Google is alternating what link it likes to rank on wordpress site and
-
Hi there,
I'm experiencing a problem where google is pick and choosing different links structures to rank my Wordpress site for my main keywords. The site had pretty good #1 rankings for a long time but recently I noticed Google is choosing to rank the page in one of two ways. Let me just say that the original way where it held good rankings looked like this for example: flowers.com/the-most-beautiful-wedding-bouquets/ this is just an example it' is not my site.
And when google decides to switch it up it uses this link structure:flowers.com > weddings (this still points to this link flowers.com/the-most-beautiful-wedding-bouquets when I hover my mouse over it) however this link structure that never appeared before and now does, usually has much lower rankings. Please note it's not both link structures being ranked at the same time for the keywords. It's one or the other that google is currently alternating in ranking and I believe it's hurting the sites position.
I'm not sure if this is a wordpress settings thats gone wrong or what the problem is but I do know when shows the expanded and descriptive link structure flowers.com/the-most-beautiful-wedding-bouquets the rankings are higher and in 2nd place. I'm hoping by rectifying this I can regain back my position.I'm very grateful for any insight you could offer on why this is happening and how I could fix it. Thank you.
PS Wordpress site has several SEO plugins
-
Hi Christy, it's not resolved yet, I'm still seeking help. My rankings are going lower because of this daily and I don't know what to do.
-
Hi Tom,
I just noticed your reply here, somehow I didn't get the email update. That would be great if you can find something. I checked my PM box and it's empty as of now.
Thanks
-
Hi Danny,
Thanks for your reply. I checked the SEO plugins Yoast and Seopressor both which are active and they are not set to have anything to do with sitemaps as far as I can tell.
Sitemaps
Google XML sitemaps plugin is handling the sitemaps. I do have two sitemaps submitted for the site however, one in the form sitemap.xml and the other sitemap.xml.gz both of which are identical just in different format. Could the two sitemaps be the cause of this problem? The other competitors are not having this issue, only my site is being affected.
Whenever google shows my site with the shortened form the site shows with substantial loss in rankings, however when it's in the normal descriptive longer form (not that long at all and doesn't require breadcrumbs or anything like that) it ranks well, which is great but it doesn't last long.
Permalinks
The permalinks are set to the correct setting as suchhttp://example.com/sample-post/
CachingCan you elaborate on this and what I should look for?
URL Length
The length is not long and my competitors have the same length or longer without the problem I'm having. This is an example length and it's no longer than this. http://example123.com/test-that-this-the-the-example/
Appreciate your insights and feedback. please let me know
-
Hey Z,
i got your PM just wanted to update you I will run an audit on that for you tonight. Sorry for the delay I've been out of town seeing my family was on a vacation. Please look for my response in the private message tonight around 8 PM Eastern in addition I will update the board here and tell you that there is a letter for you and your private mailbox.
All the best,
tom
-
Hi there, thanks for your question! Were you able to sort this issue out? We'd love an update, thanks!
Christy
-
Hey Z, it looks like SEO plugs ins are conflicting each other, creating several sitemaps for Google and Google doesn't know which links has higher authority, main one or redirect, it could be permalinks as well or cashing.
If url is the same, then most likely is too long and Google is trying to shorter it down with some type of their beta testing.They usually do run tests all the time.
I don't advice several SEO plugins, if not being used.
-
Hi Tom, I sent you a PM with the url and info, please let me know what you think.
-
Oh I see, sorry about the confusion, I made the URL up and I guess it happens to work at the same time. I will PM you now.
-
try http://flowers.com/the-most-beautiful-wedding-bouquets
I thought you gave a real domain please use example.com so I will know.
without the domain I think it is wordpres adding the / can you PM me the domain?
Thanks,
Tom
-
Hi Tom, thank you for your reply, however please note as I stated the flowers.com reference was just an example, it's not my site. I think that would probably change your advice?
