Should I use rel=canonical in this case
-
Hi SEO pros,
I am working on a website competing on the keyword "USA maps" and would appreciate your advice and comments on the issue below.
The site has one major page for USA maps and like 5-6 smaller pages under different categories, e.g. US travel maps (under Travel Maps category), US travel guides (under Travel Guides), US atlases (under Atlases), etc.
The smaller pages do not rank in search results and are not optimized well for any keyword.
Here are my questions:
#1. Do you think that if I add rel=canonical to the main USA maps page from all small pages that will help get higher ranking of the main page?
#2 Or should I better try to optimize these small pages for the keywords they target (e.g. "US travel maps") and try to send link juice to the main page from text link within the content?
Thank you,
-
Thanks Davinia and Peter,
That's what I intend to do.
I was considering adding rel=canonical, but then, as I wrote the question here, it occurred to me there's a better solution. Thanks for making the choice easier.
-
GIven that you're talking about 5-6 pages, I'd tend to agree with Davinia. It sounds like these pages have a shot at having unique value, and you could probably beef them up with solid content relatively easily. If you were spinning out 100s or 1000s of thin, geo-targeted pages, that would be different (and that can cause Panda problems), but for half a dozen pages, the canonical would have very little impact here. If they're valuable to users, let them work for you and make them valuable to search.
-
Provided the content on your lower level pages is unique by going for option 2 you can widen your reach on search engine result pages; leading to more traffic for your website. Rel=canonical will make lower level pages pretty much redundant for gaining ranking, so if the content is valuable (to a user and search engine) wouldn't you want to optimize that opportunity? I vote option 2
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
-
Moz Pro recommends not using a keyword more than 15 times. If there is a lot of content and the density is low, is it okay to go over that?
From MOZ on-page grader... "Recommendation: Edit your page to use your targeted keywords no more than 15 times." But if I use a keyword 50 times and the keyword density is only 2 percent, is that ok? What is more important, the raw number used or the density?
On-Page Optimization | | Jeremy-Marion1 -
Should i avoid using H2 to optimize my home page
Hi, my site is www.in2town.co.uk and i am looking at ranking for lifestyle magazine but i am a bit worried. The titles of the articles on the home page are h2, and i am just wondering if i should change this to h3 as it may get confusing for google. Can anyone let me know if i should keep the article titles as h2 or if i am right that they need to be changed to h3 or something else any help would be great
On-Page Optimization | | ClaireH-1848860 -
Can I use Same Keyword for Multi pages Title Tags?
Hello All, I am working on client website and currently they are targeting One Keywords for multi pages. As I have search with Allintitle: Search query and Google display around 37 pages of website which carry same keyword in "Title Tags". I have told to client to change the "Title Tags" but they want that keyword for all relevant pages. So I want to know is that harm in Search Engine Ranking? Note: They have not done the link building activities for multi pages with same Keyword, they are using only in "Title Tags" only
On-Page Optimization | | jemindesai0 -
Canonical Help?
This canonical thing is brand new to me and I'm trying to wrap my mind around it. Here is my situation: I use Wordpress. I am showing duplicate content with the following url's http://crosstrainingandfitness.com/online-workout-blog/ http://crosstrainingandfitness.com/online-workout-blog/page/2/ Would setting a canonical link solve this? If so, what do I put in the Canonical box for this category (online workout blog). I use Yoast's Wordpress SEO plugin. Any help is greatly appreciated.
On-Page Optimization | | carbbon0 -
Rel Canonical - Could someone please help confirm something?
Morning Mozzers, I'm looking at a site (www.zitan.co.uk) and making a few recommendations for SEO, one of the things I've spotted is something weird with rel canonical. It looks (to me) as if they've got almost every single page set with this tag: rel="canonical" href="http://www.zitan.co.uk" /> I'm 99% certain that this means that every page on the site (that has this tag) is pointing all link juice / authority back to the homepage? If someone could please check and just confirm that, I'd really appreciate it. Thanks in advance, James
On-Page Optimization | | JamesMio0 -
Are Title meta tag keywords case sensitive'
Hi! One of the fixups that SEOmoz analysis reports is that my main keyword isn't part of the page title. The problema is that the keyrord is there but in uper case while i introduced a lower case keyword for analysis (see the example). BEAUTY (it's in the page title) beauty (that's the keyword i'm analysing) Regards, OV
On-Page Optimization | | ovieira0 -
SEO pluses/minuses of Content used in pop-up windows
I am curious to know what advantages/disadvantages there are to placing content in pop-up windows ( lightbox, etc.). My understanding is that the content can be heavily optimized, but if a user lands on the page where the content is, how will they find it if it is hidden within a pop-up? I guess it is more a of a user experience issue rather than an SEO issue? or not? Hopefully that makes sense. Gary
On-Page Optimization | | Apptixweb0 -
What is a better mobile domain from an SEO perspective an m.example.com or using your regular domain with user agent detection?
Just wondering what domain is more beneficial for a mobile site and why.
On-Page Optimization | | CabbageTree0