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        4. Whats with the backslash in the url adding as duplicate content?

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        Whats with the backslash in the url adding as duplicate content?

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        • Boogily
          Boogily last edited by

          Is this a bug or something that needs to be addressed? If so, just use a redirect?

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • Boogily
            Boogily @Lantec last edited by

            In the Pro account, it shows it as an error, but when looking at the live version, it redirects like it should. Must have been a hiccup in the crawl

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • Lantec
              Lantec last edited by

              Yeah you could either do a 301 redirect or just set the canonical tag in your page.

              Boogily 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
              • Boogily
                Boogily @RyanKent last edited by

                Thank you. It never surfaced until this week. I'll throw a redirect. Thanks

                1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                • RyanKent
                  RyanKent last edited by

                  Whats with the backslash in the url adding as duplicate content?

                  A backslash is viewed as a character. You could choose to present different content on a URL with a backslash versus without one.

                  mysite.com/testing does not necessarily offer the same content as mysite.com/testing/. Just because you choose to offer the same content on both pages does not mean search engines will understand your choice by default. Each URL is unique and viewed separately.

                  Is this a bug or something that needs to be addressed? If so, just use a redirect?

                  If you used the SEOmoz crawler and it notified you of an issue with some pages on your site which are viewed as duplicate content due to the addition of a backlash, it is not a bug. This issue should be addressed. A 301 redirect would likely be the best solution.

                  Boogily 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
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