Duplicate Page Title problems with Product Catalogues (Categories, Subcategories etc.)
-
Hey guys,
I've done a fair bit of Googling and "mozzing" and can't seem to find a definitive solution. In our product catalogue on our site we have multiple ways to access the product for navigation purposes, and SeoMoz is throwing up hundreds of duplicate page title errors which are basically just different ways to get to the same product yet it sees it as a "separate page" and thus duplicating itself.
Is this just SeoMoz confusing itself or does Google actually see it this way too?
For example, a product might be:
www.example.com/region/category/subcategory/
www.example.com/region2/category/subcategory/
www.example.com/region/category/subcategory2/
etc. Is the only solution to have the product ONLY listed in one combination? This kind of kills our ability to have easy refinement for customers browsing the catalogue, i.e: something that falls under the "Gifts for Men" might also be a match for "Father's Day Gifts" or "Gifts for Dad" etc.
Any solution or advice is greatly appreciated, cheers
-
Google looks at URLs, and not pages. It's the same content, but on different URLs.
If Google delivered mail, it would think the following were all different houses:
123 Main Street, Los Angeles, California 90210
123 Main St., Los Angeles, California 90210
123 Main Street, Los Angeles, CA 90210
123 Main Street, Los Angeles, CA 90210-1234If you're able to use a canonical tag in your custom CMS, you can effectively tell Google that one specific URL is the "right" one, and that all of the others should be treated as if they were the "right" one.
-
Hi Chris,
We aren't using a standardised CMS as our system was built from the ground up by our in-house development team several years ago so I can't give you an exact framework to go by unfortunately.
And yes, Webmaster Tools returns errors for duplication, i.e (i'll give you a sample URL path) we get duplicate title errors for different paths to navigate to the same product:
/jungle-surfing-through-the-daintree-rainforest/jungle-adventures-nightwalks/port-douglas/day-tours/jungle-surfing-canopy-tours/jungle-adventures-nightwalks
In other words, people are finding the raw Operator -> Product link organically and can land there via that route, or they can navigate through our catalogue by
Region -> Category -> Operator -> Product
...but in the end it's the same page they are landing on regardless.
Kind of hard to explain but hope that helps some.
Thanks!
-
Hi Ben,
What CMS are you using for your e-commerce platform e.g. Magento, oscommerce?
If you can let me know what you are using I might be able to help you out a bit more.
Have you checked Google Webmaster Tools to see if there are any duplication issues?
-
I Think this will help you
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/ecommerce-seo-making-product-pages-into-great-content-whiteboard-friday
http://www.seomoz.org/q/duplicate-content-on-ecommerce-sites
http://www.seomoz.org/q/how-can-you-avoid-duplicate-content-within-your-own-e-commerce-website
Remember to use
use rel=canonical as well
I want to ask you a quick question as well is this actually affecting your site what is your page rank? What is your Moz rank? How old is your domain? If your website is ranking well chances are Google understands that it is a e-commerce website and is not penalizing you as it would another type site. If you are being penalized by me know. You may also want to employee majestic SEO tools to look your link profile history in addition to the excellent tools found here. Remember you always have one private question every month if you're a pro member to ask the staff. I hope that it does not come to that however I do SEO on e-commerce sites and just use different descriptions never spin the content though make it fresh every time.
All the best,
Tom
-
- Okay I think I have an answer for you. If you are an e-commerce website and you are having issues with duplicate content because of the reasons you've given let's say the main page shows everything shirts, then another page has blue shirts so the URL like HTTP://example.com/shirts and the blue shirt will be in a URL something like this HTTP://example.com/shirts/blue
- I believe this is forgivable however I would build my site out to reflect a new category and have the wording be unique for each so my blue shirt's description would be different on shirts that would be on shirts/blue I hope that makes some sense however I do believe that there is a whiteboard Friday just after Google dropped Penguin in our lap where Rand discusses this I will look for and add it to this if I can find it however if you look in the search box here on Moz you will want to type in something to the tune of "things we should not worry about after Penguin" now you have to understand I do not recall this exactly so I sincerely hope to you & let me know if I can and help you anymore.
- Respectfully,
- Thomas von Zickell
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
-
Duplicate content in Shopify - subsequent pages in collections
Hello everyone! I hope an expert in this community can help me verify the canonical codes I'll add to our store is correct. Currently, in our Shopify store, the subsequent pages in the collections are not indexed by Google, however the canonical URL on these pages aren't pointing to the main collection page (page 1), e.g. The canonical URL of page 2, page 3 etc are used as canonical URLs instead of the first page of the collections. I have the canonical codes attached below, it would be much appreciated if an expert can urgently verify these codes are good to use and will solve the above issues? Thanks so much for your kind help in advance!! -----------------CODES BELOW--------------- <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>
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | ycnetpro101
{% if page_description %} {% endif %} {% if current_page != 1 %} {% else %} {% endif %}
{% if template == 'collection' %}{% if collection %}
{% if current_page == 1 %} {% endif %}
{% if template == 'product' %}{% if product %} {% endif %}
{% if template == 'collection' %}{% if collection %} {% endif %}0 -
Title page google serp
Why does Google change the titles automatically? I have <title>Canyoning Açores - São Jorge | Discover Experience Açores</title> but google show Discover Experience Açores: Canyoning Açores - São Jorge
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | tiagoarruda0 -
No Index No follow instead of Rel canoncical on product pages
Hi all, we handle our product pages no with rel canonical now, we have 1 url that is indexed http://www.prams.net/cam-combi-family the other colours have different urls like http://www.prams.net/cam-combi-family-3-in-1-pram-reversible-seat-car-seat-grey-d which canonicalize to the indexed page. Google still crawls all those pages. For crawl budget reasons we want to use "no index, no follow" instead on these pages (the pages for the other colours)? Google would then crawl fewer pages more often? Does this make sense? Are their any downsides doing it? Thanks in advance Dieter
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Storesco1 -
2 Title elements on a single page
Hi there. I am looking at a site that currently has 2 <title>elements present on every page through out the site. They have a main Title with appropriate optimization. Then they have another <title> that appears to be empty. It looks like this; <span class="html-tag"><title></span><span class="html-tag"></title> I know having 2 <title>elements is not ideal. But if the second one is empty, can it still have a negative affect? </p> <p>Thanks</p></title>
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Ciceron_main0 -
How to deal with canonicals on dup product pages in Opencart?
