page to the shop page, and over time ahve found that google has ranked the shop pages over the wp pages, which we do not want. So we want to put rel canonical tags on the shop pages to say the wp page is the authority. I hope that makes sense, and I would appreciate your feeback and best solution. Thanks! Is that possible?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | shabbirmoosa0 -
Near Duplicate Title Tag Checker
Hi Everyone, I know there are a lot of tools like Siteliner, which can check the uniqueness of body copy, but are there any that can restrict the check to the title tags alone? Alternatively, is there an Excel or Google Sheets function that would allow me to do the same thing? Thanks, Andy
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | AndyRSB0 -
Null Alt Image Tags vs Missing Alt Image Tags
Hi, Would it be better for organic search to have a null alt image tag programatically added to thousands of images without alt image tags or just leave them as is. The option of adding tailored alt image tags to thousands of images is not possible. Is having sitewide alt image tags really important to organic search overall or what? Right now, probably 10% of the sites images have alt img tags. A huge number of those images are pages that aren Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | 945010 -
Is it alright to repeat a keyword in the title tag?
I know at first glance, the answer to this is a resounding NO, that it can be construed as keyword stuffing,
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | MIGandCo
but please hear me out. I am working on optimizing a client's website and although MOST of the title tags
can be optimized without repeating a keyword, occasionally I run into one where it doesn't read right if I
don't repeat the keyword. Here's an example: Current title:
Photoshop on the Cloud | Adobe Photoshop Webinars | Company Name What I am considering using as the optimized title:
Adobe Photoshop on the Cloud | Adobe Photoshop Webinars | Company Name Yes, I know both titles are longer than recommended. In both instances, only the company name gets
truncated so I am not too worried about that. So I guess what I want to know is this: Am I right in my original assumption that it is NEVER okay to
repeat keywords in a title tag or is it alright when it makes sense to do so?0 -
Do I need to re-index the page after editing URL?
Hi, I had to edit some of the URLs. But, google is still showing my old URL in search results for certain keywords, which ofc get 404. By crawling with ScremingFrog it gets me 301 'page not found' and still giving old URLs. Why is that? And do I need to re-index pages with new URLs? Is 'fetch as Google' enough to do that or any other advice? Thanks a lot, hope the topic will help to someone else too. Dusan
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Chemometec0 -
H2 Tags- Can you have more than 1 H2 tag
Hi All, Screaming frog has identified that we have a few H2 tags on our pages , although we only have 1 H1 tag. We have numerous H3,H4's etc. I am wondering, is it good SEO to have only 1 H2 tag like with H1 tag or can you have more ? thanks Peter
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | PeteC120 -
How does the use of Dynamic meta tags effect SEO?
I'm evaluating a new client site which was built buy another design firm. My question is they are dynamically creating meta tags and I'm concerned that it is hurting their SEO. When I view the page source this is what I see. <meta name="<a class="attribute-value">keywords</a>" id="<a class="attribute-value">keywordsGoHere</a>" content="" /> <meta name="<a class="attribute-value">description</a>" id="<a class="attribute-value">descriptionGoesHere</a>" content="" /> <title id="<a class="attribute-value">titleGoesHere</a>">title> To me it looks like the tags are not being added to the page, however the title is showing when you view it in a browser and if use a spider view tool, it sees the title. I'm guess it is being called from a DB. So I'm a little concerned though that the search engines are not really seeing the title and description. I'm not worried about the keywords tag. Can anyone shed some light on how this might work? Why it might not being showing the text for the description in the page code and if that will hurt SEO? Thanks for the help!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | BbeS0 -
Why should your title and H1 tag be different?
Is it dangerous to have your H1 tag and your title the exact same thing? My thought was that it's not be the best use of space, but that it couldn't cause harm. What do you think?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | MarieHaynes7