How to find original URLS after Hosting Company added canonical URLs, URL rewrites and duplicate content.
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We recently changed hosting companies for our ecommerce website. The hosting company added some functionality such that duplicate content and/or mirrored pages appear in the search engines.
To fix this problem, the hosting company created both canonical URLs and URL rewrites. Now, we have page A (which is the original page with all the link juice) and page B (which is the new page with no link juice or SEO value). Both pages have the same content, with different URLs.
I understand that a canonical URL is the way to tell the search engines which page is the preferred page in cases of duplicate content and mirrored pages. I also understand that canonical URLs tell the search engine that page B is a copy of page A, but page A is the preferred page to index.
The problem we now face is that the hosting company made page A a copy of page B, rather than the other way around. But page A is the original page with the seo value and link juice, while page B is the new page with no value. As a result, the search engines are now prioritizing the newly created page over the original one.
I believe the solution is to reverse this and make it so that page B (the new page) is a copy of page A (the original page). Now, I would simply need to put the original URL as the canonical URL for the duplicate pages. The problem is, with all the rewrites and changes in functionality, I no longer know which URLs have the backlinks that are creating this SEO value.
I figure if I can find the back links to the original page, then I can find out the original web address of the original pages.
My question is, how can I search for back links on the web in such a way that I can figure out the URL that all of these back links are pointing to in order to make that URL the canonical URL for all the new, duplicate pages.
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My first question back at you is why is your hosting company deciding your canonical structure for you?
a hosting company should just host and you should be using canonical tags and .htaccess to sort out your own canonical URLs. So my gut reaction is to change hosting company.After that:
- Open Site Explorer - put both URLs in and see which ones are being linked to and which has the highest value.
If you're not a PRO member then take the 30 day trial and use OSE to sort this issue out. You'll be glad you did.
After that... seriously as a web designer & SEO, not having control of my own URLs would annoy the heck out of me, so change hosting provider. That'll be the second biggest favour you could give yourself
Slightly opinionated, I know, but at the end of the day it's your website not your host's.
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