Quick Rel Canonical Link Juice Question
-
Let's say I have two duplicate pages, A and B. However, A has 5 external links and B has 3 _different _external links. If I add the rel canonical tag to B, so that A is the "master page" do I also lose whatever link juice was going to B from the 3 external links?
-
Hey Chris,
I don't have anymore context; it was just a thought experiment. I'm doing my best to wrap my head around in foreseeable issues I might have.
Thanks for the help,
Ruben
-
Adding a canonical tag from another domain is a whole different matter.
http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.ca/2009/12/handling-legitimate-cross-domain.html
Google is aware of where it found content first and the tricks people use to try and fool it. This subject has been brought up numerous times in Google Hangouts.
"While the rel="canonical" link element is seen as a hint and not an absolute directive, we do try to follow it where possible." Google
There is no "penalty" for duplicate content, Google calls them Algorithmic devaluations. content theft has been an issue for years and making small changes to content does not work well anymore.
Also look into Google Authorship for further protection.
-
Hi KempRugeLawGroup,
If the two pages are exactly identical, you may want to 301 redirect page B to page A to consolidate the link juice flowing to both pages A and B from external sources. If you could provide us with some more context as to why you are pursuing a rel=canonical instead of a redirect, we may be able to provide more specific advice.
And to your latest post, if a site were to copy your post and change only a few words, the site would be penalized for duplicate content (unless the copy were significantly changed).
Regards,
Chris
-
Well, unless I missed something, does that mean someone from another website could copy one of my posts, target different keywords, add a rel canonical tag, and suffer no penalty? A lot of my content would be universal, if it were not targeted to my service area. For example, why you should hire a divorce attorney in Tampa?
Could someone in Orlando just do the above steps and be fine? (Change Tampa to Orlando, Target Orlando, add a rel canonical).
Thanks!
-
No Both pages stay exactly as they are. A canonical tag does not work like a 301 redirect.
John Mueller at Google has stated in the past that even if you use a canonical tag it is only an indication to Google as to what page to use, Google will still make its own decision, both pages will always remain on your site and each of those pages will have a different link profile that will affect them differently.
Adding a canonical tag will not merge the link profile, If you wanted to get the link juice to merge from B to A then a 301 is your best bet.
Hope that helps
-
The Canonical page reference is supposed to be used to tell the spiders that these 2 pages are identical. Sounds like if you have different links on 2 separate pages then they are no longer identical.
That being said there are all sorts of reasons why you may want to canonical one page to another. Hec if I could get Microsoft to Canonical their website to my storefront I would jump at the chance to pass their link juice to my site.
So here is what we are seeing with our Canonical pages. The original or lead page, page A in your example improves in its link juice, and becomes the dominant page, the second page, or page B in your case does not loose importance or have less link juice, it only serves to bolster page A.
So what this effectively does is tell the search engines how to order their results for 2 identical pages. But how does this work for two different pages? If we are selling widgets, and thing-a-ma-bobs. Neither page looses its importance in search engines as long as we are targeting different keywords and optimization for each page.
but once they are identical, then we are ranking the more important page.
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
-
301 Externally Linked, But Non-Producing Pages, To Productive Pages Needing Links?
I'm working on a site that has some non-productive pages without much of an upside potential, but that are linked-to externally. The site also has some productive pages, light in external links, in a somewhat related topic. What do you think of 301ing the non-productive pages with links to the productive pages without links in order to give them more external link love? Would it make much of a difference? Thanks... Darcy
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | 945010 -
Ecommerce Link Juice and Canonical URLs
Hello all. I am optimising an E-Commerce site and I have a questions about Products in several categories & Canonical URL's. Using Magento Platform. site.com/category1/product1/ ( link from category is site.com/product1/ )
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | s_EOgi_Bear
site.com/category2/product1/ ( link from category is site.com/product1/ )
site.com/category2/subcategory1/product1 ( link from category is the same , as is the canonical URL )
site.com/product1/ ( this is where other categories link to ) Canonical links for all the above is site.com/category2/subcategory1/product1 which takes care of duplicate content correctly. I just wonder if we would get more link juice if ALL the links from all categories went to site.com/category2/subcategory1/product1 ( instead of some going to site.com/product1/ ) Thanks in advance 🙂0 -
Community question- Penguin 2.0 link types?
What type of links do you think Penguin 2.0 targeted most - anchor text abuse , directory links, paid links, low quality guest posts, article directories etc????
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | DavidKonigsberg0 -
Link Building Question
Hey Moz'ers, I have created several blogs on different domains for the purpose of writing good content articles that contain 2-3 links per article that go back to my website. It has been up for about 3-4 weeks. I am not seeing my results/links showing up in OSE, is this because it still needs more time or is there something else I could be advised to look into? In theory these blogs will only contain 2-3 links from each domain to the site. I was also going to make sure the anchor text per link is different (keyword, brand name, random anchor like click here). Side note: How does this system sound as part of one small aspect to link building? red flags? Thanks for all the responses and advice.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | MonsterWeb280 -
Does the number of links on a page metric include repeated links?
Just wondering if the number of links on the page metric includes links that are repeated? So, if I had 100 links to one page would this count as 100 or 1 link?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Cornwall
If it's the former does this mean more links to one page adds weight? Thanks0 -
.GOV Link - same impact on my site's rankings whether link to home or Gov related category?
I own a job site and I am about to get a link from a .GOV. My site has a category called "State Jobs". Should I ask the ".Gov" to link to my homepage or to the state job page and use the anchor text "State Jobs". I understand "State Jobs" page would get a big kick by that being the anchor text and linking to that specific page, but the question I have is this: for my site as a whole (homepage and various categories) would they get around the same "push up" whether the linking is to 1) my homepage with anchor text being my site's name or 2) to the state job specific page and in this case the anchor text would be "State Jobs"? thank you
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | knielsen0 -
Site wide footer links vs. single link for websites we design
I’ve been running a web design business for the past 5 years, 90% or more of the websites we build have a “web design by” link in the footer which links back to us using just our brand name or the full “web design by brand name” anchor text. I’m fully aware that site-wide footer links arent doing me much good in terms of SEO, but what Im curious to know is could they be hurting me? More specifically I’m wondering if I should do anything about the existing links or change my ways for all new projects, currently we’re still rolling them out with the site-wide footer links. I know that all other things being equal (1 link from 10 domains > 10 links from 1 domain) but is (1 link from 10 domains > 100 links from 10 domains)? I’ve got a lot of branded anchor text, which balances out my exact match and partial match keyword anchors from other link building nicely. Another thing to consider is that we host many of our clients which means there are quite a few on the same server with a shared IP. Should I? 1.) Go back into as many of the sites as I can and remove the link from all pages except the home page or a decent PA sub page- keeping a single link from the domain. 2.) Leave all the old stuff alone but start using the single link method on new sites. 3.) Scratch the site credit and just insert an exact-match anchor link in the body of the home page and hide with with CSS like my top competitor seems to be doing quite successfully. (kidding of course.... but my competitor really is doing this.)
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | nbeske0 -
Is it ok to use both 301 redirect and rel="canonical' at the same time?
Hi everyone, I'm sorry if this has been asked before. I just wasn't able to find a response in previous questions. To fix the problems in our website regarding duplication I have the possibility to set up 301's and, at the same time, modify our CMS so that it automatically sets a rel="canonical" tag for every page that is generated. Would it be a problem to have both methods set up? Is it a problem to have a on a page that is redirecting to another one? Is it advisable to have a rel="canonical" tag on every single page? Thanks for reading!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | SDLOnlineChannel0