Ecommerce Link Juice and Canonical URLs
-
Hello all. I am optimising an E-Commerce site and I have a questions about Products in several categories & Canonical URL's. Using Magento Platform.
site.com/category1/product1/ ( link from category is site.com/product1/ )
site.com/category2/product1/ ( link from category is site.com/product1/ )
site.com/category2/subcategory1/product1 ( link from category is the same , as is the canonical URL )
site.com/product1/ ( this is where other categories link to )Canonical links for all the above is site.com/category2/subcategory1/product1 which takes care of duplicate content correctly.
I just wonder if we would get more link juice if ALL the links from all categories went to site.com/category2/subcategory1/product1 ( instead of some going to site.com/product1/ )
Thanks in advance
-
Thank you for confirming my thoughts. In the meantime, that's exactly what we've implemented anyway
It didn't seem logical to me either - nice to have a sounding board over here.
-
Why would you canonically link Product pages to the category page? Of course that is going to disappear the product pages. Why not just link from the product pages to category pages with a normal link <a>to increase page authority on the category page?</a>
-
Hey Guys
I'm sure I stumbled across a Q&A about canonically linking product pages to appropriate category pages, the theory being that 25 product pages canonically linking to the relevant category page should increase the authority of the category page. By extension, that means that product pages never show up in SERPS, which I'm not quite so keen on.
I'll be damned if I can find the thread, even with a search engine
Any advice or tales of woe gratefully received.
-
I completely agree. 1 URL is by far the better choice.
-
I still think the better option is to have 1 URL. I was using the root URL for products ( effectively 1 URL ) and not having the category in the URL and my SEO was doing well - BUT I wanted the Categories to be displayed in Google as clickable - so I changed to the canonical method having different URLs with 1 Canonical. Over a couple of months my SEO suffered terribly - some categories in the top 10 down to 20-30 . I have just implemented having 1 URL ( with category in it ) - we will see how we go..
-
Hello Yusuf,
If you have a link to Jon Mueller saying that, instead of someone else saying he did, I would love to go check it out because the statement is in direct opposition to the one on Google's website here, which says:
"Consolidating link signals for the duplicate or similar content. It helps search engines to be able to consolidate the information they have for the individual URLs (such as links to them) on a single, preferred URL. This means that links from other sites to
http://example.com/dresses/cocktail?gclid=ABCD
get consolidated with links tohttp://www.example.com/dresses/green/greendress.html
."Notice is says "helps" though. As always, the directive is a "hint" to Google, which has the right to ignore the hint if they want to.
-
Thanks - yes I am actually seeing this first hand.
I used the canonical method - and it is rapidly degrading my SEO . not hugely , but some things that were almost on page 1 are now at the end of page 1 / beginning of page 2. I am currently changing everything to have 1 URL ( with the category this time )
-
Hi Everett,
Thanks for your response.
I also believed that the rel=canonical merge the link profiles but so far all the evidence I've seen suggests that it doesn't.
Firstly - Jon Mueller from Google stated that the rel=canonical tag doesn't merge the link profile. That's talked about here.
http://moz.com/community/q/quick-rel-canonical-link-juice-question
Secondly, if I look at some examples, you'd expect pages with rel=canonical tags to have zero authority etc. reported for page alternatives in Open Site Explorer.
e.g. on the ASOS website there is a link to the men's section which uses a query string parameter.
http://www.asos.com/men/?via=top
The canonical url is
Both report different levels of authority. If the link profiles were merged, would you not expect either the same levels of authority reported or the non-canonical version to report no authority?
I understand that Moz tools don't work like Google so I'd like to hear from someone who can explain this.
Thanks,
Yusuf
-
Yusuf,
I do believe rel canonical tags merge the link profile of all non-canonical URLs to the one canonical URL.
Also, relying on redirects in this case could be problematic for breadcrumbs.
