Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Why is this SERP displaying an incorrect URL for my homepage?
-
The full URL of a particular site's homepage is something like http://www.example.com/directory/.
The canonical and og URLs match.
The root domain 301 redirects to it using the absolute path.And yet the SERP (and the cached version of the page) lists it simply as http://www.example.com/.
What gives? Could the problem be found at some deeper technical level (.htaccess or DirectoryIndex or something?)
We fiddled with things a bit this week, and while our most recent changes appear to have been crawled (and cached), I am wondering whether I should give it some more time before I proceed as if the SERP won't ever reflect the correct URL. If so, how long?
[EDIT: From the comments, see here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z8QKIweOzH4#t=2838]
-
While I'm not sure how sophisticated Google's algo is at picking this up, Google's people reviewers would probably note it as suspicious. Again I'd ask why? What business advantage does this give you? (Wil Reynolds has famously said that when something sounds fishy or not the best practice ask why 5 times.
In the Skype example, the why is language of the users. It's not spammy because it does something clear and obvious to help the user. Whereas your URL just looks like keyword stuffing.
-
So that SERP is definitely picking up on language of IP/searcher and that's showing the English version for Skype's site, which is a bit different.
-
This concern is not lost on me, but it prompts two questions. 1. How big a risk is it? 2. What other technical factors could be at play here?
-
Here is an example of a site that uses a directory for its homepage, whose SERP snippet shows its full path:
-
I agree with Lynn about questioning the reasons to set up your homepage like that. It does look suspicious and keyword stuffing. EMDs have seen a huge decline in recent years with Google algo updates.
-
HI,
There was a recentish video here with John Mueller that refers to this (see around the 46 minute mark). Basically it is saying that of you have redirects in place but google is seeing other indicators such as the original url is 'nicer' looking (often meaning shorter) and if there are other strong leads to the old url (like lots of links) then they might decide to show the original url in the serps. Since your case involves your root domain homepage and both those factors are likely the case for your original url.... I think you should probably proceed as if the serp is never going to change (really what the serp is showing now is correct, even though you do the redirect, what users are expecting to see and are seeing is the root domain's homepage right?).
I am not familiar with the site's subject - but personally I don't understand why you would want this setup anyway. If it is to get a more 'seo optimised' url into your homepage then it is looking a bit dodgy. Would it not make more sense to build a real page on the second url, optimised to the relevant phrases and leave your homepage on the root?
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
-
URL in russian
Hi everyone, I am doing an audit of a site that currently have a lot of 500 errors due to the russian langage. Basically, all the url's look that way for every page in russian: http://www.exemple.com/ru-kg/pешения-для/food-packaging-machines/
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | alexrbrg
http://www.exemple.com/ru-kg/pешения-для/wood-flour-solutions/
http://www.exemple.com/ru-kg/pешения-для/cellulose-solutions/ I am wondering if this error is really caused by the server or if Google have difficulty reading the russian langage in URL's. Is it better to have the URL's only in english ?0 -
Removing .html from URLs - impact of rankings?
Good evening Mozzers. Couple of questions which I hope you can help with. Here's the first. I am wondering, are we likely to see ranking changes if we remove the .html from the sites URLs. For example website.com/category/sub-category.html Change to: website.com/category/sub-category/ We will of course make sure we 301 redirect to the new, user friendly URLs, but I am wondering if anyone has had previous experience of implementing this change and how it has effected rankings. By having the .html in the URLs, does this stop link juice being flowed back to the root category? Second question: If one page can be loaded with and without a forward slash "/" at the end, is this a duplicate page, or would Google consider this as the same page? Would like to eliminate duplicate content issues if this is the case. For example: website.com/category/ and website.com/category Duplicate content/pages?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Jseddon920 -
Google cache is showing my UK homepage site instead of the US homepage and ranking the UK site in US
Hi There, When I check the cache of the US website (www.us.allsaints.com) Google returns the UK website. This is also reflected in the US Google Search Results when the UK site ranks for our brand name instead of the US site. The homepage has hreflang tags only on the homepage and the domains have been pointed correctly to the right territories via Google Webmaster Console.This has happened before in 26th July 2015 and was wondering if any had any idea why this is happening or if any one has experienced the same issueFDGjldR
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | adzhass0 -
Duplicate URLs ending with #!
Hi guys, Does anyone know why a site can contain duplicate URLs ending with hastag & exclamation mark e.g. https://site.com.au/#! We are finding a lot of these URLs (as duplicates) and i was wondering what they are from developer standpoint? And do you think it's worth the time and effort adding a rel canonical tag or 301 to these URLs eventhough they're not getting indexed by Google? Cheers, Chris
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | jayoliverwright0 -
Is it common for a site to disappear and reappear in the SERPS?
I have a site that's 2 years old and it completely disappeared from the search results. It wasn't a manual action because I never got a notice in webmaster tools. Could the site reappear? A lot of people on Odesk say the site will reappear after a few days.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | The_Kiwi_Man0 -
Does Google Read URL's if they include a # tag? Re: SEO Value of Clean Url's
An ECWID rep stated in regards to an inquiry about how the ECWID url's are not customizable, that "an important thing is that it doesn't matter what these URLs look like, because search engines don't read anything after that # in URLs. " Example http://www.runningboards4less.com/general-motors#!/Classic-Pro-Series-Extruded-2/p/28043025/category=6593891 Basically all of this: #!/Classic-Pro-Series-Extruded-2/p/28043025/category=6593891 That is a snippet out of a conversation where ECWID said that dirty urls don't matter beyond a hashtag... Is that true? I haven't found any rule that Google or other search engines (Google is really the most important) don't index, read, or place value on the part of the url after a # tag.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Atlanta-SMO0 -
Magento Trailing Slash URL Problem
Howdy Mozzers! Our magento store URL's are accessible with or without a trailing slash at the end. Canonical's and 301 redirects are not set up for one of them at the moment. Will this cause duplicate issue? Do we need to set canonical or 301 up? Which one is recommended? MozAddict
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | MozAddict0 -
Canonical URLs and Sitemaps
We are using canonical link tags for product pages in a scenario where the URLs on the site contain category names, and the canonical URL points to a URL which does not contain the category names. So, the product page on the site is like www.example.com/clothes/skirts/skater-skirt-12345, and also like www.example.com/sale/clearance/skater-skirt-12345 in another category. And on both of these pages, the canonical link tag references a 3rd URL like www.example.com/skater-skirt-12345. This 3rd URL, used in the canonical link tag is a valid page, and displays the same content as the other two versions, but there are no actual links to this generic version anywhere on the site (nor external). Questions: 1. Does the generic URL referenced in the canonical link also need to be included as on-page links somewhere in the crawled navigation of the site, or is it okay to be just a valid URL not linked anywhere except for the canonical tags? 2. In our sitemap, is it okay to reference the non-canonical URLs, or does the sitemap have to reference only the canonical URL? In our case, the sitemap points to yet a 3rd variation of the URL, like www.example.com/product.jsp?productID=12345. This page retrieves the same content as the others, and includes a canonical link tag back to www.example.com/skater-skirt-12345. Is this a valid approach, or should we revise the sitemap to point to either the category-specific links or the canonical links?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | 379seo0