URL Parameter Setting Recommendation - Webmaster Tools, Breadcrumbs & 404s
-
Hi All,
We use a parameter called "breadCrumb" to drive the breadcrumbs on our ecommerce product pages that are categorized in multiple places. For example, our "Blue Widget" product may have the following URLs:
http://www.oursite.com/item3332/blue-widget
http://www.oursite.com/item3332/blue-widget_?breadCrumb=BrandTree_
http://www.oursite.com/item3332/blue-widget_?breadCrumb=CategoryTree1_
http://www.oursite.com/item3332/blue-widget_?breadCrumb=CategoryTree2_We use a canonical tag pointing back to the base product URL. The parameter only changes the breadcrumbs. Which of the following, if any, settings would you recommend for such a parameter in GWT:
Does this parameter change page content seen by the user? Options: Yes/No
How does this parameter affect page content? Options: Narrows/Specifies/OtherCurrently, google decided to automatically assign the parameter as "Yes/Other/Let Googlebot Decide" without notifying us. We noticed a drop in rankings around the suspected time of the assignment.
Lastly, we have a consistent flow of products that are discontinued that we 404. As a result of the breadcrumb parameter, our 404s increase significantly (one for each path). Would 800 404 crawl errors out of 18k products cause a penalty on a young site? We got an "Increase in '404' pages' email from GWT, shortly after our rankings seemed to drop.
Thank you for any advice or suggestions! Doug
-
Thanks for the response Anthony! It's greatly appreciated.
> splitting the link equity between these duplicate pages
This is our main fear given that every listing page link uses this parameter.We thought about using the "No" option because we agree that the content doesn't really change, but google says this next to the option: "If many URLs differ only in this parameter, Googlebot will crawl one representative URL.". It may have the same result? Not sure.
Maybe the following would force the issue?
Does this parameter change page content seen by the user? >> Yes
How does this parameter affect page content? >> Other
Which URLs with this parameter should Googlebot crawl? >> Every URLAlso, we could try to delete their auto assignment of the parameter and hope for a different result. Anyway, thanks again for the feedback.
-
I would tell GWT that this parameter Does Not change the content on the page. A single breadcrumb path does not significantly change the content on a page.
Consider a site that sells shoes and may be using parameters like fakeshoestore.com/mens?color=black. In this case, the color parameter is creating a completely new set of results, Narrowing the entire men's shoe category down to black shoes. That is a new page and you want it treated as such. (No canonical, Yes->Narrows).
With Google thinking http://www.oursite.com/item3332/blue-widget and http://www.oursite.com/item3332/blue-widget_?breadCrumb=BrandTree_ have different content on them, they may be splitting the link equity between these duplicate pages, allowing neither of them to rank well. Even though you have the canonical tag in place (good job) it is more of a hint to Google as opposed to an absolute directive.
The 404 pages isn't a huge concern. As with all 404's redirect the ones that receive organic traffic or have external links pointing at them.
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
-
Tool for user intent
Hello, Is there a tool that can tell me what the user intent of my keyword is and how I should present my page (the type of content users want to see it, what questions they want answered ? Thank you,
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | seoanalytics0 -
E-commerce duplicate URLS
Hi I just realized that my e-commerce products do not have any difference except the SKUS, PRICE and THE PRODUCT name. Apart from each page has the same sidebar and a piece of content ( same ) under each product pages. And this is the reason why i am getting too many duplicate urls warning through Moz analytics. I do not have any other contents to add for each product because of the nature of the product. Only the price, product name and the SKUs will be different and rest will all be same for each products. How can i fix this ? Thanks
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | MindlessWizard0 -
How do I add https version of site to Bing webmaster tools?
I could add my site to Google Webmaster tools with no problems, but when I try to add it in Bing webmaster tools it just redirects me to what I already have. Everything is staying the same but the switch from http to https. Anyone else experienced this? This is what I just received back from Bing and it doesn't seem right- I understand that you switched to the https version of your site and you're now trying to use the Site Move tool. However, in order to do this, you must verify the https version of your site first. You cannot do this because it just redirects you to the dashboard. We thank you for reporting this to us. We've investigated on this matter and can see that you're already put a redirect from the http to the https version of your site. We also checked the /BingSiteAuth.xml file and this also redirects to the https version. At this point, we suggest that you remove the current website (http version) that is verified through Bing Webmaster Tool and add your https domain. When done, use the Site Move tool. Thoughts?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | EcommerceSite1 -
Webmaster Tools HTML Improvements Page Blank / Site Not Ranking Well
I have an ecommerce site that is not ranking well currently. It has about 1,000 pages indexed in Google but very few appear to be ranking. I normally find issues in Webmaster Tools HTML Improvements but for some reason it does not see a problem with the site. There are problems, trust me. Moz shows many issues. Google nothing! There is a problem somewhere but I am not seeing it. Why are HTML Improvements blank and the site not ranking? Am I in the dreaded sandbox? Any ideas? Sean We didn't detect any content issues with your site. As we crawl your site, we check it to detect any potential issues with content on your pages, including duplicate, missing, or problematic title tags or meta descriptions. These issues won't prevent your site from appearing in Google search results, but paying attention to them can provide Google with more information and even help drive traffic to your site. For example, title and meta description text can appear in search results, and useful, descriptive text is more likely to be clicked on by users.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | optin0 -
Microdata or RDFa for breadcrumb ?
Which one do u prefer and why? Does RDFa is better for SEO or is just the same as microdata?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | SeoMartin10 -
How to deal with URLs and tabbed content
Hi All, We're currently redesigning a website for a new home developer and we're trying to figure out the best way to deal with tabbed content in the URL structure. The design of the site at the moment will have a page for a development and within that you can select your house type, then when on the house type page there will be tabs displayed for the user to see things like the plot map, availability and pricing, specifications, etc. The way our development team are looking at handling this is for the URL to use a hashtag or a query string at the end of it so we can still land users on these specific tabs for PPC for example. My question is really, has anyone had any experience with this? Any recommendations on how to best display the urls for SEO? Thanks
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | J_Sinclair0 -
Parameters when deciding how to set up cross domain analytics?
Hi, I am planning on setting up cross domain analytics for my website. I have found lots of sources about the code to use, but haven't been able to find something about what parameters to consider. Would appreciate my fellow mozzers helping me to put together a list of all the variations of elements I may want to track to ensure I am setting it up correctly. Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | theLotter0 -
Breadcrumb Trail for SEO?
Due to the fact that we aren't in the #1 position, (dropped from #5 to page 2 - You have to love Devs and IT), our heads have hired a SEO Audit/Consultant company to review everything we are doing. I would like to post some of the things they are telling us to do, in which I don't 100% agree with and would like some other professional feedback. Especially since their site isn't marketed very well. http://www.trupanionpetinsurance.com Disclaimer: (this site was a complete nightmare when I started a year and a half ago. Yes, there are many issues that still need to be addressed.) Breadcrumb Trail They have asked us to implement a Breadcrumb trail on every page, where the final page is the only H1 Tag. Are breadcrumb trials important for SEO? (I know they are helpful for Users, but SEO) Are they important for Search Engines to track back for structure. Any thoughts about them? Similar question asked in February : http://www.seomoz.org/q/how-important-are-breadcrumbs
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Trupanion1