-
Hello Marty,
If you have the opportunity to use only ONE URL, to which you will link from all categories - and which will be the one and only canonical for that product - I would use site.com/product/product1. Note the use of a /product/ directory instead of being off the root. I find that having products in a product directory makes diagnoses of issues (i.e. index count, site:domain.com inurl:product searches, Analytics segmentation...) a lot easier. However, if you want to keep it site.com/product1 then that would be fine as well. It would be preferable to using multiple URLs and relying on 301 redirects or rel canonicals, which are effective band-aids, but band-aids nevertheless. It is better to actually fix the problem, which is products living on multiple URLs.
Of course you're going to still want to either 301 redirect or rel canonical the old ones to your canonical version since the URLs are likely already in Google's system and possibly have external links.
And you should think about what happens to breadcrumbs as well. If a user gets to /product1 from one category vs another, will their breadcrumb change and how will that be done? Is it ok for usability for the breadcrumb on that product page to always reference the canonical category (i.e. Home ---> category 2 ---> category2 ---> product1)? I tend to think so, and this also may help your internal linking be more consistent when Googlebot visits the page.
-
Thanks for your replys
- I'm not really asking the question whether it should be a 301 or Canonical - I have the opportunity to make all the links go directly to the correct URL - or to go to the category and use Canonical. ( then there would ony be one actual URL ) - just wondering if that is more beneficial as you would have 4-5 links going to the same product page instead of 1 going to the product page and the rest with Canonical URL's .
So if you have any more ideas...???
-
The canonical is the right way of setting the website up. When we take on an E-commerce client that has products accessible via multiple URL's is to Google which one has the authority, so if you are looking at product X then google it and see which URL Google is giving the authority to, look at the path then canonical all other variations to that path.
-
Hi
I've often wondered about this - whether to use a 301 or leave pages as they are and use the rel=canonical tag.
I would think that a 301 from the duplicate to preferred page would be best. This would mean that any inbound links will pass juice to the preferred page (i.e. site.com/category2/subcategory1/product1). The rel=canonical tag, as far as I know, does not merge the link profile of the duplicate pages.
However, depending on the skill of your developers, other rewrite/redirect rules on your site and your CMS - the rel=canonical might be the only feasible method.
This page explains it very nicely.
http://moz.com/blog/301-redirect-or-relcanonical-which-one-should-you-use
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
-
Links Not Detected by MOZ, AHREFS, GSC-ARE THESE QUALITY LINKS?
Our SEO provider has been creating content (6 blog posts per month as well as building page write ups) and has been promoting that content. Several links per month have been created as a result of this effort. Many of the links have been from commercial real estate publications. I am concerned that the quality of these links is not high enough to improve our ranking. Most links do not appear on AHREFS, Google Search Console or MOZ. Is this a red flag that these links are weak? Ranking and traffic on the site have improved considerably since this provider began the project in April of 2019. They have been writing about 30 pages about New York City. commercial buildings each month in addition to 4 short blog posts and 2 extremely well researched and authoritative blog posts. My concern is that the links are not of sufficient quality to result increased ranking. That the improvement in ranking is solely due to the addition of new content rather than the creation of these links. Basically, that I am incurring the cost on an ongoing basis of an link building campaign with little to no benefit. That being the case, I would shift resources to content creation and increase and improve content rather than develop links with little value. A sample of links are below: Would greatly appreciate some feedback as to whether these are in fact helpful to the domain authority, reputation and ranking of our website. Thanks,
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Kingalan1
Alan https://patch.com/new-york/bayside/bayside-queens-priciest-area-retail-office-space-study https://qns.com/story/2019/12/04/these-commercial-streets-in-queens-were-among-the-most-expensive-in-2019/ https://patch.com/new-york/brooklyn/flatbush-ave-priciest-retail-spot-outside-manhattan-study http://thejewishvoice.com/2019/12/07/nycs-most-expensive-commercial-streets-neighborhoods-in-2019-would-surprise-you/ https://atalyst.com/investment-banking-interview-metro-manhattan/0 -
Link conundrum - losing nav/footer links in mobile view
Hi Moz folks! I'm currently moving a site from being hosted on www. and m. separately to a responsive single URL. The problem is, the desktop version currently has links to important landing pages in the footer (about 60) and that's not something we want to replicate on mobile (mainly because it will look pretty awful.) There is no navigation menu because the key to the homepage is to convert users to subscription so any distraction reduces conversion rate. The footer links will continue to exist on the desktop view but, since Google's mobile-first index, presumably we lose these important homepage links to our most important pages. So, my questions: Do you think there is any SEO value in the desktop footer links? Do you have any suggestions about how best to include these 60-odd links in a way that works for mobile? Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | d_foley0 -
Does Navigation Bar have an effect on the link juice and the number of internal links?
