Why would my product pages no longer be indexed in Google?
-
Our UK site has 72 pages in our sitemap. 30 of them are product pages which take a productid parameter. Prior to 1st Feb 2011, all pages were indexed in Google but since then all of our product pages seem to have dropped from the index?
If I check in webmaster tools, I can see that we have submitted 72 pages and 42 are indexed.
I realise we should have some better url structuring and I'm working on that but do you have any ideas on how we can get our product poages back into googles index
-
Hi Ian,
I see there are some 40 URLs with product in the URL from your site that are indexed in Google. Can you share with us how you were able to get those back in the index and any tips you may have learned from the experience? If you have a good writeup, do consider submitting to YOUmoz as well.
Thanks!
-
Yes it is. Going through this whole thing myself with a few sites.
-
Thanks for your comments. As well as rewriting descriptions, I have a couple of things in development that should help e.g customer reviews etc
Just frustrating...
-
Thanks Alfredo,
The content was actually written by us. The other 6000 links are duplicated from ours. We are the manufacturer of the product and we wrote the product descriptions. I find it ironic that the original author is penalised and dropped from the index when the 6000 pages contaiing duplicate content manage to stay in the index.
I can update the content but its very frustrating.
-
It may take some time, but you better start making a move on your content. Think about what else you can bring into your product descriptions that other sites don't have (apart from rewriting descriptions). Providing additional data/value could be the easier way out - especially if you have data floating around or can collect it using your current traffic through surveys etc.
-
Alfrado is correct
I assume you are selling though somesort of franchise and you product content is supplied to you.
You need to create original content for them all.Also sitemaps should not contain every page, they should only contain your most impoartatnt pages. see whitboad friday with Duane Forrester from Bing, still on seomoz front page
If making orginal content for all pages is too hard, have some summery pages from each category and get them to rank.
while your proiduct pages used to be in the index, they probably did not rank well asn theyy were duplicates, but they would of been usefull for linksculpting, only pages in the index can be used for link sculpting
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
-
How long does Google indexes the website after algorithm update?
I've noticed that the page ranks for some queries were improved unexpectedly, without any actions from my side. Is it possible that this improvement is connected with with Google algorithm update Sep, 4-5?
Algorithm Updates | | AurigaPR0 -
New Google Update - weird ranking
Hi I wanted to get your thoughts on this keyword ranking. This page - https://www.key.co.uk/en/key/albatross-heavy-duty-office-chairs-24-stone is now ranking for heavy duty office chair 30 stone We don't mention 30 in the content anywhere, apart from the USPs at the top of the page - could this be it?! I don't know how to change this, or I guess Google is still figuring things out and maybe this will drop off? Love to get some thoughts on this! Becky
Algorithm Updates | | BeckyKey0 -
Same Meta description is being shown on Google?
Not sure why this is happening but when you this command into Google site:"mywebsite": + "key phrase" It brings up pages from my website which have the key phrase but I have noticed that Google is using the wrong meta description for all of them even though these pages all have their own unique meta description Does anyone know why this would be happening? Thanks
Algorithm Updates | | webguru20140 -
What happened on September 17 on Google?
According to mozcast: http://mozcast.com/ and to my own stats, Google had a pretty strong algorithm update on September 17. Personally I have experienced a drop of about 10% of traffic coming from Google on most of my main e-commerce site virtualsheetmusic.com. Anyone know more about that update? Any ideas about what changed? Thank you in advance for any thoughts! Best, Fab.
Algorithm Updates | | fablau1 -
Drop in Page Indexing, Small rise in Search Queries
Hello, I have a news based website so i am creating multiple new posts daily. I changed a lot of the site and got rid of old potentially duplicate content back in feb and had a sharp drop in pages indexed. I know this was because I removed a lot of pages though. However I still have a good 20,000 + pages on my site and my indexing has dropped a further three times since then. From 9,000 to 2,000 a coupe of months ago and then slowly down since April to just 133. It doesn't seem to have affected my search queries yet but surely will if it continues. I am really confused as to how this might happen & how to turn it around. We dont use any dodgy SEO tricks either.
Algorithm Updates | | luwhosjack0 -
Google Unable to Access Robots.txt
We haven't made any changes to the robots.txt file and suddenly Google claims they can no longer access the file. The site has been up and active for well over a year now. What are my next steps? I have included a screenshot of the top half of the file. See anything wrong? D3H5tgE.png
Algorithm Updates | | rhoadesjohn0 -
What Is The Deal Between Indeed and Google?
Anyone notice the love affair of Indeed and Google lately? Indeed is cannibalizing the top 30 SERPs for job related keywords. Seeing keywords where Indeed has 10-15 of the organic listings in the top 30. Compete.com is showing a +8% increase in search volume between in April and May. But it seems as if they really started to cannibalize the SERPS since the Penguin update at end of May. Any one else noticing this?
Algorithm Updates | | joncrowe0 -
How often do people use Google Product Search
I was was reading Tom Critchlow's excellent blog on how to rank well for Google Product Search. I'm trying to find out if there are stats on how often people use this feature in Google (since it is not listed on Google's main navigation). I'm working with a customer who has b-2-b products and am trying to determine the value of adjusting his ecommerce pages to appear on Google Product Search.
Algorithm Updates | | EricVallee340