-
Hi
So you know wordpress adds the forward "/" to urls that are categories for have been set up using regex /?$
Or you have it set up the right way
Source: ^/flowers.com/the-most-beautiful-wedding-bouquets/?$
1. Redirect A Page
To redirect one page to another page, just fill in the fields like so:
Name: Redirect my contact page Domain: www.flowers.com Source: ^/flowers.com/the-most-beautiful-wedding-bouquets/?$ Destination: /new-path/contact-us/ with or with out "/" Redirect type: 301 Permanent
NOTE
-
This Redirect Rule will match a URL of http://www.domain.com/old-path/contact-us -or-http://www.domain.com/old-path/contact-us/
-
The variation is because of the Regex Syntax “/?$”
-
The Question Mark “?” makes the Trailing slash Optional
-
It will also only match the Source if it Starts with a “/” (note the carrot “^” ), or ends with either “s” or “/” (note the ending “$” )
-
See
-
check your canonical's
-
use Yoast SEO it will add canonical's for you then the you will not have the tracking added like I see on all pages ?cm_sp=flowers--globalnav--birthday-topcat-D10147
-
| rel="canonical" href="http://www.flowers.com/birthdayflowers" /> |
| | -
Correct this code https://github.com/bunchoup/alert_site/blob/master/tmp/menu_FD4.xml
-
Use Deepcrawl or Screaming Frog to find & fix
I hope this helps,
Tom
-
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
-
How does google decide who to rank 1 st ?
Let take a medical example. Flu symptoms How does google know who has the best answer ? Thank you,
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | seoanalytics0 -
Indexed Pages Different when I perform a "site:Google.com" site search - why?
My client has an ecommerce website with approx. 300,000 URLs (a lot of these are parameters blocked by the spiders thru meta robots tag). There are 9,000 "true" URLs being submitted to Google Search Console, Google says they are indexing 8,000 of them. Here's the weird part - When I do a "site:website" function search in Google, it says Google is indexing 2.2 million pages on the URL, but I am unable to view past page 14 of the SERPs. It just stops showing results and I don't even get a "the next results are duplicate results" message." What is happening? Why does Google say they are indexing 2.2 million URLs, but then won't show me more than 140 pages they are indexing? Thank you so much for your help, I tried looking for the answer and I know this is the best place to ask!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | accpar0 -
Why does old "Free" site ranks better than new "Optimized" site?
My client has a "free" site he set-up years ago - www.montclairbariatricsurgery.com (We'll call this the old site) that consistently outranks his current "optimized" (new) website - http://www.njbariatricsurgery.com/ The client doesn't want to get rid of his old site, which is now a competitor, because it ranks so much better. But he's invested so much in the new site with no results. A bit of background: We recently discovered the content on the new site was a direct copy of content on the old site. We had all copy on new site rewritten. This was back in April. The domain of the new site was changed on July 8th from www.Bariatrx.com to what you see now - www.njbariatricsurgery.com. Any insight you can provide would be greatly appreciated!!!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | WhatUpHud0 -
Google displaying a content box above the listing link for top ranking listing in SERPs
Hi, In the attached Google SERP example the first listing below the paid search ads has a large box with a snippet of content from the relevant page then followed by the standard link. Does anyone know how you get Google to display a box like this in their SERPs? I checked the code on the page and there doesn't appear to be anything special about it such as any schema markup. It uses standard list code. Does this only appear for particular types of content or sites, such as medical content in this case? Is the content more likely to appear for lists? Does it only appear for high authority sites that Google has selected? We have a similar medical information based site and it would be great to try to get Google to display a similar box of content for some of our pages. Thanks. Damien ZmPJVSl.png
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | james.harris0 -
Rank Tracker Result Not Reflected In Google
I'm tracking keyword results in Rank Tracker, but I can't confirm the positions when I do a Google search for the tracked keywords. Does anybody know why RT says the site should be #23, but is not actually in Google? Is there a way to check Google results from different data centers? If I recall, Google allowed the option to view results from different cities, though I don't know if they still allow this.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | alrockn0 -
Google webmaster tools showing "no data available" for links to site, why?
In my google webmaster account I'm seeing all the data in other categories except links to my site. When I click links to my site I get a "no data available" message. Does anyone know why this is happening? And if so, what to do to fix it? Thanks.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Nicktaylor10 -
High Ranking Site with tons of junk on the server
Hey All, So to make a long story short, we own a site that has been passed through many hand and many strategies. We are in the financial field and rank high for many relevant search terms. My job is now to audit/optimize and purge out site of the garbage that has collected over the years (since 2002). During the audit I have found many issues, fized them, but I am not sure own how to proceed with the follwing issues. Any advice to solve the following would be greatly appreciated! 9932 orphan files - does just removing them affect my SEO.. I like a clean house, can I somehow use them to my benefit? Hundreds of 404s with many external "follow" links that we are no longer getting juice from 8 Sitelinks in webmaster tools, but only 4 show in our search I am straight n00b so sorry if this is 101 for anyone you but your input would be greatly appreciated!! Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | deuce1s0