Are duplicate item titles harmful to my ecommerce site?
-
Hello everyone,
I have an online shopping site selling, amongst other items, candles. We have lots of different categories within the LED candles category.
One route a customer can take is homepage > LED candles > Tealights.
Within the tealights category we have 7 different products which vary only in colour. It is necessary to create separate products for each colour since we have fantastic images for each colour.
To target different keywords, at present we have different titles (hence different link texts, different URLs and different H1 tags) for each colour, for example "Battery operated LED candles, amber", "Flameless candles, red" and "LED tealights, blue".
I was wondering if different titles to target different keywords is a good idea. Or, is it just confusing to the customer and should I just stick with a generic item title which just varies by colour (eg. "LED battery candles, colour")?
If I do the latter, am I at risk of getting downranked by Google since I am duplicating the product titles/link texts/URLs/H1 tags/img ALTs? (the description and photos for each colour are unique).
Sorry if this is a little complicated - please ask and I can clarify anything...because I really want to give the best customer experience but still preserve my Google ranking.
I have attached screenshots of the homepage and categories to clarify, feel free to go on the site live too.
Thank you so much,
Pravin
-
In my opinion, you still run a small risk of having items filtered out due to being too similar. If you feel the balance of unique content compared to duplicate is much more on the unique side - you may be ok. You may have less risk of being "penalized" compared to just filtered. Meaning your domain as a whole may not face penalty, but some of those pages still might have difficulty showing up due to being too similar for a given search.
A decent way to explore this is to do searches for phrases that might be exclusive to those pages that have similar content. Do they all show up? Then you are probably ok. How about an exact phrase match using quotes around the search query. Do some testing and see if you are hitting a filter or not.
-
Yes the whole copy and customer reviews are unique. The only thing that's duplicated is MOST of the title, img ALTs, img URLs, URL, H1 tag and link text throughout the site. I say most because these attributes would vary only in colour.
-
Hi Pravin,
Is there any content on these pages that makes them unique? Is there a greater portion of unique content compared to this duplicated content?
Owen
-
Hi Owen,
Thanks for the reply.
I meant item titles as in what I name the products in the ecommerce platform, NOT the meta titles which are unique for all my products.
If the item titles (and hence URLs, image ALTs, H1 tags etc as they are automatically set by the ecommerce platform) are duplicated (and NOT the meta titles) would it still make a difference and am I at risk of getting downranked / penalised?
Thanks again for your help,
Pravin
-
If you want to increase the chance of each unique combination being found via organic search, unique titles would be the way to go. Duplicate titles might increase the chances of Google filtering one ore more of your pages out of the search results in favor of a similar result from your site.
Another solution would be to choose the most relevant item in the set and use a canonical tag to the different color combinations. That way someone searching can find your page and decide from there if they want a different color but you wont face the duplicate content issue.
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
-
My indexed site URL removed from google search without get any message or Manual Actions???
On Agust 2 or 3.. I'm not sure about the exact date...
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | newwaves
The main URL of my website https://new-waves.net/ had been completely removed from Google search results! without getting any messages or Manual Actions on search console ?? but I'm still can find some of my site subpages in search results and on Google local maps results when I tried to check it on google
info:new-waves.net >> no results
site:new-waves.net >> only now I can see the main URL in results because I had submitted it again and again to google but it might be deleted again today or tomorrow as that happen before last few days
100% of all ranked keywords >> my site URL new-waves.net had been completely removed from all results! but I'm still can see it on maps on some results I never get any penalties to my site on Google search console. I noticed some drops on some keywords before that happens (in June and July) but it all of it was related to web design keywords for local Qatar, but all other keywords that related to SEO and digital marketing were not have any changes and been on top My site was ranked number 1 on google search results for "digital marketing qatar" and some other keywords, but the main URL had been removed from 100% of all search results. but you can still see it on the map only. I just tried to submit it again to Google and to index it through google search console tool but still not get any results, Recently, based on google console, I found some new links but I have no idea how it been added to links of my website:
essay-writing-hub.com - 9,710
tiverton-market.co.uk - 252
facianohaircare.com - 48
prothemes.biz - 44
worldone.pw - 2
slashdot.org - 1
onwebmarketing.com - 1 the problem is that all my high PR real links deleted from google console as well although it still have my site link and it could be recognized by MOZ and other sites! Can any one help to know what is the reason?? and how can I solve this issue without losing my previous ranked keywords? Can I submit a direct message to google support or customer service to know the reason or get help on this issue? Thanks & Regards0 -
Spam sites with low spam score?
Hello! I have a fair few links on some of the old SEO 'Directory' sites. I've got rid of all the obviously spammy ones - however there are a few that remain which have very low spam scores, and decent page authority, yet they are clearly just SEO directories - I can't believe they service any other purpose. Should we now just be getting rid of all links like this, or is it worth keeping if the domain authority is decent and spam score low? Thanks Sam
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | wearehappymedia0 -
Will Removing My Keyword from Breadcrumb Title to Simplify UI Hurt Page SEO?
