Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
How to properly remove pages and a category from Google's index
-
I want to remove this category http://www.webdesign.org/web-design-news-all/ and all the pages in that category (e.g. http://www.webdesign.org/web-design-news-all/7386.html ) from Google's index.
I used the following string in the "Reomval URS" section in Google Webmaster Tools:
http://www.webdesign.org/web-design-news-all/*
is that correct or I better use http://www.webdesign.org/web-design-news-all/ ?
Thanks in advance.
-
Thanks for your replies guys. Now I know how to proceed.
-
In addition I would put the "No Index" meta attribute in the pages.
http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=93710
-
It sounds like you want to de-index them.
Go into your robots.txt and disallow Google from the category..
It will look something like this:
User-agent: googlebot or *
Disallow: /web-design-news-all/
-
Are you removing the pages or just trying to de-index them? If you're trying to remove them, make sure the old pages return a 404 so they can't be restored to the index. If you're trying to remove them, make sure they are excluded by robots.txt or meta tag.
Here's the WMT Help page on the topic
http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=1663427
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
-
What is the best meta description for Category Pages, Tag Pages and Main Article?
Hi, I want to index all my categories and tags. But I fear about duplicating the meta description. for example: I have a tag name "Learn Stock Market", a category name "Learning", and a main article "What is Stock Market". What is your suggestion for meta description of these three pages that looks great for seo google?
On-Page Optimization | | mbmozmb0 -
Will Google Count Links Loaded from JavaScript Files After the Page Loads
Hi, I have a simple question. If I want to put an image with a link to another site like a banner ad on my page, but do not want it counted by Google. Can I simply load the link and banner using jQuery onload from a separate .js file? The ideal result would be for Google to index a script tag instead of a link.
On-Page Optimization | | CopBlaster.com1 -
Will shortening down the amount of text on my pages affect it's SEO performance?
My website has several pages with a lot of text that becomes pretty boring. I'm looking at shortening down the amount of copy on each page but then within the updated, shortened copy, integrating more target keywords naturally. Will shortening down the current copy have a negative effect on my SEO performance?
On-Page Optimization | | Liquid20150 -
NOINDEX, FOLLOW on product page - how about images indexing?
Hi, Since we have a lot of similar products with duplicate descriptions, I decided to NOINDEX, FOLLOW most of these different variants which have duplicate content. However, I guess it would be useful in marketing terms if Google image search still listed the images of the products in image search. How does the image search of Google actually work - does it read the NOINDEX on the product page and therefore skip the image also or is the image search completely dependent on the ALT tag of any image found on our site? Thanks!
On-Page Optimization | | speedbird12290 -
Schema and Rich Snippets What's the difference?
Sorry if this is a daft question but... what is the difference between Rich snippets and Schema markup? Are they one and the same? They seem to be used interchaneably and I'm confused. If someone could give a brief sentence or two about the differences between them that would be great. Thanks
On-Page Optimization | | AL123al1 -
WordPress and category/subcategory landing pages
Hey, Here's my situation. I'm building a WordPress blog for product reviews of a certain niche. Current category setup is 4 main categories with 4-8 subcategories each. Each subcategory has a unique description that will help it become a landing page for certain keywords, after which it lists the posts from that subcategory. The posts will always be assigned to a sub-category, never to a main category. My issue is what to do with the main categories. They're fairly general so they're not really targeting any keywords, and don't have any unique descriptions attached to them. I was thinking of choosing between three options on designing the main category pages: List the subcategories + normal posts loop that bring the latest posts from the subcategories (may create a lot of duplicate content since the subcategory pages are also listing their posts) List only the subcategories (+ maybe just the latest post from each subcategory) Don't link the main categories at all, instead only use them to create dropdowns for the subcategories So, what would you choose, and why?
On-Page Optimization | | mihaiaperghis0 -
What's the best practice for handling duplicate content of product descriptions with a drop-shipper?
We write our own product descriptions for merchandise we sell on our website. However, we also work with drop-shippers, and some of them simply take our content and post it on their site (same photos, exact ad copy, etc...). I'm concerned that we'll loose the value of our content because Google will consider it duplicated. We don't want the value of our content undermined... What's the best practice for avoiding any problems with Google? Thanks, Adam
On-Page Optimization | | Adam-Perlman0 -
Impact of removing category sidebar with keywords?
Our site (a niche financial publication: insideARM.com) requires some more room in the sidebar. We're considering removing the categories (we call them topics) sidebar block, or cutting down the number of items displayed within it. My concern is that we'd be removing a direct link to landing pages for important keyword terms from our most powerful page (the index). Sure, we have the terms listed in the footer, but I am worried that the position change will lower the value of the links. Our users don't really use these links for navigational purposes, which is why it comes up as a potential removed item. Am I wrong to worry about this? Would we be crippling our category pages by doing this?
On-Page Optimization | | insideARM0