Keyword appearing on almost every slug of product pages = over-optimizatio
-
Hello all,
I have an online store, let's say for example I sell forks of all kinds and colors. So naturally, I have 'product category' pages with titles and slugs like:
Big forks
Small forks
Plastic forks
Red fork
etc..And plenty of product pages with slugs and H1 like:
Small red fork
Large plastic fork
18th-century fork
etc...Some category pages are well-ranked, others are not, the same goes for product pages. The problem is that for the main keyword, 'fork' (exact query in the search console), my site is completely absent. Google should logically have referenced my homepage (which has links to all categories) for this main keyword. I have also optimized the page for it, without overdoing it.
I wonder if it's not because I have a lot of pages with 'fork' in the slug, and perhaps Google thinks it's too much (even though it's logical for this word to be present in all product pages because it's an essential word to describe the product).
I wonder if I should not modify half of my product pages to remove the word 'fork' from the slug...(only from the slug, without touching the H1 because removing the word 'fork' would remove its meaning).
Do you have any experiences with this kind of issue? I wouldn't ask the question if my homepage was behind the competition, but it's completely absent.
Thanks
-
Looks like you might be facing over-optimization with the frequent appearance of keywords in your product page slugs. This could potentially affect your site's SEO negatively. Consider diversifying your slugs to maintain a natural balance and avoid penalization from search engines.
-
Using too many of the same keywords in slugs on multiple product pages can lead to over-optimization and negatively impact your site's search engine rankings
). Excessive use of keywords will look unnatural to search engines and can result in penalties for spamming. By diversifying your keywords and focusing on creating relevant and user-friendly slugs, you can improve your overall SEO performance. -
Thank you for your insight! It's important to strike a balance between optimization and user experience. I'll review the keyword distribution across our product pages to ensure we maintain a natural and user-friendly approach.
-
@Veptune
Hello,
Thank you for sharing your concern. It's not uncommon for websites to face challenges with keyword optimization and ranking, especially when dealing with product categories and pages.Regarding your situation, it's possible that the abundance of "fork" keywords in your slugs could be impacting your site's visibility for the main keyword "fork." While having descriptive slugs is important for users and search engines, it's also crucial to strike a balance.
Before making any changes to your product pages, I would recommend conducting further analysis to understand why your homepage isn't ranking for the main keyword. This could involve reviewing your site's overall SEO strategy, examining competitors' strategies, and assessing the quality and relevance of your homepage content and backlinks.
Additionally, consider exploring other optimization opportunities such as improving internal linking structure, enhancing meta tags, and creating high-quality content that targets relevant keywords.
Ultimately, it's essential to approach any modifications carefully and monitor the impact on your site's performance over time. Consulting with an experienced SEO professional could also provide valuable insights tailored to your specific situation.
Best of luck with your optimization efforts!
Warm regards, MrOSMANI
-
Hello,
The "fork" is a relevant keyword, but it's quite broad.
-
Users searching for "fork" could be looking for information (e.g., history of forks), buying a specific type of fork (e.g., disposable forks), or browsing a variety of forks.
-
Analyze your search console data to understand what specific terms users are searching for to find your products. Optimize your content and titles for these terms while still incorporating "fork" where relevant.
-
Having high-quality backlinks from relevant websites can significantly improve your ranking for competitive keywords like "fork."
Warm Regards
Rahul Gupta
Suvidit Academy
Digital Marketing Course, Mentorship & Training -
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
-
Unsolved Should I combine pages?
