Targeting by IP Address... SEO Issues?
-
I'm setting up a site to display a different site header graphic depending on which U.S. State the IP address is coming from. In theory we may end up doing 50 different images, although we'll probably start with 4 or 5 and then the other states will get a "default".
How will the SE's treat this... if it's just an image change, but the text on the page is the same, will it affect anything? Any best practice advice out there?
thanks!
-
Jim I agree with Jason and don't think you have anything to worry about. Where you run into trouble is when you are specifically trying to show Google (or any other search engine) something different. For example, if Googlebot was using an IP address from Kansas you'd want to show them the Kansas image just like you show everyone else. Don't complicate things by saying "Show Kansas.jpg to all Kansas IPs, but always show Googlebot the default.jpg file). That would be cloaking. What you are doing is simple IP delivery and it should be safe.
-
That variable image shouldn't cause you any SEO trouble. You should consider changing the meta data for the image (Alt Tag, etc...) with the image.
If you want to be extra safe, and avoid any cache problems with your geolocation feature, you will want to use a HTTP Vary header with "*" on the pages that have the GeoLocation personalization.
-Jason "Retailgeek" Goldberg
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
-
Express js and SEO?
Hi fellow Mozzers, I have been tasked with providing some SEO recommendations for a website that is to be built using express.js and Angular. I wondered whether anyone has had any experience in such a framework? On checking a website built in this and viewing as a GoogleBot etc using the following tools it appears as though most of the content is invisible: http://www.webconfs.com/search-engine-spider-simulator.php http://www.browseo.net/ Obviously this is a huge issue and wonder if there are any workarounds, or reccomendations to assist (even if means moving away from this - would love to hear about it)
Technical SEO | | musthavemarketing2 -
Do Letters With Accents Affect SEO?
Hi Guys, My company has a franchise of a foreign company that uses an accent/foreign letter in its brand name. We have to refer to this franchise with this symbol on our website to meet their standards. I've done some research on this but its not conclusive, so i was wondering whether anyone here can confirm this for me; Will using the letter with this symbol impair our rankings for this franchise name? Obviously as a UK business people search for this franchise with a regular letter and not the accented one. I would have thought that Google is clever enough to recognise the meaning of the accented letter by now and therefore it wouldn't affect rankings (much). Furthermore, do you think that it would make any difference to use the HTML element to represent the accent rather than copy and pasting the symbol onto our website? I would've thought this would help Google pick it up, but it might not make a difference anyway! Any help is appreciated. Thanks Sam
Technical SEO | | Sandicliffe1 -
IP canonization
Hi, I need your opinions about IP canonization. Site www.peoplemaps.com is on 78.136.30.112 IP. Now we redirect that IP to the main page (because of possible duplicate content). But, we have more sites on the same IP address. How can that affect on their SEO? Before redirecting, when we visit that IP address, the browser showed mainpage of www.peoplemaps.com, not any other site. Thanks, Milan edit: We have used 301 redirect.
Technical SEO | | MilanB.0 -
Redirection Impact on SEO
Need help urgently. There is the situation [This is how is it working now]: 1. Have a global landing page [say when user types in www.mysite.com - takes user to the global landing page: [www.mysite.com/global/en.html]](http://www.mysite.com/global/en.html] ) 2. Users from this landing page can select a country on his/her choice and get redirected say: [www.mysite.com/us/en.html] Would like to change the functionality as below: 1. When user types in www.mysite.com 1a. Would find the location of the request based on GEO IP and if the request is coming from North America region then would redirect the users to: www.mysite.com/us/en.html 1b. If the request is from any other location/region then it would continue to work as it is currently working: take the user to the global landing page: www.mysite.com/global/en.html Would this change have any negative impact or not found by search engines from SEO perspective? If it does then what are the impacts and if does not then why not. If it does then what is the best possible way to address this request. Appriciate your help. Thanks, Koushik Roy
Technical SEO | | KoushikRoy0 -
Do different hosting IP addresses really matter?
Hi all It used to be (allegedly) the case that you should have all your sites on different Class Cs or Google would hit you with the spam hammer. Which I guess made some sense because back then they probably didn't have many other ways of detecting unnatural link networks. But today with all their data on who is related to who, can this really matter any more? I'd like to move 3 or 4 of our sites (all long-established with widely varied link sources) onto one server, one CMS install, one less headache but I wanted to check first in case I'm about to shoot myself in the foot. Thanks Roger
Technical SEO | | RogerElliott0 -
Entry based content and SEO
My E-commerce team is implementing functionality that allows us to display different content based on what channel and even what keyword the customers used to reach our page. This is of course a move that we believe will strengthen our conversion rates, but how will this effect our organic search listings? Do you guys have any examples of how this could affect us, and are there any technology pitfalls that we absolutely need to know about?
Technical SEO | | GEMoney_No0 -
Duplicate Content issue
I have been asked to review an old website to an identify opportunities for increasing search engine traffic. Whilst reviewing the site I came across a strange loop. On each page there is a link to printer friendly version: http://www.websitename.co.uk/index.php?pageid=7&printfriendly=yes That page also has a link to a printer friendly version http://www.websitename.co.uk/index.php?pageid=7&printfriendly=yes&printfriendly=yes and so on and so on....... Some of these pages are being included in Google's index. I appreciate that this can't be a good thing, however, I am not 100% sure as to the extent to which it is a bad thing and the priority that should be given to getting it sorted. Just wandering what views people have on the issues this may cause?
Technical SEO | | CPLDistribution0
