How to fix duplicate issue among multiple root domains
-
Hello,
I’m doing SEO for one E-commerce website which name is Lily Ann Cabinets & I’ve around 300 different root domains which having same linking structures, same design & even same product database for all 300 websites, but currently I’m focusing only on Lily Ann Cabinets website & trying to get ranking on some targeted keywords, but website is not performing well in Google.com
For Example:
http://www.lilyanncabinets.com/ (Main Websites)
http://www.orlandocabinets.com/
http://www.chicagocabinets.org/
http://www.miamicabinets.org/
http://www.newyorkcabinets.org/
http://www.renocabinets.org/So please can anyone tell that Will it create duplicate issue in search engines or may be due to this reason website doesn’t have good ranking in search engines, then how can I fix this issue? Do I have to make different structures for Lily Ann Cabinets?
-
Hello CommercePundit,
I'm going to recommend Justin Taylor's first reply as the best solution here. You want your cake and you want to eat it too, but unfortunately that is against several of Google's Webmaster Guidelines.
Either give each of those sites their own content, which would mean not using the same database, which would mean investing a LOT of money, which is probably not scalable or doable - OR - Give up the idea of having a mirror-site on multiple geotargeted domains and instead 301 redirect those to the primary / canonical domain at www.lilyanncabinets.com . You could also use the cross-domain rel canonical tag as suggested by Justin, but I find that does best on content websites. Due to the nature of an eCommerce site (e.g. secure shopping carts, etc...) I think just redirecting the domains would be best.
You can put up a landing page for each location if you have a good reason to, such as having office or warehouse locations in those areas. But if you have no presence in those areas and are just trying to get traffic because they are big markets I wouldn't do that either. Go for the national market instead. I see on the Orlando site that the contact address is in Toledo, Ohio.
You don't have to take our advice, but you asked for it and despite your other sites getting traffic I think getting rid of, and redirecting, all of those mirror sites is the best long-term option if you want to continue getting business from search engines. Let's assume that you can get local traffic with those other domains and business does really well for a few months or even a year or two. You hire more people and buy a bigger house/warehouse/infrastructure... only to have Google wipe out every one of your sites completely with a single algorithm update. Now you're firing people, selling your house and looking for a job. It's not worth it, IMO.
-
Justin,
We can go with this way, but again there is one issue, as I told you that I don't have only one page on root domains, have entire same structure & all pages on root domains, then how can i all redirect to one sub folder, If I would have single page or landing page then I can redirect to new created sub folder.
And let's say I don't want to change anything in other root domains, then Do you have any other solution for the same..?
-
Yeah, Justin Thanks for your reply. 2000 visits per day is huge visits, that's why I am looking proper solution for the same & at the same time traffics which are coming from root domains should not be affected..
-
If you decide to go this way, it would be better to use subfolders instead of subdomains, as subdomains don't pass on link juice to their parent domain, where as sub folders do
so redirect to:
http://www.miamicabinets.orgto
-
2000 visits per day from all 300 different root domains, it not much.
I would do 301 as Justin said or create subdomain.
Sample:
-
redirect http://www.miamicabinets.org to miamicabinets.lilyanncabinets.com
-
create a landing page for miami-cabinets.lilyanncabinets.com
-
targeting the keywords Miami Cabinets with unique text.
-
-
That does put a different slant on things...
2000 visits per day is a lot and i would be wary of doing anything that would effect this.
Your best and safest route forward may be to change Lily Ann Cabinets so that the text etc is unique and different to the other sites, that way you can still maintain the traffic from other domains, but at the same time you can look to optimise Lily Ann Cabinets and get it performing well in SERPs without it being dragged down by duplicate content.
Justin
-
Thanks Justin for your quick reply,
But still I would like to share one thing to you that currently i am getting 2000 visits per day from all different root domains as I've customized Google e-commerce tracking code to track visits from all domains & if i will put canonical tag in other domains as you said, then Is there any chance to down the traffic from different domains which are coming right now, because I am getting huge traffic from those domains, so isn't it risky..?
So what can i do in this case? Should i do try with canonical tag or what.? What is your opinion in this case..?