Hi, Im not sure of the correct route to take here... We are a training provider and I manage the website. The main course offered is the transport manager CPC. Currently, I have a "catch all" landing page which links to each different course option: Landing page > Classroom Online Self study Distance learning The main keyword revolves around "transport manager cpc" I want searchers to land on the online page is they search "online transport manager CPC" for example but I think its confusing Google. I'm wondering if I should de-index the store pages (although some perform very well) and increase the content on the main landing page to rank for every related keyword on that page. Initially, I wanted to devalue the landing page in favor of the store pages but I'm unsure if that's the right way to go. I've stripped out the bulk of the keywords and content and shifted it to each individual page. but as above, Im now unsure if that's the right route to take. Any help would be greatly appreciated 👍 Thanks
On-Page Optimization | | dunbavand
Rich0 -
Pagination for product page reviews
Hi, I am looking to add pagination on product pages (they have lots of reviews on the page). I am considering using rel="next/prev, to connect the series of review pages to the main product page. I unfortunately don't have a view-all page for these reviews or the option to get one - the reviews refresh on the same product page (by clicking whatever number page of reviews). This means each page has the exact same description content and everything else, but with different reviews. In this case is rel=next a good option? The format currently would be: On example.com/product link rel="next" href="http://example.com/product?review-p2" On example.com/product?review-p2 link rel="prev" href="http://example.com/product, link rel="next" href="http://example.com/product?review-p3 etc. Would this be a good format for product page reviews? I see rel=nextprev commonly used on ecommerce category/list pages but not really on the paginated reviews on product pages, so I thought I would see if anyone has advice on how best to solve this. I'm also wondering if it would be best to not combine this with a canonical tag on all the different review pages pointing to the product page, seeing as the reviews are actually different (despite the rest of the content being identical). I am hoping to pick up longer tail traffic from this, I figure by connecting the pages and not using canonicals that this way I could get more traffic from the phrases used in the reviews. By leaving out the canonicals, is it possible a user searching for phrases that might be deeper in the series, to land on, say, ?review-p4? Any thoughts if this would drive more traffic? Thanks!.
On-Page Optimization | | pikka0 -
Two keywords in one page
Hi guys, I have a question...is it possible to posicionate two keywords in one only page? If yes, how would it be the process so that Google take note of that action/s. How many criteria/keywords are recommended to positionate in one site? Thanks all
On-Page Optimization | | juanmiguelcr0 -
ECommerce Product Meta Descriptions vs. Product Descriptions
Wondering if using on-page product descriptions as the individual product meta descriptions is a best practice for an eCommerce site? Instead of writing two product descriptions (one regular and one meta), I am thinking if the product copy is SEO rich, we'd be good to use just the one for both purposes. Thoughts? Ideas? Suggestions? Seems that many companies follow this practice. Thanks!
On-Page Optimization | | kennyrowe1 -
Dupelicate content home page and custom page question
I am working on a website that got hit by the penguin update. Didn't get hit terribly bad, but dropped from number one to number 9. As I'm going through the pages, the theme and content is a mess. To give an example, say the site is about custom colored marbles. The main page content covers custom colored marbles, custom promotional marbles, custom glass marbles, etc. Custom colored marbles is mentioned and covered on all pages, which I am going back and trying to make each page theme specific. There is also a custom page, so I am at a cross roads on how best to employ the focus of the custom page and the home page. I am thinking the home page should emphasize colored marbles, and the custom page should emphasize custom colored marbles. My fear is that making such a drastic change will bounce the site completely off front page and that it will take time for the custom page to come up in rankings. AS it stands now I am confused as to how it even ranks on first page as there's two pages with custom colored marbles emphasis. Id like to clean this up as much as possible so there are no big hits with future google updates, but I don't want the site to drop off either as that would be hard to explain to the owner. Yeah, we are cleaning up your site and making it google compliant and in so doing you no longer rank on first page. That won't put food on the table. Thanks for any advise on this.
On-Page Optimization | | anthonytjm0 -
Why is on-page optimisation not showing all my keywords
Why is on-page optimisation not showing all my keywords, it is reporting on only about 10 of the 40
On-Page Optimization | | yours2share0 -
Links to Product pages
Hello all, I am still rather new to SEO and learning a lot every day. I do have a question. On our product search result pages (example http://shop.ferguson.com/search/bathroom-lighting)
On-Page Optimization | | Ferguson
It is currently set up so the image, text, price etc of a product is linking to that product page. Our question is, if we were to link the image and the product name - will this be seen as two links to the same page? Is this a bad thing having multiple links to the same page? I searched around to see how other ecommerce sites have similar pages setup and it seems they link the image and also the product name, and the description is not click-able, which allows a user to "Highlight" the text (this is not possible on ours) Which would be to correct approach for SEO as well as User Interface, the way we have it set up, or by going with the method of the question I asked, Thank you for any information on this! Nick0 -
Old pages
I have a site where I have 5,000 new products each year, I never waned to deleted the old pages due to links pointing to them and keywords. But I now have 20,000 plus pages, does having that many pages spread out my link juice or does it effect me in any other ways over having a site with 5,000 pages or should I keep not deleting old pages so I dont loose any links? Along with that I currently do not link to my old pages from my site so Im guessing google does not get to them very often if at all, if you agree to still keep them should I link to them somewhere? Because the products are not that simiiar and they do bring added value I dont think canonical would work here
On-Page Optimization | | Dirty0