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I had our web development company implement the rel-canonical tag on all pages of our website to get rid of the duplicate content months ago. However, when I use the On Page optimizer tool (in previous version) it would tell me I'm not using the rel-canonical tag correctly on the page I was grading and when I untagged use rel-canonical tag in our CMS (which was pointing to the correct page) my grade would go to an A. Now with the new version it says I'm using it wrong either way, when I have the tag used in my CMS and everything else is good I have a B, but one I click to not use Rel-canonical tag I have a C. Both ways it shows up in On-page tool without a check in Apprpriate Use of Rel Canonical. I've attached pictures. In C version it says - Canonical URL "/info/solutions/" and "/info/solutions/" In B version: Canonical URL "/info/solutions/" What am I doing wrong and how do i fix this? Because ALL of my grades have dropped to Bs and Cs. Thanks! iklEHOjJLZE4966 [URL]]([URL=http://imgur.com/5BYcV][IMG]http://i.imgur.com/5BYcV.jpg[/IMG][/URL]) 5BYcV

I've gotten confused when it comes to the Competitive Analysis Report in the Web App. I track in my own spreadsheet how many backlinks I accumulate. However, I had thought that the Competitive Analysis report would do that as well. But each month, the numbers of Total LInks- through Linking c-blocks changes up and down drastically. I clicked HELP to try and understand what each of these means, but could you please explain them to me? I was under the impression that External Followed Links are the ones I was going after, however, shouldn't my records match with the one in the web app? Somehow I went from 786 ext followed links in January, to 867 in Feb, to 804 in March, to 804 in April, then 973 in May, and dropped to 791 2 weeks later...I don't think I'm understanding how the web app calculates these numbers. And how come Domain Authority seems to fluctuate up and down? So what would be the best way to track my progress in accumulating backlinks? Would it be my own spreadsheet or do you have a tool for this? Because I'd like to see how many I've gotten since January, but don't understand how to see this in the webapp. HELP!

Hi, I'm having some confusion with the rel-canonical tag. A few months ago we implemented the rel-canonical tag because we had many errors specifically duplicate page content come upon the SEOmoz web  app (mostly because we use tracking code). I had asked what to do about this and was advised by the SEOmoz web app to implement the rel-canonical tag. However, when I'm working on the Keyword Optimizer Tool, it always checks off that I'm using the rel-canonical tag improperly, and then when I go into our sites' CMS for that page and uncheck "Use Canonical URL", the keyword optimizer tool up's my grade for that correction/that I've made an improvement. So my question is if the page I'm working on is the one I want search engines to find, should I not be using the Canonical URL tag? Should the Canonical URL tag only be used on URL's with the tracking code?

When selecting which Keywords to optimize for, should I choose all words that I want us to move up for? Like that my company appears ranked for 5, 10, 42, 44, etc.? Or should I select a mix of some that rank well (top 1-2 pgs in Google) /rank near pg 5/ and some that aren't showing up in the top 50 yet? I don't want to waste my time optimizing for words I don't need to. Thanks!

I watched a tutorial on lynda.com about keyword research. And they said to use the All In Tittle trick to see how many pages on google are optimized for that keyword - do you reccommend using that method as well? In google, you type allintitle:"key word phrase" and the results show how many page titles are optimized for that phrase. Should I use this technique as well when choosing keywords?

I've done all of my keyword research, and now I'm selecting the KW's. In a previous question, seomoz had answered to pick a mix of easy, medium, and difficult words to rank for. How do I know which are easy, medium, difficult? The KW Difficulty Tool is not very specific. Is the level of difficulty related to where the phrase pops up for my company in search results? Are hard words ones that you do not already rank in the top 50 search results? When selecting KWs should I choose words that rank already in the top 50 that I'd like to try to move up? Or look for NEW phrases/words not in the top 50 results? Also, when entering KW phrases int the KW Difficulty Tool, Rank Tracker, and in Campaigns - do I need to use quotation marks if it is a phrase? I noticed that the KW difficulty tool has different results if you use quotation marks. Lastly, The person who did SEO before me has a list of KWs he optimized for, would it be valuable for me to include his words in my On-Page optimization efforts?