Hi Moz community, I am getting the "Avoid Too Many Internal Links" error from Moz for most of my pages and Google declared the max number as 100 internal links. However, most of my pages can't have internal links less than 100, since it is a commercial website and there are many categories that I have to show to my visitors by using the drop down navigation bar. Without counting the links in the navigation bar, the number of internal links is below 100. I am wondering if the navigation bar links affect the link juice and counted as internal links by Google. The Same question also applies to the links in the footer. Additionally, how about the products? I have hundreds of products in the category pages and even though I use pagination I still have many links in the category pages (probably more than 100 without even counting the navigation bar links). Does Google count the product links as internal links and how about the effect on the link juice? Here is the website if you want to take a look: http://www.goldstore.com.tr Thank you for your answers.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | onurcan-ikiz0 -
SEO Overly-Dynamic URL Website with thousands of URLs
Hello, I have a new client who has a Diablo 3 database. They have created a very interesting site in which every "build" is it's own URL. Every page is a list of weapons and gear for the gamer. The reader may love this but it's nightmare for SEO. I have pushed for a blog to help generate inbound links and traffic but overall I feel the main feature of their site is a headache to optimize. They have thousands of pages index in google but none are really their own page. There is no strong content, H-Tags, or any real substance at all. With a lack of definition for each page, Google see's this as a huge ball of mess, with duplicate Page Titles and too many onpage links. The first thing I did was tell them to add a canonical link which seemed to drop the errors down 12K leaving only 2400 left...which is a nice start, but the remaining errors is still a challenge. I'm thinking about seeing if I can either find a way to make each page it's own blurb, H Tag or simple have the Nav bar and all the links in the database Noindex. That way the site is left with only a handful of URLs + the Blog and Forum Thought?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | MikePatch0 -
Dynamic URLs Appearing on Google Page 1\. Convert to Static URLs or not?
Hi, I have a client who uses dynamic URLs thoughout his site. For SEO purposes, I've advised him to convert dynamic URLs to static URLs whenever possible. However, the client has a few dynamic URLs that are appearing on Google Page 1 for strategically valuable keywords. For these URLs, is it still worth it to 301 them to static URLs? In this case, what are the potential benefits and/or pitfalls?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | mindflash0 -
How to keep the link juice in E-commerce to an "out of stock" products URL?
I am running an e-commerce business where I sell fashion jewelry. We usually have 500 products to offer and some of them we have only one in stock. What happens is that many of our back links are pointed directly to a specific product, and when a product is sold out and no longer is in stock the URL becomes inactive, and we lose the link juice. What is the best practice or tool to 301-redirect many URLs at the same time without going and changing one URL at a time? Do you have any other suggestions on how to manage an out of stock product but still maintain the link juice from the back link? Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | ikomorin0 -
Google Maps results doesn't show my site url but rather the maps url, why is this?
For several of my clients landing pages that show up in the Maps results the website url has been overwritten by the maps url (maps.google.com). Even though on my places page I have the correct website set up. Does anyone have any idea why they would be doing this and how I can correct it? Thanks kinldy in advance, Aaron. maps-url.png
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | afranklin0 -
Too many links!
Hi, I'm running a wordpress blog (modhop.com) and am getting the "too many links" on almost all of my pages. It appears that in addition to basic site navigation I have plug-ins that create invisible links that are counted in the crawl...at least that's my guess. Is there a good way to control this in wordpress? A nofollow in the .htaccess? A plug-in that does this? (I'm sort of at novice-plus level here so the simplest solution is ideal.) Thanks! Jake modhop.com
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | modhop0