Where to point Rel = Canonical?
-
I have a client who is using the rel=canonical tag across their e-commerce site. Here is an example of how it is set up.
URLs
1. http://www.beautybrands.com/category/makeup/face/bronzer.do?nType=22. http://www.beautybrands.com/category/makeup/face/bronzer.doThe canonical tag points to the second URL. Both pages are indexed by Google.The first page has a higher page authority (most of the internal site links go to the first URL) than the second one. Should the page with the highest authority be the one that the canonical tag points to? Is there a better way to handle these situations? Does any authority get passed through the tag?Thanks!
-
Absolutely
-
Canonicals are fine, but you should always canonical the correct or main url. (The one being used in the navigation)
-
That canonical is fine - they're essentially saying that all those pages are the same content - applies to all "Sort By" filters too - better to have the 2 URLs consolidated into one in the SERPs
.. btw, what's with all the whitespace characters in the source code? :S
-
I would see if they could restructure their site so that the 2nd link was the actual link. (without type2). I don't see why they would have those parameters as the main category.
You really want the link architecture to flow with what your Canonical tags are saying.
-
This is fine. Nothing to worry about. The link juice does get passed onto the canonical URL. There's a slight loss, but it's sort of like a 301.
This tag helps you avoid any duplicate content issues.
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
-
Base href + relative link href for canonical link
I have a site that in the head section we specify a base href being the domain with a trailing slash and a canonical link href being the relative link to the domain. <base <="" span="">href="http://www.domain.com/" /> href="link-to-page.html" rel="canonical" /> I know that Google recommends using an absolute path as a canonical link but is specifying a base href with a relative canonical link the same thing or is it still seen as duplicate content?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Nobody16116990439410 -
Pagination with rel=“next” and rel=“prev”
Hi Guys, Just wondering can anyone recommend any tools or good ways to check if rel=“next” and rel=“prev” attributes have been implemented properly across a large ecommerce based site? Cheers. rel=“next” and rel=“prev”
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | jayoliverwright0 -
Rel=prev/next and canonical tags on paginated pages?
Hi there, I'm using rel="prev" and rel="next" on paginated category pages. On 1st page I'm also setting a canonical tag, since that page happens to get hits to an URL with parameters. The site also uses mobile version of pages on a subdomain. Here's what markup the 1st desktop page has: Here's what markup the 2nd desktop page has: Here's what markup the 1st MOBILE page has: Here's what markup the 2nd MOBILE page has: Questions: 1. On desktop pages starting from page 2 to page X, if these pages get traffic to their versions with parameters, will I'll have duplicate issues or the canonical tag on 1st page makes me safe? 2. Should I use canonical tags on mobile pages starting from page 2 to page X? Are there any better solutions of avoiding duplicate content issues?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | poiseo1 -
Why is "Noindex" better than a "Canonical" for Pagination?
"Noindex" is a suggested pagination technique here: http://searchengineland.com/the-latest-greatest-on-seo-pagination-114284, and everyone seems to agree that you shouldn't canonicalize all pages in a series to the first page, but I'd love if someone can explain why "noindex" is better than a canonical?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | nicole.healthline0 -
Appropriate use of rel canonical
Hey Guys,I'm a bit stuck. My on-page grade indicated the following two issues and I need to find how how to fix both issues.If you have a solution, could you please let me know how to address these issues? It's all a bit intimidating at the moment!!Thank you so much..****************************************************************************************************************************************Appropriate Use of Rel Canonical If the canonical tag is pointing to a different URL, engines will not count this page as the reference resource and thus, it won't have an opportunity to rank. Make sure you're targeting the right page (if this isn't it, you can reset the target above) and then change the canonical tag to reference that URL. Recommendation: We check to make sure that IF you use canonical URL tags, it points to the right page. If the canonical tag points to a different URL, engines will not count this page as the reference resource and thus, it won't have an opportunity to rank. If you've not made this page the rel=canonical target, change the reference to this URL. NOTE: For pages not employing canonical URL tags, this factor does not apply. No More Than One Canonical URL Tag The canonical URL tag is meant to be employed only a single time on an individual URL (much like the title element or meta description). To ensure the search engines properly parse the canonical source, employ only a single version of this tag. Recommendation: Remove all but a single canonical URL tag
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | StoryScout1 -
Canonical referencing and aspx
The following pages of my website all end up at the same place:
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | IPROdigital
http://example.com/seo/Default.aspx
http://example.com/SEO/
http://example.com/seo
http://example.com/sEo
http://example.com/SeO but we have a really messy URL structure throughout the website. I would like to have a neat URL structure, including for offline marketing so customers can easily memorize or even guess the URL. I'm thinking of duplicating the pages and canonical referencing the original ones with the messy URLs instead of a 301 redirect (done for each individual page of course), because the latter will likely result in a traffic drop. We've got tens of thousands of URLs; some active and some inactive. Bearing in mind that thousands of links already point in to the site and even a small percentage drop in traffic would be a serious problem given low industry margins and high marketing spend, I'd love to hear opinions of people who have encountered this issue and found it problematic or successful. @randfish to the rescue. I hope.0 -
Is a 301 Direct with a canonical tag Possible ?
Hi All, Quick question , Are we correct in thinking that for any given URL it's not possible to do a 301 redirect AND a canonical tag? thanks Sarah
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | SarahCollins0 -
Duplicate Content, Campaign Explorer & Rel Canonical
Google Advises to use Rel Canonical URL's to advise them which page with similiar information is more relevant. You are supposed to put a rel canonical on the non-preferred pages to point back to the desired page. How do you handle this with a product catalog using ajax, where the additional pages do not exist? An example would be: <colgroup><col width="470"></colgroup>
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | eric_since1910.com
| .com/productcategory.aspx?page=1 /productcategory.aspx?page=2 /productcategory.aspx?page=3 /productcategory.aspx?page=4 The page=1,2,3 and 4 do not physically exist, they are simply referencing additional products I have rel canonical urls' on the main page www.examplesite.com/productcategory.aspx, but I am not 100% sure this is correct or how else it could be handled. Any Ideas Pro mozzers? |0