So I have a seriously large amount of duplicate content problems on my Opencart site, and I've been trying to figure out the best way to fix them one by one. But is there a common, easy way of doing this? Because frankly, it is a nightmare otherwise. I bought an extension which doesn't appear to work (http://www.opencart.com/index.php?route=extension/extension/info&extension_id=20468&utm_source=ordercomplete&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=wm), so now I'm at a loss.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | moon-boots0 -
Problem: Magento prioritises product URL's without categories?
HI there, we are moving a website from Shoptrader to Magento, which has 45.000 indexations.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | onlinetrend
yes shoptrader made a bit of a mess. Trying to clean it up now. there is a 301 redirect list of all old URL's pointing to the new one product can exist in multiple categories want to solve this with canonical url’s for instance: shoptrader.nl/categorieA/product has 301 redirect towards magento.nl/nl/categorieA/product shoptrader.nl/categorieA/product-5531 has 301 redirect towards magento.nl/nl/categorieA/product shoptrader.nl/categorieA/product¤cy=GBP has 301 redirect towards magento.nl/nl/categorieA/product shoptrader.nl/categorieB/product has 301 redirect towards magento.nl/nl/categorieB/product, has canonical tag towards magento.nl/nl/categorieA/product shoptrader.nl/categorieB/product?language=nl has 301 redirect towards magento.nl/nl/categorieB/product, has canonical tag towards magento.nl/nl/categorieA/product Her comes the problem:
New developer insists on using /productname as canonical instead of /category/category/productname, since Magento says so. The idea is now to redirect to /category/category/productname and there will be a canonical URL on these pages pointing to /productname, loosing some link juice twice. So in the end indexation will take place on /productname … if Google picks it up the 301 + canonical. Would be more adviseable to direct straight to /productname (http://moz.com/community/q/is-link-juice-passed-through-a-301-and-a-canonical-tag), but I prefer to point to one URL with categories attached. Which has more advantages(?): clear menustructure able to use subfolders in mobile searchresults missing breadcrumb What would you say?0 -
How to Optimize Product Page for Better Ranking in Google?
Today, I was searching for product page SEO on Google for better optimization of product pages and category level pages. I want to introduce about my website structure. Root category: http://www.vistastores.com/outdoor Sub category: http://www.vistastores.com/outdoor-umbrellas End level category: http://www.vistastores.com/patio-umbrellas Product page: http://www.vistastores.com/patio-umbrellas-california-umbrella-slpt758-f13-red.html I'm doing link building for sub category & end level category page. But, I'm not able to do inbound marketing for product level URLs due to resource problem. But, I have checked that... There are many competitors who are rank well with long trail keyword... I'm selling same product but not ranking well... What is reason behind it? I don't know... Just look at Olefin Red Patio Umbrella search result. I want to rank in top 3 with this kind of long trail keywords... I have made study of following video and article. http://www.seomoz.org/blog/ecommerce-seo-making-product-pages-into-great-content-whiteboard-friday http://www.distilled.net/blog/seo/in-search-of-the-perfect-seo-product-page/ I have done all things which were described by them... But, I'm still waiting for good ranking...
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | CommercePundit0 -
Problem with 404 and 500 Status code pages
Dear SeoMozzers, I have a question related to one of the sites I have recently changed the URL, going from http:example.com to http://www.example.com I did 301 redirects, as I was recommended to do. In the past month I have noticed an incredible drop in Google's rankings for many keywords and checking the crawling errors appearing in the SEO Crawling Report I have witnessed mayhem with Canonical/301 redirect types of errors. Now, things seem a little better. I have noticed a reduction in the number of 301 and Canonical type or errors (by the way, I still do not get the Canonical issue :-)). My little questions are the following: Will I ever go back to the positions I used to occupy before I redesigned the site's URL structure? I have now noticed that the SeoMoz Crawling report show "404 Staus" errors and one "505 Status" error. Can somebody please tell me how to fix the 404 Status Errors? Can I fix them by myself, or maybe I can ask the guys at the web hosting company, since I am really bad at taking care of technical issues? Thank you for the time you took to clarify my doubts. Ad maiora, Sal
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | salvyy0