Duplicate content

[Madlena]

the report shows duplicate content for a category page that has more than one page.

how can we avoid this since i cannot make a different meta content for the second page of the category page:

http://www.geographics.com/2-Cool-Colors-Poster-Board-14x22/c183_66_327_387/index.html

http://www.geographics.com/2-Cool-Colors-Poster-Board-14x22/c183_66_327_387/index.html?page=2

thanks,

Madlena

[Dr-Pete]

I'm not seeing that Google is currently indexing either of these pages, so they may be too deep or duplicated in other ways. Pagination is a tough issue, but in general pages 2+ have little or no search value (and, post-Panda, can actually harm you).

I would strongly recommend NOT using a canonical tag to page 1 - Google generally advises against this. You can use rel=prev/next, although it's a bit tough to implement and isn't honored by Bing. Generally, I'd advise one of two things:

(1) META NOINDEX, FOLLOW pages 2, 3, etc. - they really have no SEO value.

(2) If you have a View All page, link to it and rel-canonical to view all. This seems to be accepted by Google, but then the larger page will rank.

Generally, I find (1) easier and pretty effective.

Sorry, just saw Nakul's comment, and didn't realize you already have canonical tags in place. While it's not preferred solution, since it's already there and seems to be keeping these pages out of the index, I'd probably leave it alone. It doesn't look like Google is indexing these pages at all right now, though, which you may need to explore in more depth.

[NakulGoyal]

I see that you already have canonical tags in place. If I am on either of the 2 URLs you posted or if I am on http://www.geographics.com/?cPath=183_66_327_387&custom_perpage=48 or http://www.geographics.com/?cPath=183_66_327_387&custom_perpage=24 They all lead me to the same page, which will help you get rid of any possible duplicate content penalty, because you are passing a directive to Google telling that what the correct URL is so they only rank the canonical tag URL in the SERPS. IMO, you are good. You can however take it to the next level if needed by implementing the rel canocal = next / prev and test it to see if that helps.

[My-Favourite-Holiday-Cottages]

I am not entirely sure if this will prevent the dup content issue, but you could try setting up rel canocal = next / prev for the pages to make it explicit that they are paginated content, and then change the rel canoncal on the individual pages to point to themselves instead of the index page.

If it's the rel cannocal causing confusion, that should help.

[Naghirniac]

You will need to use the rel=cannonical meta tag in your index.html file.

In the section of your index.html file include the follow:

It will solve your problem. Good luck!