Are Google now indexing iFrames?
-
A client is pulling content through an iFrame, and when searching for a snippet of that exact content the page that is pulling the data is being indexed and not the iFrame page. Seen this before?
-
Yeah, I use iframes and if I want to be sure they are NOT indexed, I Just add a "noindex" tag. You may also want to add a "nofollow" tag to avoid spiders to follow links inside the frame. Using iframes may be a good idea to reduce the number of links on a page (Bruce Clay suggestion).
-
I've never seen it before, but like everyone here said, it's not a good idea.
This makes me wonder though:
1. Can you find the original page using a snippet? And if not:
2. Is the page contained in the iframe indexed? (Or better-phrased, is the page that is being framed "noindex"?)
It makes sense to me that if the framed page is noindex, that Google would index the content and attribute it to the page framing it.
One perfect example:
I embed videos using an iframe and then I make the video unlisted in YouTube. My embedded content is indexed and even displayed as a rich snippet....
-
I have noticed content within iFrames being indexed by google and text within those iFrames being attributed to the page/url that is hosting the iFrame. Not sure how often this applies. I avoid iFrames.
Merchant Circle uses them and their pages get credit for content in them.
-
It might have been covered but it does seem that google is ignoring iframes in relation to commets code posted on sites.for instance: our text cached version.: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:8IZ95GICp7AJ:gaveltek.com/seoblog/&hl=en&gl=us&strip=1
compare the page title to (use headers it easier)
www.gaveltek.com/seoblog the list "comments" and despite there being some the are not posted. However, I do believe general wordpress comments hold some weight. That is not to sayt that facebook comments do not, its just done via different metrics, like social, and trust, and egngagement.
Cheers
TODD
-
A good way to check is go to google.com and type in your full URL like this:
site:www.domain.com
Then you will be populated with your sites pages of course. Now there is a link there that says: "cache" and you can see what it cached.
I think they may be getting better at knowing what's in a iframe. Look at how many sites use facebook comments on the blog and how do you think thats ran? iframes. Do you remember google and adobe working together at reading .pdf's and flash.
The little magnifying glass has some cool technology behind it that I'm sure helped them know whats really on the site. Without getting to far off track I do feel like they are better at reading iframes. Just my .02c in this thread.
-
last thought... i've only ever used iframes in the aforementioned example. Not an ideal way to display your original content if you want it indexed.
-
It is very typical for Google to ignore iframes. I don't know the precise details of your situation but there are several reasons for iframing that might make sense - this is situational - so no hating!
-
you're an affiliate and using another offer (conversion form) that you have to iframe to generate leads, etc
-
you want to hide duplicate content that appears elsewhere on the site (although there are far more elegant ways to do this)
3)You're pulling video or other syndicated content from a publisher who wants to maintain control (ie not let you outrank them with their own content)
*** Remember that the iframed content can certainly be indexed but usually only from the destination URL's originating source. For example: You are www.insuranceaffilifate.com running an offer from www.insurance.com/form_1011 - you will most likely use insurance.com's form via iframe on your landing page. That form, unless it uses a NOINDEX meta tag, will likely be picked by the search engines from www.insurance.com but will be ignored on your site www.insuranceaffiliate.com.
Hope this helps.
-
-
I have to agree with Julich in that you should move the content to be truly located on www.domain.com instead of iframe.domain.com.
-
I totally agree that they shouldn't be using iFrames and it is part of my recommendations to them, but we need to work with what we have at the moment.
So just to clarify, you would say that www.domain.com which is pulling the data through from iframe.domain.com would rank?
Even though all the content except the navigation, footer, etc is on iframe.domain.com.
-
Normally, it would be www.domain.com (unless it doesn't provide any content outside the iFrame).
But it is not abnormal to also see iframe.domain.com in the SERPS, since it may have some backlinks pointing to it.
Anyway, using iframes is a weird technique and I recommend you merge those into www.domain.com if possible (and don't forget to do some 301 redirections to tell Google your pages have definitely moved to www.domain.com).
-
OK, so if www.domain.com was pulling through content from iframe.domain.com which domain would you expect to rank?
I would personally expect iframe.domain.com to rank as that is actually where the content is and the www.domain.com provides the link to that page. I am currently seeing both domains rank, which has lead me to ask the question.
