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.
Mobile URL parameter (Redirection to desktop)
-
Hello,
We have a parallel mobile website and recently we implemented a link pointing to the desktop website. This redirect is happening via a javascript code and results in a url followed by this paramenter: ?m=off
Example:
http://www.m.website.com redirects to:
http://www.website.com/?m=offQuestions:
- Will the "http://www.website.com/?m=off" be considered duplicate content with "http://www.website.com" since they both return the same content?
- Is there any possibility that Google will take into consideration the url ending in "/?m=off"? How should we treat this new url?
- The webmaster tools URL parameter configuration at the moment isn't experiencing problems but should we submit the parameter anyway in order not to be indexed or should we wait first and see the error response?
- In case we should submit this for removal... what's the best way to do it? Like this?
- Parameter: ?m=off
- Does this parameter change page content seen by the user? - doesn't affect page content
Any help is much appreciated.
Thank you! -
Hi again!
It's normal that you feature very similar or even, duplicate content through both your mobile and desktop Website versions, what it is fundamental though is that you use the rel alternate and canonical tags that I shared with you in my previous answer. I've just checked your site and you're not using them.
If you correctly add these tags in your mobile and desktop URLs as I described in my previous answer you shouldn't have any content duplication or cannibalization issues in Google's search results.
Thanks!
Aleyda
-
Thanks Aleyda, mobile website development is something new for and since we developed this in house, we are not sure if we have done the right thing, if we have duplicate content. Is there any way we can check for duplicate content? Could you take a look at our website and its mobile version and let us know what you think?
Thank you!
-
Hi there!
It's ok (and needed) in these circumstances to use a parameter in the URL since you cannot simply add a direct link otherwise your mobile users who select to switch to the desktop version will end-up in a redirection loop. What you can do to avoid any type of content duplication issues in this type of settings is:
- Add a link rel="alternate" tag in each of the desktop URLs referring to their specific mobile URL versions and a link rel="canonical" tag in all of the mobile URLs referring to their specific desktop URLS versions, as specified here by Google. Take a look at an example here
- Configure the appropriate canonical tags in your Desktop URLs as specified here by Google, so they always refer to their original URL versions (without parameters). This means that in http://www.website.com/?m=off you should add this canonical tag:```
pointing to its original URL version... and do this with every URL (referring to its own original URL version).
By doing this you won't have any content duplication issues. If you want to learn more about Mobile SEO take a look at the Webinar I did sometime ago in SEOmoz here and this post where I answer the most common Mobile SEO questions.
Thanks,
Aleyda
-
The page ending in ?m=off is non existent. We are using Joomla and such page does not exist and cannot be configured via canonical tags. Any other suggestion?
Thank you!
-
Query parameters can become indexed by Google and can lead to duplicate content. Just make sure that you are using the canonical tag in your header pointing to the non-query parameter page, that way Google will know to index the proper URL.
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
-
301 redirect from dynamic url to static page
Hi, i want to redirect from this old link http://www.g-store.gr/product_info.php?products_id=1735/ to this one https://www.g-store.gr/golf-toualetas.html I have done several attempts but with no result. I anyone can help i will appreciate. My website runs in an Apache server with cpanel. Thank you
Technical SEO | | alstam0 -
301 Redirects, Sitemaps and Indexing - How to hide redirected urls from search engines?
We have several pages in our site like this one, http://www.spectralink.com/solutions, which redirect to deeper page, http://www.spectralink.com/solutions/work-smarter-not-harder. Both urls are listed in the sitemap and both pages are being indexed. Should we remove those redirecting pages from the site map? Should we prevent the redirecting url from being indexed? If so, what's the best way to do that?
Technical SEO | | HeroDesignStudio0 -
My old URL's are still indexing when I have redirected all of them, why is this happening?
I have built a new website and have redirected all my old URL's to their new ones but for some reason Google is still indexing the old URL's. Also, the page authority for all of my pages has dropped to 1 (apart from the homepage) but before they were between 12 to 15. Can anyone help me with this?
Technical SEO | | One2OneDigital0 -
XML Sitemap and unwanted URL parameters
We currently don't have an XML sitemap for our site. I generated one using Screaming Frog and it looks ok, but it also contains my tracking url parameters (ref=), which I don't want Google to use, as specified in GWT. Cleaning it will require time and effort which I currently don't have. I also think that having one could help us on Bing. So my question is: Is it better to submit a "so-so" sitemap than having none at all, or the risks are just too high? Could you explain what could go wrong? Thanks !
Technical SEO | | jfmonfette0 -
301 redirect from Blogger
Hello, I have a client with a Wordpress network of blogs, each blog is owned by a different blogger. Many of them were migrated time ago from Blogger. I have seen that the way used to redirect them is a meta refresh, so no authority is being passed. I cannot find any reliable way of making a 301 from Blogger, There are some plugins, but I'm afraid of using them. Any of you have experience with this situation please? I have even thought about placing a global rel canonical before the meta refresh, but I think that here the problem is the meta refresh itself.... Thank you in advance
Technical SEO | | Juandbbam0 -
What tools produce a complete list of all URLs for 301 redirects?
I am project managing the rebuild of a major corporate website and need to set up 301 redirects from the old pages to the new ones. The problem is that the old site sits on multiple CMS platforms so there is no way I can get a list of pages from the old CMS. Is there a good tool out there that will crawl through all the sites and produce a nice spreadsheet with all the URLs on it? Somebody mentioned Xenu but I have never used it. Any recommendations? Thanks -Adrian
Technical SEO | | Adrian_Kingwell0 -
Old URL redirect to New URL
Alright I did something dumb a year a go and I'm still paying for it. I changed my hyphenated URL to the non-hyphenated version when I redesigned my website. I say it was dumb because I lost most of my link juice even though I did 301 redirects (via the htaccess file) for almost all of the pages I could find in Google's index. Here's my problem. My new site took a huge hit in traffic (down 60%) when I made the change and even though I've done thousands of redirects my old site is still showing up in the SERPS and send much if not most of my traffic. I don't want to take the old site down in fear it will kill all of my traffic. What should I do? Is there a better method I should explore then 301 redirects? Could the other site be affecting my current rank since it's still there? (FYI...both sites are built on the WP platform). Any help or ideas are greatly appreciated. Thank you! Joe
Technical SEO | | kaje0