-
Yes duplicate content will almost definitely be affecting your rankings and the links above seem to have identical contnet
If you are focusing on Lily Ann Cabinets why not either 301 or better still rel=canonical from the other domains to Lily Ann Cabinets
That would solve the issue with minimal work.
See article below for info on redirects
http://www.seomoz.org/learn-seo/redirectionOr this one for info on rel=canonical http://www.seomoz.org/learn-seo/canonicalization
As a side note, regionalised domain names offer little if anything from an SEO perspective and in this case they are most likely harming your SEO because of the duplicate content.
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
-
Duplicate Titles - Recruitment Agency
Hi All, I was just wondering if anyone had come across this problem before - We are a recruitment agency so we have multiple of the same jobs at the same time, so we're looking into ways to differentiate and change it but we've got the same Duplicate Titles - has anyone faced this problem before? And if so what did they do? Thanks in advance!
On-Page Optimization | | marketingmc0 -
Duplicate Content
When I say duplicate content, I don't mean that the content on a clients site is displaying on another site on the web or taken from a site on the web. A client has a few product pages and each product page has content on the bottom of the page (4-5 paragraphs) describing the product. Now, this content is also displaying on other pages, but re-worded so it's not 100% duplicate. Some pages show a duplicate content % ranging from 12% to 35% and maybe 40%. Just curious if I should suggest having each product page less than 10% duplicated. Thanks for your help.
On-Page Optimization | | Kdruckenbrod0 -
Duplicate Home Page
Hi, I have a question around best practise on duplicate home pages. The /index.aspx page is showing up as a top referrer in my analytics. I have the rel=canonical tag implemented for the www.mysite.com on both pages. Do I need to 301 the /index.aspx to the mysite.com? I have a lot of links pointing to the /index.aspx (half of those are coming from the mysite.com). www.mysite.com/index.aspx www.mysite.com Many thanks Jon
On-Page Optimization | | JonRaubenheimer0 -
Copyscape Duplicate Content Ownership Question
We have a site that has had its content copied verbatim to numerous other sites and articles. We were advised to change our content but the content is originally ours. Does google take that into account before they apply duplicate penalties? And shouldn't copyscape be able to show this information in their reports? It just doesnt seem right that the originating author would have to change content because everyone else is stealing it. Any clarification on this?
On-Page Optimization | | anthonytjm0 -
Canonical issue
Hi, Very new to seomoz but very impressed. First report has shown me that I have duplicate pages. Some seem to be duplicate titles and some were duplicates of pages i found on the server. however the main problem is it seems to be picking up pages with www and without it which I have a vague idea is a canonical issue. so it throws up pages like this: http://web-writer-articles.co.uk and http://www.web-writer-articles.co.uk I want it just to pick up pages with www Firstly should it be picking up both and if not how can I make amendments so that it is only picking up pages which include www ? thank you for your help, louandel15
On-Page Optimization | | louandel150 -
Meta Descriptions - Duplicate Content?
I have created a Meta Description for a page that is optimized for SERPS. If I also put this exact content on my page for my readers, would this be considered duplicate content? The meta description and content will be listed on the same page with the same URL. Thanks for your help.
On-Page Optimization | | tuckjames0 -
Keyword domains
Hello, I am the proprietor of RacquetSource.com, Is there any merit to using keyword domains and have them redirect to the site, or a specific page on the site? For Example, the keyword term, Squash Racquets, if I were to purchase a domain name, squash-racquets.com and have it redirect to http://www.racquetsource.com/squash-racquets-s/95.htm will this effect positively to my search ranking of the keyword term Squash Racquets? Any insight would be greatly appreciated. Cheers Geoff
On-Page Optimization | | GeoffBatterham0 -
Competitive Domain Analysis
In the competitve domian analysis my domain root (gpscity.com) is showing up as a 404 not found. My competition is showing up as 200. My site is live, index and viewable, but I'm wondering if this has an effect on my rankings? What can I do to test that it's not returning a 404 when the crawlers view my site?
On-Page Optimization | | tinyfactory0