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
-
Desktop & Mobile XML Sitemap Submitted But Only Desktop Sitemap Indexed On Google Search Console
Hi! The Problem We have submitted to GSC a sitemap index. Within that index there are 4 XML Sitemaps. Including one for the desktop site and one for the mobile site. The desktop sitemap has 3300 URLs, of which Google has indexed (according to GSC) 3,000 (approx). The mobile sitemap has 1,000 URLs of which Google has indexed 74 of them. The pages are crawlable, the site structure is logical. And performing a Landing Page URL search (showing only Google/Organic source/medium) on Google Analytics I can see that hundreds of those mobile URLs are being landed on. A search on mobile for a longtail keyword from a (randomly selected) page shows a result in the SERPs for the mobile page that judging by GSC has not been indexed. Could this be because we have recently added rel=alternate tags on our desktop pages (and of course corresponding canonical ones on mobile). Would Google then 'not index' rel=alternate page versions? Thanks for any input on this one. PmHmG
Technical SEO | | AlisonMills0 -
No Longer Indexed in Google (Says Redirected)
Just recently my page, http:/www./waikoloavacationrentals.com/mauna-lani-terrace, was no longer indexed by google. The sub pages from it still are. I have not done anything sketchy with the page. When I went into the google fetch it says that it is redirected. Any ideas what is this all about? Here is what it says for the fetch: Http/1.1 301 moved permanently
Technical SEO | | RobDalton
Server: nginx
Date: Tue, 07 Mar 2017 00:43:26GMT
Content-Type: text/html
Content-Length: 178
Connection: keep-alive
Keep-Alive: timeout=20
Location: http://waikoloavacationrentals.com/mauna-lani-terrace <title>301 moved permanently</title> <center> 301 moved permanently </center> <center>nginx</center>0 -
Is there a way to get Google to index more of your pages for SEO ranking?
We have a 100 page website, but Google is only indexing a handful of pages for organic rankings. Is there a way to submit to have more pages considered? I have optimized meta data and get good Moz "on-page graders" or the pages & terms that I am trying to connect....but Google doesn't seem to pick them up for ranking. Any insight would be appreciated!
Technical SEO | | JulieALS0 -
Web page is showing up on Google but doesn't show when it was cached, so is it indexed?
Hey everyone So I created a new page on a WordPress website, it was live for a few hours till I changed my mind & switched it back to a draft. Just out of curiosity I did the Site:www.example.com/Example search on Google to see if it had been indexed & apparently it had but when I click on cached to see what time it got indexed at exactly it's showing me an error. So does this mean it is indexed or not?
Technical SEO | | conversiontactics0 -
Google indexing less url's then containded in my sitemap.xml
My sitemap.xml contains 3821 urls but Google (webmaster tools) indexes only 1544 urls. What may be the cause? There is no technical problem. Why does Google index less URLs then contained in my sitemap.xml?
Technical SEO | | Juist0 -
Site not indexing correctly
I am trying to figure out what is going on with my site listings. Google is only displaying my title and url - no description. You can see it when you search for Franchises for Sale. The site is www.franchisesolutions.com. Why could this happen? Also I saw a big drop off in a handful of keyword rankings today. Could this be related?
Technical SEO | | franchisesolutions0 -
Google rankings tanked....Now what?
We just experience a drop in Google rankings, some pretty harsh, across all of the keywords we have been ranking greater than 50. I’m a noob at SEO, but a technical noob so I started doing my home work. I’ve seen references to the “google dance” and “Honeymoon”, but this hit seems to have effected competitors too. Everyone seems re-ranked with several junk directories jumping up more than I think they should. Has anyone else seen this? Is this more Google algorithm adjustment or a natural settling based on our new SEO attempts? In either case, what should we do next? I know there is a holistic approach and everything is important however, we need bang for the buck at this point to before we start bleeding. One or two next steps? Our industry is residential cleaning and the site is www.bitabliss.com Here is a little history:
Technical SEO | | BitABliss
The site that’s been running for about 2 years. We initially put up a very basic “throw something up” site without much thought of SEO except for some basics and a long tail approach with a blog, FaceBook and Twitter. We launched an updated site on Feb 23. with new theme and this time some, “on page” work to better hit the basics. The site structure was kept the same and we added on some more localized content in hopes to take advantage of local searches. Also, enter SEOMoz to get us tracking things (Yay MOZ). Until yesterday, we had been doing pretty well in some of our target cites even with the more basic site. When we launched the new site focusing on page titles, descriptions and page content, and a few directory attempts. We started to see some incremental growth. It seemed to me that this kind of growth meant that we were doing the right things and doing a better job than some of the other sites. Any way, yesterday we got smacked down. This seems too harsh for a for the slow increases we have seen over the last month. Any thoughts you have would be great appreciated. Thanks! -Shawn1 -
HTML and no index, follow
I’m just learning about HTML and I was wondering can a tag be put into a dynamic HTML page?
Technical SEO | | EricVallee340