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 and hreflang tags
-
Moz is flagging a lot of pages on our site which have duplicate page titles. 99% of these are international pages which hreflang tags in the sitemap.
Do I need to worry about this? I assumed that it wasn't an issue given the use of hreflang. And if that's the case, why is Moz flagging them as an issue?
Thanks.
-
We're all students of the game. I hope I never stop learning about marketing.
I had read about the sitemap implementation but never tried it. Then I ran into an enterprise client who has over 40,000 indexed pages & 20 separate languages.
One of the languages didn't have a subfolder but all the rest did. Instead of coding it in, I figured my way through sitemaps & thought it was SO much easier in the end. I've used it a few times since and it's great.
-
I updated my first answer to point out my error - thanks again!
-
Hi everyone
Oh wow! I can't believe I missed that! I stand 100% corrected - thanks so much guys, I am sorry about that!
Looks like you should be all good then!
Thanks again for pointing this out - cheers everyone
-
No, you don't need to worry. If you've implemented hreflang into the sitemap properly, it will work and you don't have to worry about the Moz reading. Moz tries to cover off the main things that affect you and give you an indication of what Google may like & dislike on your site but by no means are the implementations of everything exactly the same. So yes, Google will understand your 'duplicate' page titles are not.
@Patrick - you can definitely implement hreflang in sitemap. I was surprised when I saw that the first time, too, but I've tried it for a few clients lately and it works well.
-
Hi,
I'm fairly sure you can put the tags in a sitemap rather than the header.
https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/2620865?hl=en https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/189077?hl=en
Placing the tags into the header is a much bigger technical issue for us at present.
Cheers
-
Hi there
Are you saying that your hreflang tags are in your sitemap? If that's the case, that's not the proper implementation. THIS IS IN FACT NOT CORRECT AS POINTED OUT BY ahyde & MattAntonino BELOW
These tags are supposed to live in the tag of the page(s) which are region and language targeted.
I would read into hreflang tags and make sure that you have the proper implementation. You should also look at language tags for Bing.
I would also take a look at this chart for guidance and make sure that your international pages have language/region specific content - if you're not changing the language, then the tag isn't really necessary. I would instead focus on canonical tags, setting up Webmaster Tools accounts for each region variation directory or subdomain, and country targeting those profiles to their separate regions in Google and Bing Webmaster Tools.
I would also take a look at the following resources as well:
International SEO (Moz)
The International SEO Checklist (Moz)Let me know if this helps - I hope I am understanding - good luck!
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 generate an automatic title and meta description for lots of pages
Hi, I'm working on a big website that will have new pages every month. I would like to find a plug-in or something free to generate automatic title and meta description for futur new pages. Thanks you for your help!
On-Page Optimization | | Maely0 -
Commas in title tags
Hello Guys, Thanks in advance for all who can help me with this I am helping a dinnerware company with their SEO. I told them to change their ambiguous title tags for more specific ones. However, they opted to create some title tags with 2 or three keywords separated by commas. I have attached an excel image illustrating their new title tags.. My question is, will this format be a problem with Google--penalties? The questionable title tags are highlighted in light orange. Thanks! lHH92
On-Page Optimization | | HectorCortes0 -
Duplicate page titles and Content in Woocommerce
Hi Guys, I'm new to Moz and really liking it so far!
On-Page Optimization | | jeeyer
I run a eCommerce site on Wordpress + WooCommerce and ofcourse use Yoast for SEO optimalisation I've got a question about my first Crawl report which showed over 600 issues! 😐 I've read that this is something that happens more often (http://a-moz.groupbuyseo.org/blog/setup-wordpress-for-seo-success). Most of them are categorized under:
1. Duplicate Page Titles or;
2. Duplicate Page Content. Duplicate Page Titles:
These are almost only: product category pages and product tags. Is this problem beeing solved by giving them the right SEO SERP? I see that a lot of categories don't have a proper SEO SERP set up in yoast! Do I need to add this to clear this issue, or do I need to change the actual Title? And how about the Product tags? Another point (bit more off-topic) I've read here: http://a-moz.groupbuyseo.org/community/q/yoast-seo-plugin-to-index-or-not-to-index-categories that it's advised to noindex/follow Categories and Tags but isn't that a wierd idea to do for a eCommerce site?! Duplicate Page Content:
Same goes here almost only Product Categories and product tags that are displayed as duplicate Page content! When I check the results I can click on a blue button for example "+ 17 duplicates" and that shows me (in this case 17 URLS) but they are not related to the fist in any way so not sure where to start here? Thanks for taking the time to help out!
Joost0 -
Page Title & Meta Description Getting Cut Off In The SERPs
Hi Guys, I am trying to figure out why my page titles and meta d tags are getting cut off in Goofle SERPS. My page titles are 70 characters or under (including spaces) and my meta Dd's are 155 characters or under (including spaces) so I cannot work out why They are getting cut off. Is there something I have missed?! Thanks, Meaghan
On-Page Optimization | | StoryScout0 -
Using phrases like 'NO 1' or 'Best' int he title tag
Hi All, Quick question - is it illegal, against any rule etc to use phrases such as 'The No 1 rest of the title tag | Brand Name' on a site?
On-Page Optimization | | Webrevolve0 -
Fewer keywords in title tag?
Hello, I have a title tag that includes three keywords and has a total of 59 characters. The third keyword is not very important. If I eliminated the third keyword, leaving the first two (for a total of 48 characters), would the ranking value of the first two keywords increase? Does including the third keyword dilute the value of the first two? Thank you!
On-Page Optimization | | nyc-seo0 -
Is it damaging to have TOO long a title tag these days? i.e. well over character limit
Is it damaging to have TOO long a title tag these days? i.e. well over character limit. I learned that title tags should be around 70 characters. I am new at this, but have a client that has three times that, with the same three keyword phrases repeating 3-4 times. And then NO h1's or h2's in the text......advice? Rookie here 🙂
On-Page Optimization | | cschwartzel0 -
How to handle Meta Tags on Pagination... page 2,3,4....
Seems that SEOMoz reports are considering my paginated pages as duplicate Meta Tags. For example, I have a product catalog with 5 paginated pages. Obviously the content on each page is unique and the URL ends in =4, =5 for the page number, but the Title and Description are the same for all the pages. Any suggestions on how to handle this? The pages other than page 1 are not indexed, so it should not be a big deal. But wondering if I should programatically ad the page number to the additional pages to show a difference?
On-Page Optimization | | paddlej0