301 to canonical
-
I'm doing some work on a website, they have a very popular product search where you enter a specific part code (6 digits) and it takes you to the product. So for example
Search: 123456
Page redirected to domain.com/product/123456
With a canonical of domain.com/product/this-is-the-product-title
Would it be beneficial to redirect from /product/123456 to /product/this-is-the-product-title
Google seems to be indexing both versions. For some of these products a reasonable amount of links are built.
-
No prob, let me know how things turn out (professional curiosity)
Like yourself my main project is dated in areas and a workaround is more cost effective than a rebuild, always interesting to see how people get around issues.
GL!
-
The 123456 url is only used in once place (or on banners in various places) any time this is in a category it is using the canonical url, once stock is loaded it only takes an hour for this to pull through. So the mass of links to this is the canonical url (however it usually has some form of tracking attached to it)
It's a very large and dated website, so we've got to try and get workarounds until development get round to sorting this kind of thing.
The mass of urls are showing as the canonicals, we've just got a few (hundreds) that aren't playing ball.
Really appreciate your help.
-
Sorry just want to check i understand this,
The product is originally created as domain.com/123456.html and is utilised at this url for a period of time.
You get the canonical url of domain.com/product-title.html later the day the product goes live.
You then create the canonical url and insert the canonical tags at a later time?
If all these are correct then it could explain why your having issues.
Google will crawl and index 123456.html pretty quickly, if this is the base url the product is created at you will most likely find that the links off your category pages use this url and any initial links use this url, this is bad for what you are trying to achieve.
When you then change to the canonical you create a situation where you have 2 copies of the page. 1 with loads of links pointing to it, especially internally, and another with no links. But your trying to tell google that the one with no links is the main version. I would bet this is why it is indexing both.
Even if you change all of the links and add the correct canonical tag it can take time for google to change, even then it can choose to ignore it (it can be frustrating).
Ideally you want to create the canonical URL first or at the same time as the 123456.html url and instantly add all the canonical tags, this way that all default links that a created internally point to it, and the first time it gets crawled it is already pointing to the canonical url.
In your current timetable, I would say redirects would be more suitable than canonical for both the order you release them and the general use.
About your plan,
If your timings are correct, then sure, that doesn't sound like too much of a time commitment and i think the benefit would be worth it. What I would expect to see within the month is the de-indexing of all the 123456.html versions
**Just remember, check all your canonicals actually need a 301 before doing them on bulk. You may have places on your site that you have canonicals because both versions of a page are needed, don't redirect these in your haste
-
Thank you for your response ATP.
I've done numerous checks and we're following all of the best practices, the only thing I can think of is that this url is the first that's seen (we only release stock on a time due to the nature of the business, we then only get the canonical on that day) so any scheduled work uses the part code, which we then at a later date manually change to the canonical url.
We are always trying to get these links changed to the correct version, however as we have a large site (570k+ pages) crawling for these is always an issue.
We can quite comfortably get a list of the canonicals thanks to screaming frog and being able to export our product codes (which are these six digit numbers). So you think it would be a viable solution to bulk upload our whole product catalog and on the /product/123456 urls redirecting to the /product/product-title and we should see a benefit from this? (Would take about an hours work initially then just adding current urls being 5 minutes a day)
-
Hi Thomas,
Firstly, the canonical does the same job as the 301 (for all intensive purposes) without the physical redirect. So in theory only the canonical should be being indexed and all the link juice should be being passed.
The fact that both are indexed suggests that the canonical isn't behaving as intended
- I would check for common cannonical errors to begin with
- If this isn't the case, i would suggest that the 123456 version has too many links maybe internally and externally and that google is ignoring the canonical because it has too much authority.
An issue with using canonical like this is that people who use the search are not sent to the main canonical url. This gives people the opportunity to copy and link to the wrong version of the url, which isn't a practice you want.
A possible solution would be to find all backlinks and get them changed to the main canonical version internally and externally, this could be a lot of work.
The 301 redirect is better in my opinion because it achieves the following
- Customer always see a useful URL and the main canonical URL
- Because of this, links will only likely be built the the url you want
- Google will de-index the 123456 version because it becomes inaccessible
However, unless you can automate this procedure, it can take too much time to create all those 301's for every product.
Personally i use the following guidlines as i find it keeps things clean and tidy
301 any url that isn't domain.com/main-product-url.html
keep the canonical on domain.com/main-product-url.html so that any version created from filtering or unexpected cms pages dont create duplicate content.
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
-
Site has 302 redirects for HTTP to HTTPS when it should be 301
Hey all, In the latest Moz crawl, certain pages on our website have shown as having 302 redirects for the http to https, but not all. There should be a 301 solution, but wanted to see if anyone had any advice or guidance. Thanks!
