I see lots of duplicate content errors related to our site on Google Webmaster Tools dashboard (Duplicate meta descriptions, Duplicate title tags)
Most of these are related to the same page but with language code added in the URL, so I can't repair it by editing the meta data:
www.mydomain.com/something
www.mydomain.com/en/something
these and similar URL pairs point to the very same page (both in English), and causing the duplicate content errors. As a result Google lists our homepage twice in the search results as www.mydomain.com/ and as www.mydomain.com/en/ some positions later.
I upgraded from 1.9 to 2.65 a long time ago (added an other language then), I suppose the URL without the language code is originating from this upgrade (to keep the old links working)
I suppose this duplication is not good for our SEO rating, I would prefer one appearance with a higher rank than two with both at a lower position. As a quick repair should I add a Disallow: /en in the robots.txt to have Google see only one copy of each page ? or should I do a 301 redirect, how ? What do you think ? How to make it so that Google adds together our double SERP appearances' valuation we achieved so far and not just lose one of them.
PS. I run 2.65, so I miss the latest SEO related improvements, will soon upgrade to 3.30, but not sure if the upgrade would solve this problem.
SEO problem - duplicate content
- 35
- 195
- 1/21/2013
- United States
I too am having the same issues with duplicate content, meta descriptions, and meta titles in webmaster tool errors. We have some products where they have multiple pages because of all the part numbers, so for some reason Google is seeing this at the same page, even though the URL says that it is page 1, 2, 3, etc.
I am interested to hear how to resolve this issue as well. Although I have not seen a difference in our organic rankings because of these errors, but I would like to know of a way to resolve the issue and possibly get ranked even better.
I am interested to hear how to resolve this issue as well. Although I have not seen a difference in our organic rankings because of these errors, but I would like to know of a way to resolve the issue and possibly get ranked even better.
- 174
- 1361
- 4/14/2011
- Ukraine
We operate a forum under our webshop. In the past 2 years it grew quite large, we have over 10k posts by now.
Google (Webmaster Tools) is continuously complaining about the duplicate Meta descriptions of the many pages of the forum posts. There are 10 posts/page, you can imagine how many pages Google finds with the same meta tags when it crawls thru the 10k posts. In the desperate struggle to please Google's each and every wish (like pampering a spoilt child) to get perhaps higher on that d.mn SERP listing we are of course trying to fix this.
How am I supposed to give different meta descriptions for the same topic's posts different pages (ie. a different description for post #770-780 as another one for posts #780-790). And even if I could edit it in such a detail, how I am I supposed to be so creative to attach a thousand different Meta descriptions (for a 10k post forum) so, that not a single one matches another. (Is it only me who would enjoy having the Goggle executives sit at a table and not allow them to get up until they write 1000 different sentences with the same meaning but different words)
Or should I disallow Google's crawling of our forum altogether in the robots.txt ? Would it give a better looking site for Google? Is it more SEO-attractive to have 10k posts with the same (allegedly faulty) meta tags or is it better not having crawled the forum at all?
Google (Webmaster Tools) is continuously complaining about the duplicate Meta descriptions of the many pages of the forum posts. There are 10 posts/page, you can imagine how many pages Google finds with the same meta tags when it crawls thru the 10k posts. In the desperate struggle to please Google's each and every wish (like pampering a spoilt child) to get perhaps higher on that d.mn SERP listing we are of course trying to fix this.
How am I supposed to give different meta descriptions for the same topic's posts different pages (ie. a different description for post #770-780 as another one for posts #780-790). And even if I could edit it in such a detail, how I am I supposed to be so creative to attach a thousand different Meta descriptions (for a 10k post forum) so, that not a single one matches another. (Is it only me who would enjoy having the Goggle executives sit at a table and not allow them to get up until they write 1000 different sentences with the same meaning but different words)
Or should I disallow Google's crawling of our forum altogether in the robots.txt ? Would it give a better looking site for Google? Is it more SEO-attractive to have 10k posts with the same (allegedly faulty) meta tags or is it better not having crawled the forum at all?