Guarantee SEO success Duplicate content is a problem for lots of sites, frequently the site owner does not even realize his/her site has this problem and is being penalized by Google and other search engines, whilst loosing valuable PageRank. Let me explain this in more detail and offer you a simple solution;
Canonicalization
Let's get the terminology out of the way first. Canonicalization is computers speak and means the same page can be represented in over one way. For instance, you may not be aware your home page may have the following versions;
. vvv.example(dot)com
. example(dot)com
. vvv.example(dot)com/
. example(dot)com/
. vvv.example(dot)com/index.html
. example(dot)com/index.html
. vvv.example(dot)com/home.aspx
. example(dot)com/home.aspx
Is this a problem? YES! Should you care about it? YES!
Why is duplicate content a problem?
If Google indexes your site and your home page shows up several times, Google will think you have duplicate content and it will penalizes you for having duplicate content! Its plagiarism or old fashioned cheating, and you have to make an effort and avoid it at all costs. All your back links go to some of the above 8 versions of your homepage. Each version of your homepage will get its own ranking which dilutes the PageRank (PR) of your preferred (canonical) page. Why share the linking-love with all these pages that are essentially the same?
How can you realize if you have a duplicate content problem?
Type into the Google search box: Site: example.com.au You can now find that Google has indexed more than one URL for your home page e.g.
. example(dot)com
. example(dot)com/home.htm
How do you solve Google having indexed some URLs which are essentially the same? Preferably you avoid having more than one version per page from the very beginning, so make sure you or your content management system (CMS) creates standardized URLs which are always identical.
Also make sure you are reliable yourself when it comes to linking internally and have all your preferred links in your sitemap.
Always use Google Webmaster Tools to tell the Google spider about your preferred URL. This is a free tool to use and works fine if you set it up from the start.
All this does not clean up all the non-canonical URLs you might have floating around though. If you have found that you have a duplicate content issue you can do a number of things. Best practice is to insert a canonical link element or set up a 301 redirect.
Canonical Link Element
Insert a canonical link element into the head section of your site. This is a good solution if you do not want to cross domain names. It tells the search engines which of the various URLs you want to be the 'official' URL. It looks like this: It is a great solution for when you or your web developers do not have time to set up a permanent 301 redirect.
Permanent (301) redirect
You can also use an everlasting (301) redirect from all your non-canonical pages to your canonical or preferred pages. It is identical to the canonical link element, but it can cross domains. So you can redirect www(dot)anotherexample(dot)com to www(dot)example(dot)com.
posted by India Seos
@ 2:31 PM
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