On-Page Optimization | | Julzseo1 -
Is it better to shorten my existing url to use only keyword after domain with a 301 redirect from existing url
I have a long existing URL that has included my key word but the url has about 5 additional words in the text ( eg url would have " /super widgets in stock at the widget store " as url text after domain. keywords is super widget The URL was at the top of search results for my keyword for many years until recently. Is it better to shorten my url text to now use only my keyword " /super-widgets " after the domain with a 301 direct from my existing url to optimize it Thanks
On-Page Optimization | | mrkingsley2 -
Canonical home page references - logo link
should a website's logo be linked to the "abc.com/index.html" page or to the "abc.com" domain root? Is one better for the search engine robots?
On-Page Optimization | | mtishman1 -
Rel-canonical
Hi, I am a bit confused. A potential clients website has three versions: http://www. http:// http://dev. In each version they have used the rel=canonical back to each base version. So http://www." http://" http://dev." I would have expected duplicate content but I see only one version of the content when I check using "....." in Google. Using the site: tool I see that all three versions are indexed. When moving through the navigation on them, they all redirect to the one home page - the www version. Any idea what is going on and what should be recommended?Redirecting all versions to the www. version? Is it a problem?
On-Page Optimization | | AL123al0 -
Depreciated content - Canononical, 301, or noindex?
I have a page that has existed on our website for many years, without ever being updated.This is what I would consider an "evergreen" content page, but it is now considered out of date and depreciated. It was never ranking high for any keyword in particular, but it is a page that has existed for many years. We have now created a more up-to-date version of the page, with much more informative content, a new URL, and of course it is SEO optimized. I am puzzled as to what I should do with my old page. Should I add a canononical link pointing it to the new updated page, or should I 301 redirect it to the new page, or should I no-index the old page? What are your thoughts and suggestions? I can give more information if needed. Thank you!!
On-Page Optimization | | jcph0 -
301 redirects / clean urls (2)
hello again! 1st i want to thank robert, istvan and everyone else for the great answers to my last question. i guess i should have been a bit more specific with the questionas i am still a bit unclear about a couple of things. i forgot to mention that we actually moved the site several months back and redirected all the "category" pages, but, i wasnt aware that the "product" pages were never redirecte! so my next questions are: at this point is it even worth redirecting those old product pages? if so, should we use the IP address as shown below or the domain as shown below ...i am guessing at the IP address. http://72.3.181.97/catalog/CanineCushionDogCouchBeds.aspx
On-Page Optimization | | k9byron
http://www.k9electronics.com/catalog/CanineCushionDogCouchBeds.aspx also, our old site was never deleted from the server. our ranking / sales dropped off by about 50% when the new site went live so im guessing this can be directly contributed to the products not being redirected / duplicate content from the 2 sites? im also guessing i need to find a new developer ..can i get a vote on that? 😉 <colgroup><col width="856"></colgroup>
| http://72.3.181.97/catalog/CanineCushionDogCouchBeds.aspx |0 -
Canonical URL problem
On page analysis wanted me to add a canonical url tag. However I added then re ran the on page analysis and it came up with an error. What is the proper way to add a canonical url tag in the head of an index page? ie. add a canonical tag to www.hompeage.com/index.html would it be ? Or should I ignore this for a home page? Because I add it then run the analysis again and get this? Appropriate Use of Rel Canonical Moderate fix <dl> <dt>Canonical URL</dt> <dd>"http://www.ensoplastics.com/index.html"</dd> <dt>Explanation</dt> <dd>If the canonical tag is pointing to a different URL, engines will not count this page as the reference resource and thus, it won't have an opportunity to rank. Make sure you're targeting the right page (if this isn't it, you can reset the target above) and then change the canonical tag to reference that URL.</dd> <dt>Recommendation</dt> <dd>We check to make sure that IF you use canonical URL tags, it points to the right page. If the canonical tag points to a different URL, engines will not count this page as the reference resource and thus, it won't have an opportunity to rank. If you've not made this page the rel=canonical target, change the reference to this URL. NOTE: For pages not employing canonical URL tags, this factor does not apply.</dd> <dd>So do I add it or not? If I don't I get a lower page rating if I take it off I get a higher page rating with room for improvement. </dd> </dl>
On-Page Optimization | | ENSO0 -
Rel Canonical
Hi Folks I have 77 Rel Canonical warning, and mostly confuse me. Mainly because they seem to be the exact link I would expect for that page. So I'm not so sure why they have been flagged.... two examples below Any thoughts or tips? (please 🙂 ) | Page Title
On-Page Optimization | | PHDAustralia68
URL | Tag value | Page Authority | Linking Root Domains | | BlueTea: New Sydney Kitchen Designs Company, Renovations, Colour Designs http://bluetea.com.au/ bluetea.com.au/ 37 18 Blog | Blue Tea http://bluetea.com.au/2010/10/?cat=15 | bluetea.com.au/category/blog/ | 1 | 0 |
| |0