Will Google Visit Non-Canonicalized Page Again and Return Its Page's Original Ranking?
-
I have 2 questions about canonicalization.
1. Will Google ever visit Page A again if after it has been canonicalized to Page B?
2. If Google will still visit Page A and found that it is not canonicalizing to Page B already, will the original rankings and traffic of Page A returned to the way before it's canonicalized?
Thanks.
-
Hi Guys...sorry, one more question here.
About the recovery of rankings for canonicalized page after removing canonical tag, the theories seem very true but are there any case studies or direct experiences which proves these theories?
-
Thank you for your advice! Greatly appreciated
-
Thanks. That answers my query.
-
If the canonicalization is accepted by Google and there is no additional UGC on Page A, then no Page A will not rank.
If the canonicalization is not accepted (i.e. the pages have enough differences to where Google does not feel the pages should be canonicalized) then Page A can rank.
If the pages are identical, but there is some unique content on Page A such as a comment, then Page A can rank for the unique comment.
-
One more question. If page A has been canonicalized to page B, will Page A rank ? As according to search engines, Page B is the preferred page Now. I know it may seem innocuous query to you. But would like to know ?
-
Didn't expected such a detailed explanation to my query :). Thanks a lot Ryan for making SEO seems less daunting to me with your insightful answers.
-
Search engines follow links. If there are links on a page, then Google wants to know what is on the page. There are many reasons to visit a canonicalized page.
1. Canonical links are a suggestion. Google does not have to agree, and may choose to index the page rather then follow through to the canonical version of the page.
2. Sometimes two pages can have the same core content, but different UGC. Let's say you write a great article on SEO and post it on your site. Later, you post the article on the SEOmoz blog with an agreement that the SEOmoz version of the article offers a canonical link to your page.
When people read the SEOmoz article, they may offer comments (UGC) which offer questions, answers, links, etc. All of these comments are only on the SEOmoz page, not the page on your site. Depending on what a user searches for, the result could be the SEOmoz page, even though it has a canonical link to the page on your site.
3. As you shared, the canonical tag can change. A search engine needs to check to see if the canonical tag changed, or a noindex tag has been added, or any of the links on the page have changed, etc. Also the content could change as well.
-
O.k, so Google will visit the page A, but what purpose does it serve ? The original page is B now. Just curious to know...
-
Will Google ever visit Page A again if after it has been canonicalized to Page B?
Yes. Google will visit your pages by following links even if the page is canonicalized. I would imagine they may choose to visit the page less frequently (that is just my guess) but they do revisit the page.
If Google will still visit Page A and found that it is not canonicalizing to Page B already, will the original rankings and traffic of Page A returned to the way before it's canonicalized?
Yes BUT I can only assume the page was canonicalized for a reason, and that reason being the content was duplicated. If you have a duplicate content issue you will not be happy with the result. If you remove the canonical tag because you have modified the page's content to be unique, then you can expect the page to be indexed normally.
It may take up to a month for all the ranking to settle for the page, but it will happen.
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
-
Does creating too many parent pages damage my website's SEO?
I need to know how to keep my website structure well organised and ensure Google still recognises the key pages. I work for a travel company which needs to give customers various pieces of information on our website and this needs to be well organised in terms of structure. For example, customers need information on airport pick-ups and drop-offs for each of our destinations but this isn't something that needs to rank on Google. Logically for site structure would be to create a parent page: thedragontrip.com/transfers/india Is creating parent pages for unimportant content a bad idea?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | nicolewretham1 -
Why Would My Page Have a Higher PA and DA, Links & On-Page Grade & Still Not Rank?
