How can I tell Google not to index a portion of a webpage?
-
I'm working with an ecommerce site that has many product descriptions for various brands that are important to have but are all straight duplicates. I'm looking for some type of tag tht can be implemented to prevent Google from seeing these as duplicates while still allowing the page to rank in the index. I thought I had found it with Googleoff, googleon tag but it appears that this is only used with the google appliance hardware.
-
Correct you should make sure is not used elsewhere.
But I can't refrain from stressing again to hide the content is unlikely the best strategy.
-
So what should it look like in the code?
If my area to block was a product description it might say
"Product Description
bla bla bla bla bla bla bla bla bla bla bla bla bla bla bla bla bla bla bla"
Secondly, in the robots.txt if I disallow /iframes/ then I would need to make sure we are not using iframes anywhere else?
-
Just as Chris Painter pointed out, you shouldn't worry too much about duplicate content if your site is legit (not an autoblog for example) and if you really want hide it from google, iframes are the way to go.
-
Matt Cutts has said (source:http://youtu.be/Vi-wkEeOKxM ) not to worry too much about duplicate content especially with the sheer volume of it there is on the internet. You may find you're looking more like you are trying to cheat Google or similar which could cause you a bigger head ache not to mention you may slow your webapge down, duplicate content isn't the worse enemy for seo. If you are worried put all the effort of trying to hide stuff from Google into making the product description unique.
-
Hello Brad,
Just to get your question clear.
I'm I correct that you want a method that does let Google (and other search engines) know a portion of your pages are duplicates while you want both duplicated pages and original pages to rank in the SERP's?
If you could provide us with an example (link) that would help a great deal as well.
-
Hi Brad,
You can prevent Google from seeing portions of the page by putting those portions in iframes that are blocked by
robots.txt.
Disallow: /iframes/
Thanks
-
You can iframe those chunks of content and block with robots.txt or just meta tagging noindex in the iframe source.
But I would not, if you can't build a plan to make the content unique just canonicalize, or let google choose which page to pick among the duplicate bunch.
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
-
Did anyone else noticed Google index bug?
Noticed page indexation drop in Search Console for most of my sites. Guys from Search Engine Land seem to know about that: http://selnd.com/1YqiOoQ Did anyone else noticed something weird?
Technical SEO | | solvid1 -
Webmaster tools not showing links but Moz OSE is showing links. Why can't I see them in the Google Search Console
Hi, Please see attached photos. I have a website that shows external follow links when performing a search on open site explorer. However, they are not recognised or visible in search console. This is the case for both internal and external links. The internal links are 'no follow' which I am getting developer to rectify. Any ideas why I cant see the 'follow' external links? Thanks in advance to those who help me out. Jesse T7dkL5s T7dkL5s OkQmPL4 3qILHqS
Technical SEO | | jessew0 -
How to know how much pages are indexed on Google?
I have a big site, there are a way to know what page are not indexed? I know that you can use site: but with a big site is a mess to check page by page. This is a tool or a system to check a entire site and automatically find non-indexed pages?
Technical SEO | | markovald0 -
Google Cache can't keep up with my 403s
Hi Mozzers, I hope everyone is well. I'm having a problem with my website and 403 errors shown in Google Webmaster Tools. The problem comes because we "unpublish" one of the thousands of listings on the site every few days - this then creates a link that gives a 403. At the same time we also run some code that takes away any links to these pages. So far so good. Unfortunately Google doesn't notice that we have removed these internal links and so tries to access these pages again. This results in a 403. These errors show up in Google Webmaster Tools and when I click on "Linked From" I can verify that that there are no links to the 403 page - it's just Google's Cache being slow. My question is a) How much is this hurting me? b) Can I fix it? All suggestions welcome and thanks for any answers!
Technical SEO | | HireSpace1 -
What can i do to get google to visit my site more often
Hi, i am having serious problems since i upgraded my website from joomla 1.5 to 3.0 We have dropped down the rankings from page one for the word lifestyle magazine, and we have dropped down in rankings for other very important words including gastric band hypnotherapy and i am starting to regret having the site upgraded. i am finding the google is taking its time visiting my site, i know this for two reasons, one i have checked the cache and it is showing the 2nd july and i have checked articles that we have written and they are still not showing. example if i put this article name in word for word it does not come up, Carnival Divert Ships In The Caribbean Due To bad Weather this was an article that was done yesterday. in the old days before the upgrade that would have been in google now. these problems are costing us the loss of a great deal of traffic, we are losing around 70% of our traffic since the upgrade and would be grateful if people could give me advice on how to turn things around. we add articles all the time. each day we add a number of articles, i was considering changing the front page in the middle and having a few paragraphs of the latest story to get google to visit more often. i know this would look messy but i am running out of ideas. any help would be great
Technical SEO | | ClaireH-1848860 -
Google indexing tags help
Hey everyone, So yesterday someone pointed out to me that Google is indexing tags and that will likely hurt search engine results. I just did a "site:thetechblock.com" and I notice that tags are still being pulled. http://d.pr/i/WmE6 Today, I went into my Yoast settings and checked "noindex,follow" tags in the Taxomomies settings. I just want to make sure what I'm doing is right. http://d.pr/i/zmbd Thanks guys
Technical SEO | | ttb0 -
Do pages that are in Googles supplemental index pass link juice?
I was just wondering if a page has been booted into the supplemental index for being a duplicate for example (or for any other reason), does this page pass link juice or not?
Technical SEO | | FishEyeSEO0 -
Partial Site Move -- Tell Google Entire Site Moved?
OK this one's a little confusing, please try to follow along. We recently went through a rebranding where we brought a new domain online for one of our brands (we'll call this domain 'B' -- it's also not the site linked to in my profile, not to confuse things). This brand accounted for 90% of the pages and 90% of the e-comm on the existing domain (we'll call the existing domain 'A') . 'A' was also redesigned and it's URL structure has changed. We have 301s in place on A that redirect to B for those 90% of pages and we also have internal 301s on A for the remaining 10% of pages whose URL has changed as a result of the A redesign What I'm wondering is if I should tell Google through webmaster tools that 'A' is now 'B' through the 'Change of Address' form. If I do this, will the existing products that remain on A suffer? I suppose I could just 301 the 10% of URLs on B back to A but I'm wondering if Google would see that as a loop since I just got done telling it that A is now B. I realize there probably isn't a perfect answer here but I'm looking for the "least worst" solution. I also realize that it's not optimal that we moved 90% of the pages from A to B, but it's the situation we're in.
Technical SEO | | badgerdigital0