Google Sitelinks
-
We have an e-commerce site that has about 50k pageviews of our main shop page every week. However in our Google sitelinks we have one for 'Shop'. However, for the Shop sitelink Google is linking to a random URL that we have never & would never use as a URL and not to our Shop page. I can't work out why Google would pick up this random url as we have so many links etc to the main shop page. Why are they not linking to the right page?
I have blocked that url in webmaster tools and done a redirect but I want to understand why it happened in the first place. It included 'swedish+fish' so it seems weirdly spammy?!
Any thoughts would be really helpful (and I am only mildly techy).
Many thanks
-
Aha - thank you so much. I thought I had already checked my internal links but double-checked again after your response and you were completely correct. There was a horrendous error with our code that led an example link being added to every page rather than the correct one. Thank you helping me look in the right direction to find the solution!
-
It's a bit hard to tell without seeing the specific case, but the first thing that comes to mind is a ton of links to that URL - either bad internal links or inbound/external links created accidentally or maliciously. If Google sees the URL linked to prominently, they could decide to treat that URL as legitimate (even without a page).
Does the bad URL 404 correctly? It's possible the URL is out there but it's resolving with a 200 or a weird redirect, and Google isn't recognizing that the page doesn't exist. One of the first things I'd do is run a header checker against the bad URL and see how it's resolving. For example, a tool like:
-
Oh wow. When you said "non-existent" I didn't know you meant literally. That's crazy. Sorry I couldn't be more help.
-
Well, I have good news and bad news.
The bad news is that I can't be TOO much help. The good news is that you're not alone.
Just last week I wrote a post on the SEOmoz blog about this exact issue. You can check it out here.
If you can figure out exactly why it happened then definitely let me know and I'll give you a big high five.
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
-
Hide sitelinks from Google search results
Does anyone have any recommendations on how you can tell Google (hopefully via a URL) not to index that page of a website? I have tried through SEO Yoast to hide certain sitemaps (which has worked to a degree) but certain functionalities of Wordpress websites show links without them actually being part of a "sitemap" so those links are harder to hide. I'm having an issue with one of my websites - the sitelinks that Google is suggesting are nowhere near the most popular pages and I know that you can't make recommendations through Google not to show certain pages through Search Console. anymore. Any suggestions are greatly appreciated! Thanks!
Technical SEO | | MainstreamMktg0 -
Deindexed homepage by Google
I just noticed that my homepage was de-indexed by google. Any thoughts would be appreciated.
Technical SEO | | Jenny_H0 -
Google My Business Service Area Question
Hello Moz Friends I just wanted to make sure I'm doing things correctly. On google my business your given the option to list your service area. I serve the entire state of Colorado with my internet marketing services. So I listed Colorado as my service area. but Moz Friends, is this the wrong idea? Like should I list the major cities and call it good? So instead of service area Colorado, I should put Denver, Colorado Springs, Pueblo etc Thank you for your friendly help Chris
Technical SEO | | asbchris0 -
Why is Google not indexing my site?
I'm a bit confused as to why my site just isn't indexing on Google. Even if I type in my brand name, my social channels rank and there's no evidence of my website. I've followed all of the advice I've read and gone into webmaster tools and got the Wordpress yoast plug-in but nothing seems to be making a difference!One thing I've noticed, in Google Webmaster Tools it says "Couldn’t communicate with the DNS server." in site errors. I've called GoDaddy and they said that everything is fine. A bit frustrating. Trying to work out what my next steps should be but feeling a bit lost to be honest! Any help GREATLY appreciated!
Technical SEO | | j1066s0 -
Google Disavow Tool
Some background: My rankings have been wildly fluctuating for the past few months for no apparent reason. When I inquired about this, many people said that even though I haven't received any penalty notice, I was probably affected by penguin. (http://moz.com/community/q/ranking-fluctuations) I recently did a link detox by LinkRemovalTools and it gave me a list of all my links, 2% were toxic and 51% were suspiscious. Should I simply disavow the 2%? There are many sites where is no contact info.
Technical SEO | | EcomLkwd0 -
Some competitors have a thumbnail in Google search results
I've noticed that a few of my top competitors have a small photo (thumbnail) next to their listing. I'm sure it's not a coincidence that they are ranked top for the search phrase too. Is this really a help and how can it be done? Many thanks, Iain.
Technical SEO | | iainmoran0 -
What else: struggling with google position
Hi. I understand everyone is offering their time for free here so any advice or support is much appreciated. http://www.cytronex.com
Technical SEO | | AdamJamesCytronex
PA 44 || mR 4.6 || mT 5.73 || 986 links from 43 Root Domains
DA 33 || 3,942 links from 71 Domains We've dropped from position 25ish to position 70ish in keyword searches for 'electric bikes'. I've tried everything and I just don't understand! It's genuine content, the actual product is increasingly popular, we have several links from sites which are (well, to my mind) reasonable quality. I've only just been brought in to look at this and my lack of any SEO or web experience is not putting my boss off expecting an instant solution 😞 As I'm only just getting to grips with it, Analytics was only installed about a month ago so I can't pin point a moment when it dropped. We're consistently out-positioned by sites with lower PA/DA scores. Any insight anyone might have would be amazing! Thanks
Adam0 -
How a google bot sees your site
So I have stumbled across various websites like this: http://www.smart-it-consulting.com/internet/google/googlebot-spoofer/ The concept here is to be able to view your site as a googlebot sees it. However, the results are a little puzzling. Google is reading the text on my page but not the title tags according to the results. Are websites like this accurate OR does Google not read title tags and H1 tags anymore? Also on a slighly related note. I noticed the results show the navigation bar is being read first by google, is this bad and should the navigation bar be optimized for keywords as well? If it did, it would read a bit funny and the "humans" would be confused.
Technical SEO | | StreetwiseReports0