"Duplicate without user-selected canonical” - impact to SERPs

[Alex_Pisa]

Hello, we are facing some issues on our project and we would like to get some advice.

Scenario
We run several websites (www.brandName.com, www.brandName.be, www.brandName.ch, etc..) all in French language . All sites have nearly the same content & structure, only minor text (some headings and phone numbers due to different countries are different). There are many good quality pages, but again they are the same over all domains.

Goal
We want local domains (be, ch, fr, etc.) to appear in SERPs and also comply with Google policy of local language variants and/or canonical links.

Current solution
Currently we don’t use canonicals, instead we use rel="alternate" hreflang="x-default":

<link rel="alternate" hreflang="fr-BE" href="https://www.brandName.be/" />
<link rel="alternate" hreflang="fr-CA" href="https://www.brandName.ca/" />
<link rel="alternate" hreflang="fr-CH" href="https://www.brandName.ch/" />
<link rel="alternate" hreflang="fr-FR" href="https://www.brandName.fr/" />
<link rel="alternate" hreflang="fr-LU" href="https://www.brandName.lu/" />
<link rel="alternate" hreflang="x-default" href="https://www.brandName.com/" />

Issue
After Googlebot crawled the websites we see lot of “Duplicate without user-selected canonical” in Coverage/Excluded report (Google Search Console) for most domains. When we inspect some of those URLs we can see Google has decided that canonical URL points to (example):

User-declared canonical: None
Google-selected canonical: …same page, but on a different domain

Strange is that even those URLs are on Google and can be found in SERPs.

Obviously Google doesn’t know what to make of it. We noticed many websites in the same scenario use a self-referencing approach which is not really “kosher” - we are afraid if we use the same approach we can get penalized by Google.

Question: What do you suggest to fix the “Duplicate without user-selected canonical” in our scenario?

Any suggestions/ideas appreciated, thanks. Regards.

[ezkrt]

The issue of "Duplicate without user-selected canonical" refers to situations where there are multiple identical or very similar pages on a website, but a canonical tag has not been explicitly set to indicate which version should be considered the preferred or original version by search engines.

The impact of this issue on search engine results pages (SERPs) can be negative for several reasons:

Keyword Dilution: When search engines encounter multiple versions of the same or similar content, they might have a hard time determining which page to rank for a particular keyword. This can lead to keyword dilution, where the authority and relevance of the content is spread across multiple pages instead of being concentrated on a single page.

Page Selection Uncertainty: Without a canonical tag to guide search engines, they may choose to index and display a version of the page that is not the most relevant or valuable to users. This can result in users landing on less optimal pages from their search queries.

Ranking Competition: Duplicate content can cause internal competition between your own pages for rankings. Instead of consolidating ranking signals onto one page, they get divided among duplicates, potentially leading to lower overall rankings for all versions.

Crawling and Indexing Issues: Search engine bots may spend more time crawling and indexing duplicate content, which could lead to inefficient use of their resources. This might affect how often your new or updated content gets indexed.

To address the "Duplicate without user-selected canonical" issue and mitigate its impact on SERPs:

Implement Canonical Tags: Set up canonical tags on duplicate or similar pages to indicate the preferred version. This guides search engines to consolidate ranking signals and direct traffic to the correct page.

301 Redirects: If possible, redirect duplicate pages to a single, canonical version using 301 redirects. This not only consolidates ranking signals but also ensures that users are directed to the most relevant content.

Consolidate Content: Consider merging similar pages into a single, comprehensive page. This helps avoid duplication issues and improves the overall user experience.

Use Noindex Tags: If some duplicate pages are not crucial for SEO or user experience, you can add a noindex meta tag to prevent search engines from indexing those pages.

Monitor and Update: Regularly audit your website for duplicate content and ensure that new content is properly canonicalized to prevent future occurrences.

By addressing the "Duplicate without user-selected canonical" issue, you can help improve the clarity and accuracy of how your content appears in SERPs, potentially leading to better rankings and a more effective SEO strategy.

[jeffmoore121]

@GeorgeJohn727
Duplicate without user-selected canonical

[jeffmoore121]

Understanding 'Duplicate without user-selected canonical' is crucial for optimizing SERPs. This issue can lead to content duplication concerns, potentially affecting search engine rankings. Just as addressing this matter ensures streamlined search results, exploring the 'best online betting sites in India' exemplifies how selecting the right canonical source enhances visibility and credibility in the online domain.

[Alex_Pisa]

@georgejohn727

1. Even if this error occurs it doesn't mean Google ignores the pages - it can and in our case they appear in SERPs.
2. Duplicate pages carry value in sense that there is a slight alteration for local market - contact info, different pricing, etc. So 90% of the page is same on national
   domains, but only slight part differs.

[GeorgeJohn727]

@alex_pisa
The error "Duplicate without user-selected canonical” indicates that Google found duplicate URLs that are not canonicalized to a preferred version. Google didn't index these duplicate URLs and assigned a canonical version on its own.

How to fix this issue

Should these pages even exist? If the answer to this is no, simply remove these pages and return a HTTP status code 410.

If these pages have a purpose, then ask yourself whether they
carry any value:

• If yes, then canonicalize them to the preferred version of the URL. Need some inspiration where to canonicalize to? See which URL Google finds most relevant using the URL Inspection tool(opens in a new tab). If Google's listing PDF files for your site, canonicalize them through the HTTP header.

• If these pages don't carry any value, then make sure to apply the noindex directive through the meta robots tag or X-Robots-Tag HTTP Header.