URL with affiliate ID won't stop outranking our homepage. Time for nuclear option?
-
We have affiliate links applied to our index URL - https://playon.co - which are not picked up as a duplicate URLs by Google.
We've applied a canonical URL, but our homepage is a 301 redirect to a page with a language parameter.
So what happens is:
- https://playon.co/ goes to https://playon.co/en
- Affiliate links such as https://playon.co/#/?affiliate_token=1390448caccb7d go to https://playon.co/en#/?affiliate_token=1390448caccb7d
This gets picked up as rel="canonical" href="https://playon.co/en" which I assumed marked it as a non-canonical page. Nonetheless, we keep seeing this affiliate "page" ranking - even above our own homepage for some terms.
Worse, the affiliate URL also contains old cached information of the page. I don't even see how these SERP results should exist, because the affiliate link just ends up at the homepage (https://playon.co/en)
My questions:
- What can we do to remove these affiliate URL versions of our homepage from being ranked?
- Google doesn't see anything after the hash in the indexed affiliate URLs. If we were to no-index our index URL (https://playon.co/) to completely remove the affiliates links, would our canonical version (https://playon.co/en) assume the top listing, or will we have effectively nuked our entire site?
Appreciate any help.
-
The problem with removing these URLs is Google/Webmaster Tools doesn't read anything beyond the hash.
Specifically - requesting that https://playon.co/#/?affiliate_token=04d234f75b1d74 be hidden removed from the index + cache is then processed simply as https://playon.co being removed.
Again - https://playon.co is just a redirect, it is not the actual homepage. But will no-indexing https://playon.co prevent https://playon.co/en from ranking, which is the URL we need to be recognized as the homepage?
-
Thanks for following up. Sorry for the confusion.
Yes, the "affiliate-tagged version of our homepage" is outranking the canonical at times. This is resulting in organic, branded traffic from Google being credited to an affiliate.
Just as maddening is that said "affiliate-tagged version of our homepage" doesn't even exist. Google seems to refuse to let go of an old, cached version of our homepage content.
-
Thanks. Both the affiliate token and # parameters have been set in Webmaster Tools, but had no effect.
To clarify - are you saying the "nuclear option" is on the table?
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
-
Does Canonical Tag passes link juice to the original URL?
We are using Canonical tags at almost all the pages of our eCommerce website. We have various sorting options like "High to Low", "Best Sellers", etc., due to this page URLs get change with some dynamic URL parameters. To avoid duplicity, we are using canonical tag on each page which point to the original url. Also, we are using IBM Coremetrics to track traffic and conversions, but to measure referral traffic in Coremetrics, we have to add tracking parameters in the URL. So, while link building we need to share URLs with Coremetrics tracking parameters in the URL, but the canonical of this page is pointing to the original URL. Suppose we have a Page that needs to be shared with Coremetrics tag: domain.com/category-name/?cm_mmc=Referral_-xyz--izUPF8VmRng--3 This Page has the canonical tag pointing to the original url: domain.com/category-name/ My question is if the URL: domain.com/category-name?cm_mmc=Referral_-xyz--izUPF8VmRng--3 got shared on other websites, will it pass link juice to the original URL: domain.com/category-name.
Affiliate Marketing | | Ramendra.Singh0 -
Affiliate marketing for our Amazon Products ??
Hi Guys. Can any recommend or is it possible to build an affiliate marketing programme to generate sales from our Amazon product pages rather the the traditional way of generating sales through your own website ? Can anyone advise ? Or recommend any companies ? Thanks Gareth
Affiliate Marketing | | GAZ090 -
Can 302 chains (affiliate links) from "toxic" sources hurt you? Or are you "shielded"?
Hi, I'm going through some affiliate links, which send visitors to our website via a chain of several 302 redirects Some of them are relevant links, others perhaps not so much. I know that Google doesn't pass PageRank on 302s... But are they still considered valid links that pass, let's say, "reputation", "relevance", "link neighbourhood" kind of signals? Otherwise put, is a 302 similar to adding the "nofollow" attribute on a link? Sort of? Not at all? More succinctly put, should I be worried about "toxic" sources separated from us by 302 redirect chains? By the way, yes I recognize that (Google's 302 redirect chain handling aside) associating our brand with perhaps what some might consider spammy websites is not in general a good move; I'm concerned with the technical SEO implications here however. In fact, this technical information may very well help drive decisions/policies on where we allow our affiliate advertising to appear. Thanks 🙂 PS - The affiliate company by the way is cj.com if that helps
Affiliate Marketing | | ntcma0 -
Affiliate marketing dead?
I have created a network of travel websites that I have decided to promote little by little.. Also so they getdomain age and google trust.... but now when you search for all my main keyphrases... you either have wikitravel,lonelyplanet,frommers and other big brand. I guess that Google gave them better value as to get trusted travel information... However, it seems it will be very difficult to rank my sites. I could do long tail keyphrases but again might not be worth it... I used to work as a SEO consultant for other travel sites selling products... they still rank pretty well as they are sites of value selling something.. of course threy compete with other sites but we are in the same level. How can you compete with loneyplanet with your affiliate site because I am not selling anything on my sites. I am pretty much desperate. I designed a network of 30 sites... all good content with good SEO on the page... of course, I will be honest. I might have to change the content to make it better... you can check one of my site here; www.simplyparis.org it is worth it or better stop this project and focus on 1 product oriented website ? Is anyone working as an affiliate marketer with experience after google panda and pinguin ? is affiliate marketing dead in 2013 now?