The Search Term is "Alcohol Ink" and our client has a better page authority, domain authority, links to the page, and on-page grade than those in the SERP for spaces 5-10 and we're not even ranked in the top 51+ according to Moz's tracker. The only difference I can see is that our URL doesn't use the exact text like some of the 5-10 do. However, regardless of this, our on-page grade is significantly higher than the rest of them. The one thing I found was that there were two links to the page (that we never asked for) that had a spam score in the low 20's and another in the low 30's. Does anyone have any recommendations on how to maybe get around this? Certainly, a content campaign and linking campaign around this could also help but I'm kind of scratching my head. The client is reputable, with a solid domain age and well recognized in the space so it's not like it's a noob trying to get in out of nowhere.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Omnisye0 -
Inner pages not ranking well
Hi Guys I'm currently working on a website and scratching my head. It seems certain pages of the website rank absolutely fine. The homepage, certain pages on footer and the primary navigation pages are ranking fine. Pages, however, that sit on the inner navigation (e.g 3rd level navigational pages) - do not rank well at all. Looking in webmaster, it is apparent these are fluctuating in and out of the Google index - sometimes they are there - sometimes not. I fully understand issues with Google penalties but I don't believe this is case as other pages are ranking fine. Link building has been done to these pages but to no effect. We have also increased internal links e.g by putting the pages on the footer - but still nothing. One thing that may impact the ranking is possibly the URL structure The website URLs are all www.Example.com/widgets - even if they sit on the 3rd level of the user navigation. Could this be a reason why? Would it help if 3rd level pages had the URL structure www.Example.com/services/widgets ? If anyone can provide help that would be great!!! thanks, Duncan
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | CayenneRed890 -
When Mobile and Desktop sites have the same page URLs, how should I handle the 'View Desktop Site' link on a mobile site to ensure a smooth crawl?
We're about to roll out a mobile site. The mobile and desktop URLs are the same. User Agent determines whether you see the desktop or mobile version of the site. At the bottom of the page is a 'View Desktop Site' link that will present the desktop version of the site to mobile user agents when clicked. I'm concerned that when the mobile crawler crawls our site it will crawl both our entire mobile site, then click 'View Desktop Site' and crawl our entire desktop site as well. Since mobile and desktop URLs are the same, the mobile crawler will end up crawling both mobile and desktop versions of each URL. Any tips on what we can do to make sure the mobile crawler either doesn't access the desktop site, or that we can let it know what is the mobile version of the page? We could simply not show the 'View Desktop Site' to the mobile crawler, but I'm interested to hear if others have encountered this issue and have any other recommended ways for handling it. Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | merch_zzounds0 -
Ecommerce SEO - Indexed product pages are returning 404's due to product database removal. HELP!
Hi all, I recently took over an e-commerce start-up project from one of my co-workers (who left the job last week). This previous project manager had uploaded ~2000 products without setting up a robot.txt file, and as a result, all of the product pages were indexed by Google (verified via Google Webmaster Tool). The problem came about when he deleted the entire product database from our hosting service, godaddy and performed a fresh install of Prestashop on our hosting plan. All of the created product pages are now gone, and I'm left with ~2000 broken URL's returning 404's. Currently, the site does not have any products uploaded. From my knowledge, I have to either: canonicalize the broken URL's to the new corresponding product pages, or request Google to remove the broken URL's (I believe this is only a temporary solution, for Google honors URL removal request for 90 days) What is the best way to approach this situation? If I setup a canonicalization, would I have to recreate the deleted pages (to match the URL address) and have those pages redirect to the new product pages (canonicalization)? Alex
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | byoung860 -
On Page vs Off Page - Which Has a Greater Effect on Rankings?
Hi Mozzers, My site will be migrating to a new domain soon, and I am not sure how to spend my time. Should I be optimizing our content for keywords, improving internal linking, and writing new content - or should I be doing link building for our current domain (or the new one)? Is there a certain ratio that determines rankings which can help me prioritize these to-dos?, such as 70:30 in favor of link-building? Thanks for any help you can offer!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Travis-W0 -
End of March we migrated our site over to HubSpot. We went from page 3 on Google to non existent. Still found on page 2 of Yahoo and Bing. Beyond frustrated...HELP PLEASE "www.vortexpartswashers.com"
End of March we migrated our site over to HubSpot. We went from page 3 on Google to non existent. Still found on page 2 of Yahoo and Bing under same keywords " parts washers" Beyond frustrated...HELP PLEASE "www.vortexpartswashers.com"
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | mhart0 -
Why my blog ranks poorly on Google ?
Hi 🙂 I need help for my blog, my blog http://www.dota2club.com/ for many keywords it is not in first 50 results on google. What am i doing wrong ? Can you tell me what errors / mistakes i have made and what can i do to improve my blog ? Thank you !!!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | wolfinjo0