Working on the UI of a new site and I would like to simplify the breadcrumbs so they do not take up as much space. They will still communicate the same message to user. See example below: Before: Home > Widget Dealers > Tennessee > Nashville After: Home > Dealers > Tennessee > Nashville The page title and/or menu item would still be "Widget Dealers". So my question is, if I remove the keyword "Widget" only from the breadcrumb could that hurt me in any way?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | the-coopersmith1 -
People buying links to their profiles on my site
As we have a major Penguin update looming in the background, I am looking for expert advice on how to deal with professionals buying into link programs whether they are doing it deliberately or not. Our site provides detailed profile information on hundreds of 1000's of professionals and some professionals apparently believed that buying into link program will lift their profile in the SERPS. About 10 professionals have paid shady link building companies to buy links to their profiles on our site. The biggest offender bought over 1,500 links to his profile. Aside from adding the known toxic links to our disavow file, what else can we do to avoid any link penalties? I can think of three distinct options and would love to hear feedback especially based on actual experience. Option 1. 404 the existing profile - "http://www.anysite.com/jones_smith" and create a new URL "http://www.anysite.com/jones_smith_1". Option 2. Keep the existing URL and fully rely on the disavow file. Contact the professionals and kindly ask them to stop buying links and to contact their link building companies to remove the links. Any other ideas?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | irvingw0 -
How Does This Site Get Away With It?
The following site is huge in the movie trailer industry: http://bit.ly/18B6tF It ranks #3 in Google for "Movie Trailers" and has high rankings for multiple other major keywords in the industry. Here's the thing; virtually all of their movie trailer pages contain copy/pasted content from other sites. The movie trailer descriptions are the ones given by the movie companies and therefor the same content is on thousands of websites/blogs. We all know Google hates duplicate content at the moment... so how does this site get a away with it? Does it's root-domain authority keep it up there?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | superlordme0 -
Can I get harmed by an inlink?
Hi! I'll jump right in to my question. There's a webpage with the following stats:
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | mozalbin
PA 80, mR 4.70, mT 5.00. Pagerank ZERO. Now, these are some beautiful stats for every webpage, except for the pagerank. The reason to why the pagerank is so low is that the inlinks to this site is partial spammy (hidden links and other bad naughty black-hat stuff that I hate). (It's not my webpage, I don't even know whos webpage this is..) I happen to have a backlink from this page. A clean dofollow, in-content link to my site. The total amount of external links on this page is five and there's no spam on the page or hidden anywhere else. My question #1:
Is this particular inlink to my site harmful? Will I get penaltized for getting a backlink from this site? I mean, Google have figured out the spam factor of the links to the page that is linking to me. But I'm innocent, the link to me is just lying there... (Why or why not?) My question #2:
IF (and only IF) the link to my webpage is harmful. Are links from my page harmful? (Why or why not?) Thank you very much for using you awesome knowledge to answer this 🙂0 -
Problems with link spam from spam blogs to competitor sites
A competitor of ours is having a great deal of success with links from spam blogs (such as: publicexperience.com or sexylizard.org) it is proving to be a nightmare. Google does not detect these (the competitor has been doing well now for over a year) and my boss is starting to think if you can’t beat them, join them. Frankly, he is right – we have built some great links but it is nigh on impossible to beat 400+ highly targeted spam links in a niche market. My question is, has anyone had success in getting this sort of stuff brought to the attention of Google and banned (I actually listed them all in a message in webmaster tools and sent them over to Google over a year ago!). This is frustrating, I do not want to join in this kind of rubbish but it is hard to put a convincing argument against it when our competitor has used the technique successfully for over a year without any penalty. Ideas? Thoughts? All help appreciated
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | RodneyRiley0 -
Does the site have duplicate, overlapping, or redundant articles on the same or similar topics with slightly different keyword variations?
Hi All, In relation to this thread http://www.seomoz.org/q/what-happend-to-my-ranks-began-dec-22-detailed-info-inside I'm still getting whipped hard from Google, this week for some reason all rankings have gone for the past few days. What I was wondering though is this, when Google says- Does the site have duplicate, overlapping, or redundant articles on the same or similar topics with slightly different keyword variations? I assume my site hits the nail on the head- [removed links at request of author] As you can see I target LG Optimus 3D Sim Free, LG Optimus 3D Contract and LG Optimus 3D Deals. Based on what Google has said, I know think there needs to be 1 page that covers it all instead of 3. What I'm wondering is the best way to deal with the situation? I think it should be something like this but please correct me along the way 🙂 1. Pick the strongest page out of the 3 2. Merge the content from the 2 weaker pages into the strongest 3. Update the title/meta info of the strongest page to include the KW variations of all 3 eg- LG Optimus 3D Contract Deals And Sim Free Pricing 4. Then scatter contract, deals and sim free throughout the text naturally 5. Then delete the weaker 2 pages and 301 redirect to the strongest page 6. Submit URL removal via webmastertools for the 2 weaker pages What would you do to correct this situation? Am I on the right track?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | mwoody0