Duplicate Content issue
-
I have been asked to review an old website to an identify opportunities for increasing search engine traffic.
Whilst reviewing the site I came across a strange loop. On each page there is a link to printer friendly version:
http://www.websitename.co.uk/index.php?pageid=7&printfriendly=yes
That page also has a link to a printer friendly version
http://www.websitename.co.uk/index.php?pageid=7&printfriendly=yes&printfriendly=yes
and so on and so on.......
Some of these pages are being included in Google's index.
I appreciate that this can't be a good thing, however, I am not 100% sure as to the extent to which it is a bad thing and the priority that should be given to getting it sorted.
Just wandering what views people have on the issues this may cause?
-
use the rel=canonical on the main page/s to show that they are the original/source/master page of the content.
See this helpful guide:
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/complete-guide-to-rel-canonical-how-to-and-why-not
Don't forget you can also tell Googlebot to ignore certain URL parameters to prevent them being indexed and treated as duplicate content.
"If your site uses URL parameters, some of the parameters may be unnecessary for page navigation. Asking Google to ignore these parameters can reduce duplicate content in Google's index and make the site more crawlable."
This is done through Google.com/Webmasters - Your Domain - Dashboard - Settings - Parameter Handling.
-
I believe this may cause duplicate content issues.
If possible, remove the link to the printer friendly version from the printer friendly pages.
http://www.websitename.co.uk/index.php?pageid=7 would have a link to printer friendly page.
http://www.websitename.co.uk/index.php?pageid=7&printfriendly=yes If &printfriendly = true, do not display the link.
Also ensure you're using rel=canonical to show that http://www.websitename.co.uk/index.php?pageid=7 is the actual page that should be indexed. The following should be placed in the head tags of the printer friendly 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
-
Duplicate content and 404 errors
I apologize in advance, but I am an SEO novice and my understanding of code is very limited. Moz has issued a lot (several hundred) of duplicate content and 404 error flags on the ecommerce site my company takes care of. For the duplicate content, some of the pages it says are duplicates don't even seem similar to me. additionally, a lot of them are static pages we embed images of size charts that we use as popups on item pages. it says these issues are high priority but how bad is this? Is this just an issue because if a page has similar content the engine spider won't know which one to index? also, what is the best way to handle these urls bringing back 404 errors? I should probably have a developer look at these issues but I wanted to ask the extremely knowledgeable Moz community before I do 🙂
Technical SEO | | AliMac260 -
Duplicate Content
Hello guys, After fixing the rel tag on similar pages on the site I thought that duplicate content issue were resolved. I checked HTML Improvements on GWT and instead of going down as I expected, it went up. The duplicate issues affect identical product pages which differ from each other just for one detail, let's say length or colour. I could write different meta tags as the duplicate is the meta description, and I did it for some products but still didn't have any effects and they are still showing as duplicates. What would the problem be? Cheers
Technical SEO | | PremioOscar0 -
Duplicate content vs. less content
Hi, I run a site that is currently doing very well in google for the terms that we want. We are 1,2 or 3 for our 4 targeted terms, but havent been able to jump to number one in two categories that I would really like to. In looking at our site, I didn't realize we have a TON of duplicate content as seen by SEO moz and I guess google. It appears to be coming from our forum, we use drupal. RIght now we have over 4500 pages of duplicate content. Here is my question: How much is this hurting us as we are ranking high. Is it better to kill the forum (which is more community service than business) and have a very tight site SEO-wise, or leave the forum even with the duplicate content. Thanks for your help. Erik
Technical SEO | | SurfingNosara0 -
Duplicate Content
Hi, we need some help on resolving this duplicate content issue,. We have redirected both domains to this magento website. I guess now Google considered this as duplicate content. Our client wants both domain name to go to the same magento store. What is the safe way of letting Google know these are same company? Or this is not ideal to do this? thanks
Technical SEO | | solution.advisor0 -
Affiliate urls and duplicate content
Hi, What is the best way to get around having an affiliate program, and the affiliate links on your site showing as duplicate content?
Technical SEO | | Memoz0 -
Standard Responses Causing Duplication Issues
Hi Guys We have a Q&A section on our site which we reply to customers using standard responses which have already been approved. This is causing a lot of duplication errors, however due to the nature of our business we need to use these responses. Is there anything that we can do to stop this? Matthew
Technical SEO | | EwanFisher0 -
Block Quotes and Citations for duplicate content
I've been reading about the proper use for block quotes and citations lately, and wanted to see if I was interpreting it the right way. This is what I read: http://www.pitstopmedia.com/sem/blockquote-cite-q-tags-seo So basically my question is, if I wanted to reference Amazon or another stores product reviews, could I use the block quote and citation tags around their content so it doesn't look like duplicate content? I think it would be great for my visitors, but also to the source as I am giving them credit. It would also be a good source to link to on my products pages, as I am not competing with the manufacturer for sales. I could also do this for product information right from the manufacturer. I want to do this for a contact lens site. I'd like to use Acuvue's reviews from their website, as well as some of their product descriptions. Of course I have my own user reviews and content for each product on my website, but I think some official copy could do well. Would this be the best method? Is this how Rottentomatoes.com does it? On every movie page they have 2-3 sentences from 50 or so reviews, and not much unique content of their own. Cheers, Vinnie
Technical SEO | | vforvinnie1 -
Duplicate content connundrum
Hey Mozzers- I have a tricky situation with one of my clients. They're a reputable organization and have been mentioned in several major news articles. They want to create a Press page on their site with links to each article, but they want viewers to remain within the site and not be redirected to the press sites themselves. The other issue is some of the articles have been removed from the original press sites where they were first posted. I want to avoid duplicate content issues, but I don't see how to repost the articles within the client's site. I figure I have 3 options: 1. create PDFs (w/SEO-friendly URLs) with the articles embedded in them that open in a new window. 2. Post an image with screenshot of article on a unique URL w/brief content. 3. Copy and paste the article to a unique URL. If anyone has experience with this issue or any suggestions, I would greatly appreciate it. Jaime Brown
Technical SEO | | JamesBSEO0