Why do two pages compete while a canonical tag is active?

[Sebastiaan1]

Hi guys,

My SERP analysis show me that two pages compete eachother for the keyword kinderfiets, which should not happen since there is a canonical tag is active.

www.halfords.nl/‎fiets/kinderfiets/kinderfiets/‎ Ranks #6 and www.halfords.nl/‎fiets/kinderfiets/‎ Ranks #7. The first one is a subcategory which is one step deeper than the second one. I prefer consumers to land on the broader subcategory, because that one shows more products.Furthermore, we already did some SEO tweaking for the #7 page, but did not work on the #6 page. So it is even kind of strange that this page ranks higher.Can somebody help me out?Kind Regards,Tom

[EGOL]

The canonical tag is meant to tell Google....   "These two pages are the same"

It was not meant to prioritize pages in the rankings.

Because your pages are very different from one another Google is probably ignoring the canonical tag.

"should we just appreciate the fact that Google ranks us twice on the first page for this important keyword? "

Yes.  You got two pages in the top ten of Google.  When that happens to me, I give thanks.

[Sebastiaan1]

Hi Martijn,

Thanks for your response. Okay, seems logic. So is there an easy way to fix this "problem" so we can boost this category into the top 5 or should we just appreciate the fact that Google ranks us twice on the first page for this important keyword?

Kind regards, 
Tom

[Martijn_Scheijbeler]

Hi Tom,

Likely due to the internal linking structure of the subcategory your page /kinderfiets/kinderfiets is ranking better or it just has some more history/relevance. My guess is that it's likely a close call knowing the Dutch market a bit. You're mentioning that the canonical tag is active, but they're also both unique as they are self-referencing. So basically they don't play a role at all as you're suggesting that they're not the same page and both could rank.

Martijn.