Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Duplicate page titles on Ecommerce
-
Hi,
My question is in reference to an E-commerce site- Our SEO MOZ scan is showing many errors for Duplicates- such as Duplicate titles -
The majority of these are on the products map- and the page titles are
Products Map :: Company Name
How do we get correct this or does Google not penalize for it?
Thanks.
-
That's what I'd do. Just make sure to set up a 301 redirect from all of those pages to the homepage, so you don't lose any visitors with the change.
-
Kristina,
thanks for continuing input-
We have an XML site map- Knowing that combined with what you said- It seems that the answer is to just take that products_map.php off the site?
Thanks again!!
-
Hi Frank,
I would change the page titles to:
Tommeys Mardi Gras | [letter] | [page #]
For example, http://www.toomeys-mardigras.com/products_map.php?symb=C&page=4's page title would be:
Tommeys Mardi Gras | C | 4
That'll at least make them different, and show the structure of your site better. Generally, you want the page title first, then the brand, but since most people aren't going to search for the letter C, I put those last.
But, in general, it's probably better not to have massive indexes like this on your site. The category pages are much better for search engine optimization, and when you have both category pages and alphabetical lists, you're duplicating that content.
-
Kristina,
Thanks for the reply- Here are some of the links that are showing as errors for duplicate page titles.
http://www.toomeys-mardigras.com/products_map.php?symb=M&page=5
http://www.toomeys-mardigras.com/products_map.php?symb=Y
http://www.toomeys-mardigras.com/products_map.php?symb=C&page=4
http://www.toomeys-mardigras.com/products_map.php?symb=C&page=2
Plus many more..
They all have the page title: Products Map :: Toomey's Mardi Gras
Looking forward to your advice.
Thank you!
Frank
-
Hi Frank,
I think that the link you shared is locked for you personally. Do you mind sharing your website URL so we can look it up in Open Site Explorer ourselves?
Google doesn't penalize for duplicate content per se, but it'll generally hurt your rankings:
- If your issue is that you have identical pages with different URLs, leading to duplicate page titles, your link building efforts are going to be split. Google will only rank one of your duplicate pages on its results page, and that page will be weaker because some backlinks go to the duplicate.
- If the issue is that you have different pages that happen to have the same title, both could rank, but the pages won't be easily distinguishable from each other on the results page. It's much better to have a unique page title so that searchers can see what they're going to get from your page.
Hope this helps,
Kristina
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
-
How to add titles to Pardot landing pages
I have 5 URLs that are "missing titles" however, all 5 are landing pages that were created in Pardot. how would I go about adding the missing title? Would I need to add it on our website platform or in Pardot?
Technical SEO | | cbriggs0 -
Duplicate titles from hreflang variations
Hi, I am working on a large global site which has around 9 different language variations. We have setup the hreflang tags and referenced the corresponding content as follows: (We have not implemented a version X-default reference, as we felt it was not necessary) Using DeepCrawl and Search Console, we can see that these language variations are causing duplicate title issues. Many of them. My assumption was that the hreflang would have alleviated this issue and informed Google what is going on, however i wanted to see if anyone has any experience with this kind of thing before. It would be good to understand what the best practice approach is to deal with the problem. Is it even an issue at all, or just the tools being over-sensitive? Thank you in advance.
Technical SEO | | NickG-1230 -
Create Page Titles from H1 using Yoast?
I'm working on a site that has 280 blog posts that have either been migrated from an old CMS site or created on the Dev version of the new WordPress site. We've written 280 unique meta descriptions so they don't truncate but it there a quick way I can export the current H1s and then import them into Yoast so they are set as the Page Titles? I've written unique Page Titles and meta descriptions for all the Service and Products page and just want a way to speed up the blog posts as their H1s are really good and what I would use as Page Titles anyway. Any help, greatly appreciated!
Technical SEO | | Marketing_Today0 -
Canonical for duplicate pages in ecommerce site and the product out of stock
I’m an SEO for an ecommerce site that sells shoes I have duplicate pages for different colors of the same product (unique URL for each color), Conventionally I have added canonical tags for each page, which direct to a specific product URL My question is what happens when a product which the googlbot is direct to, is out of stock but is still listed in the canonical tag ?
Technical SEO | | shoesonline0 -
Duplicate content on Product pages for different product variations.
I have multiple colors of the same product, but as a result I'm getting duplicate content warnings. I want to keep these all different products with their own pages, so that the color can be easily identified by browsing the category page. Any suggestions?
Technical SEO | | bobjohn10 -
We have set up 301 redirects for pages from an old domain, but they aren't working and we are having duplicate content problems - Can you help?
We have several old domains. One is http://www.ccisound.com - Our "real" site is http://www.ccisolutions.com The 301 redirect from the old domain to the new domain works. However, the 301-redirects for interior pages, like: http://www.ccisolund.com/StoreFront/category/cd-duplicators do not work. This URL should redirect to http://www.ccisolutions.com/StoreFront/category/cd-duplicators but as you can see it does not. Our IT director supplied me with this code from the HT Access file in hopes that someone can help point us in the right direction and suggest how we might fix the problem: RewriteCond%{HTTP_HOST} ccisound.com$ [NC] RewriteRule^(.*)$ http://www.ccisolutions.com/$1 [R=301,L] Any ideas on why the 301 redirect isn't happening? Thanks all!
Technical SEO | | danatanseo0 -
Handling 301s: Multiple pages to a single page (consolidation)
Been scouring the interwebs and haven't found much information on redirecting two serparate pages to a single new page. Here is what it boils down to: Let's say a website has two pages, both with good page authority of products that are becoming fazed out. The products, Widget A and Widget B, are still popular search terms, but they are being combined into ONE product, Widget C. While Widget A and Widget B STILL have plenty to do with Widget C, Widget C is now the new page, the main focus page, and the page you want everyone to see and Google to recognize. Now, do I 301 Widget A and Widget B pages to Widget C, ALTHOUGH Widgets A and B previously had nothing to do with one another? (Remember, we want to try and keep some of that authority the two page have had.) OR do we keep Widget A and Widget B pages "alive", take them off the main navigation, and then put a "disclaimer" on the pages announcing they are now part of Widget C and link to Widget C? OR Should Widgets A and B page be canonicalized to Widget C? Again, keep in mind, widgets A and B previously were not similar, but NOW they are and result in Widget C. (If you are confused, we can provide a REAL work example of what we are talkinga about, but decided to not be specific to our industry for this.) Appreciate any and all thoughts on this.
Technical SEO | | JU19850 -
Nofollow and ecommerce cart/checkout pages
Hi!! Another noob question: Should I be nofollowing my site's cart and checkout pages? Or as SEs can't get to the checkout pages without either logging in or completing the form is it something I shouldn't worry about? Have read things saying both. Not sure which is correct. Thank you! Appreciate the help. Lynn
Technical SEO | | hiphound0