Is linking to search results bad for SEO?
-
If we have pages on our site that link to search results is that a bad thing? Should we set the links to "nofollow"?
-
No it will no be a problem. Even if the search results show duplicate content, to show a sample of pages is fine.
-
Those pages due to the nature of searching for them are the exact same same pages as your normal content just that the url has changed . The best way in my opinion to address this is by using the canonical element you can read more here . if your normal pages have the element embedded in the code any instance of duplicate content should not be an issue.
Hope this helps
-
So you have links to search results on your page and those links are followed and indexed by google. LInking to a search result is not a bad thing per se. Just make sure, that the indexed pages are not to similar (i.e. duplicate content).
An example:
if the indexed page for "widget" (domain.tld/search/widget) and the indexed page for "widgets" (domain.tld/search/widgets) are similar or nearly similar they might be considered duplicate content, resulting in none of them ranking. One way to test this is to use d/c checker or the seomoz campaign. You want at least 20% difference in any combination of pages.
If you manually set these links you might want to check whether the results are different enough. If you don't want these pages to be indexed at all just "follow, noindex" them.
Besides that it's not a problem.
-
Search results on our own domain
-
Hi michelleh,
to what pages specifically are you linking? Google results like http://www.google.com/search?q=query ? Pages on other domains? could you please give some more information?
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 Get Rid of Dates Shown In Google Search Results
When I enter "Site: URL" to check what a search how Google displays search result, a date appears at the very front. This takes away several characters, really valuable real estate. How can I stop Google from displaying these dates? There are certain Wordpress plugins like "WP Date Remover" however the seem to only apply to blog posts. Dates are appearing on results on all my Wordpress pages. Is there an internal setting in Wordpress that will allow me to remove dates for these non blogpost pages?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Kingalan11 -
There are SEO benefits to external links, but should they be nofollow?
I just read a great article on the SEO benefits of external links to relevant authoritative sites. But it didn't state if the benefits still existed if the external links were nofollows.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Caro-O
The article concluded: “Outgoing relevant links to authoritative sites are considered in the algorithms and do have a positive impact on rankings.” I found this old article on the subject, but opinions on the nofollow issue were mixed:
https://mza.seotoolninja.com/blog/external-linking-good-for-seo-whiteboard-friday Can anyone shed any light? Thanks! ~Caro1 -
Base href + relative link href for canonical link
I have a site that in the head section we specify a base href being the domain with a trailing slash and a canonical link href being the relative link to the domain. <base <="" span="">href="http://www.domain.com/" /> href="link-to-page.html" rel="canonical" /> I know that Google recommends using an absolute path as a canonical link but is specifying a base href with a relative canonical link the same thing or is it still seen as duplicate content?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Nobody16116990439410 -
Mobile Search Results Include Pages Meant Only for Desktops/Laptops
When I put in site:www.qjamba.com on a mobile device it comes back with some of my mobile-friendly pages for that site(same url for mobile and desktop-just different formatting), and that's great. HOWEVER, it also shows a whole bunch of the pages (not identified by Google as mobile-friendly) that are fine for desktop users but are not supposed to exist for the mobile users, because they are too slow. Until a few days ago those pages were being redirected for mobile users to the home page. I since have changed that to 404 not founds. Do we know that Google keeps a mobile index separate from the desktop index? If so, I would think that 404 should work.. How can I test whether the 404 not founds will remove a url so they DON'T appear on a mobile device when I put in site:www.qjamba.com (or a user searches) but DO appear on a desktop for the same command.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | friendoffood0 -
Location appearing on search result. how can this be achieved?
I'm pretty sure this site is not doing any SEO but i think what made them no. 1 is the location. I already tried adding a google publisher tag to my site that points to my google page which contains my address but i still can't have the location appear.. here's a screenshot of the search result that i want to achieve: https://www.dropbox.com/s/tbdv3121rrs6zp5/Screen Shot 2013-04-15 at 9.39.30 AM.png Screen%20Shot%202013-04-15%20at%209.39.30%20AM.png
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | optimind0 -
Is removing inorganic links a bad idea?
Hey there, We have recently been in touch with a SEO agency that recomended we remove all inorganic links from our backlink profile. Most of the links are pretty good but there are some news sites that have sitewide links to our site. The link is in the nav menu, as a useful link. We didn't ask for this link it was totally organic. Also some link building in the past was focused on anchor text so some of the keywords may have been over emphasised. Is it a good idea to go about removing all of the potentially inorganic looking links? My concern is that we wipe out links that google are actually valuing. I still know sites are ranking #1 with much more dubious backlink profiles, and then there's this guy who removed his sitewide backlinks and dropped in his ranking: http://www.seomoz.org/q/removed-site-wide-links If a competitor decided to add negative links to our site, it would take longer to find and remove negative links than it would for them to add them. It seems odd that google would allow negative SEO to be that easy.. What do you think?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | timscullin0 -
Are External Links Really Bad for SEO?
I have a quality site with good PR and we have very few outbound links. We are always looking for good content since it is a blog, and I get frequent requests from "guest bloggers"–some of which actually provide really high quality & unique content. But, of course, to get their content I have to give them at least 1 link. I have always been taught that external links really hurt your site and that basically 1 outbound link cancels out 1 inbound link because they balance each other out. Is this true? I always wondered why we must get penalized for linking out to good sites? It makes me get very "stingy" with my outbound links, whereas if my site would not be effected, I would want to be more generous. Any suggestions & info would greatly help! Thank you, Afshin
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | applesofgold0 -
RSS feeds- What are the secrets to getting them, and the links inside then, indexed and counted for SEO purposes?
RSS feeds, at least on paper, should be a great way to build backlinks and boost rankings. They are also very seductive from a link-builder's point of view- free, easy to create, allows you to specifiy anchor text, etc. There are even several SEO articles, anda few products, extolling the virtues of RSS for SEO puposes. However, I hear anecdotedly that they are extremely ineffective in getting their internal links indexed. And my success rate has been abysmal- perhaps 15% have ever been indexed,and so far, I havenever seem Google show an RSS feed as a source for a backlink. I have even thrown some token backlinks against RSS feeds to see if that helped in getting them indexed, but even that has a very low success rate. I recently read a blog post saying that Google "hates aRSS feeds" and "rarely spiders perhaps the first link or two." Yet there are many SEO advocates who claim that RSS feeds are a great untapped resource for SEO. I am rather befuddled. Has anyone "crackedthe code" onhow to get them,and the links that they contain, indexed and helping rankings?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | tclendaniel0