Affiliate Marketing | | sandyallain0 -
Can anyone help me find the broadband ISP affiliate program I need?
I have a couple sites that deal with broadband internet access, and I'm looking to monetize beyond adsense. I'd like to sign up for some affiliate programs from internet service providers like Charter, CenturyLink, Comcast, etc. I found a couple affiliate programs but I am having no luck at all figuring out the programs that so many other websites are involved with. In about every case, the user is able to enter in their address and then a search is performed, returning programs available at their location. The programs I've found just do the traditional ad click-throughs for a possible commission. Can anyone enlighten me what kind of programs they are using?
Affiliate Marketing | | bizzer0 -
How should I deal with the affiliate URLs we create through our affiliate program?
Our website offers an affiliate program and every affiliate gets a link http://www.ourwebsite.com/?affiliateID. Because we get many such links we use redirects to avoid duplicate content. Unfortunately we have 302 redirects set up and I want to make them 301. Many of our affiliates build backlinks using their http://www.ourwebsite.com/?affiliateID as the URL. If such links were redirected through a 301, would they pass any juice? Can our site get penalized by search engines for having backlinks to URLs that contain affiliate IDs, URLs that are 301 redirected to our homepage lets say?
Affiliate Marketing | | nick.leech0 -
URL Tags / Affiliate tracking help
1. If I give a sales rep a unique tag to put at the end of a URL for tracking purposes, will Google index the "www.mysite.com/service.html?unique-tag" version of a page and display it in search results? 2. Would a tool like Xenu be able to find that version of a URL? Reason for questions: If I give my sales people tags with their names in them, I don't want competitors poaching my sales people by search for all URLs on my domain. Follow up: are there any other potential issues that I should think about? Thanks!
Affiliate Marketing | | pbhatt0 -
Did Something Happen With Google's Algo On 06/09/2011?
Yesterday, June 9th, I wokeup and ran my rank checking software. My two domains that I have page one number one rankings for are solid as they have been for the last year. Before I went to sleep last night I ran the rank check again, and had lost all rankings. After researching into it more, I realized my entire domain name is deindexed. The site: search yields no results at all. The domain name has links from over 250 root domain names, is highly focused on one product and one keyword. The links come mostly from articles, comments, forum posts, press releases, and 3-4 articles that were posted talking about my website by other bloggers. The site has 60 pages, which I think (thought) was more than enough for such a tight focus. The domain is a good keyword match name that I paid a grand for. In webmaster tools it says my URLs are still indexed, however thats not the case. I tried searching in Bing, and Yahoo. Bing - DeIndexed. Yahoo - One page of the site indexed. I havent done anything black hat at all, which is ironic this domain was banned because its the only domain name links were built to using a respectable seo company. It runs on wordpress, and I had not added any new content in about 4 months. PR4, and the PR still exists in the toolbar and on the websites I used to check it. Also tried searching google.fr, google.ru, etc... to see if it was a complete deindex, and it is. Then used the multiple datacenter check - which told me my domain name was not listed in any of the DCs checked. It is an affiliate website, with one affiliate link on the homepage. I use a plugin to mask the link so it appears as /starthere/ rather than a long affiliate URL. There is ONE catch, this website is in the pharmacy niche. Now before you all go saying oh well thats why, consider my question. I dont sell anything illegal, nor does the affiliate program I promote. I collect traffic from people searching for a prescription drug and then recommend a herbal alternative. Something odd however, is that I have 5 websites like this. Each tailored to their respective prescription drug backlink wise, and then on site I have comparisons and explain the benefits of instead using one of the herbal products or OTC supplements from savon/walgreens whatever. The other 4 websites gained rank, pages 1, 2, and 3 for their keywords when they were previously on pages 15-20. No new link building to the other domains, I hadn't given them any focus due to other projects. The issue is the domain name which was banned was a real money maker with an aesthetically pleasing theme. Now its completely deindexed, and I dont know why. Despite the fact I am lost an income stream, I really would like to know why this occurred at all. I feel like I walked into my job, was fired and not told why. This isn't the first time this has happened to me, however previously it was my own fault because I used an affiliate template and it didn't occur to me 5k other people were doing the same thing. (earlier days before I learned more about link building and basic SEO). So, my question is what exactly happened yesterday? Did anyone else see an sudden change in traffic or rankings? Has anyone else experienced a complete deindex of their domain name, and if you have is this permanent or is google known for accidental / temporary removals during an update to their algo? I may share my link if it will help, however I prefer not to unless its in private. Also if someone has access to Matt Cutts directly so I can ask what I am doing wrong, or has any idea how to contact someone at google (other than a request for reinclusion) I am all ears. Its very frustrating to see a decision made to ban my domain name without so much as an email saying "we dont like you". All responses and opinions are welcome and appreciated!
Affiliate Marketing | | getbigyadig0