Should I disable the indexing of tags in Wordpress?
-
Hi,
I have a client that is publishing 7 or 8 news articles and posts each month. I am optimising selected posts and I have found that they have been adding a lot of tags (almost like using hashtags) .
There are currently 29 posts but already 55 tags, each of which has its own archive page, and all of which are added to the site map to be indexed (https://sykeshome.europe.sykes.com/sitemap_index.xml).
I came across an article (https://crunchify.com/better-dont-use-wordpress-tags/) that suggested that tags add no value to SEO ranking, and as a consequence Wordpress tags should not be indexed or included in the sitemap.
I haven't been able to find much more reliable information on this topic, so my question is - should I get rid of the tags from this website and make the focus pages, posts and categories (redirecting existing tag pages back to the site home page)?
It is a relatively new websites and I am conscious of the fact that category and tag archive pages already substantially outnumber actual content pages (posts and news) - I guess this isn't optimal.
I'd appreciate any advice.
Thanks
-
Yes it would be best if you were the tags option off, It excellent performance working for example Shillong Teer Club chart
-
Disabling the indexing of tags in WordPress can be beneficial for SEO purposes, as it prevents search engines from indexing individual tag pages, which may otherwise lead to duplicate content issues. However, whether to disable tag indexing depends on your specific website goals and content structure. If you use tags sparingly and they add value to your site's organization, leaving them indexed may be beneficial. Evaluate your SEO strategy and content structure to determine the best approach for your WordPress site.
-
I'm having the same problem right now, my site is fairly new but it was already receiving some organic traffic then, all of a sudden traffic sank like a brick and i can't find the answer why.
Only thing that changed was adding tags to blog posts which i think might be creating duplicate content so I'm proceeding to disable those, will leave categories alive for the moment because they were bringing traffic but if nothing changes after it will deindex them as well, site in question is sluthpass hope i can recover traffic after disabling those annoying tags.
-
Hello experts, I have disabled the tags but it is still showing in Google. What should I do now? Here you can check redeemcodecenter.com, Thanks in Advance.
-
If you have a large number of tags that don't add clear value to your site's content, disabling tag indexing in WordPress can be beneficial for search engine optimization. However, if your tags are well-curated and provide meaningful navigation for your users, enabling indexing can improve discoverability and site organization. Evaluate the relevance and usefulness of your tags, considering both SEO considerations and user experience before making a decision.
-
I experienced the same problem. I once read an article that Google prefers websites that have a neat structure. and in my opinion, it is difficult to make tags more structured on my website. my site is malasngoding.com . what do you think?
-
Even i was also looking the answer for same for my website https://abcya.in/ i think tags should not be indexed.
-
I don't think it's a good idea. I'm testing tons of articles with and without tags for my website, Dizzibooster. It seems that adding tags will provide an edge for indexing purposes. However, you can test these things yourself."
-
I am facing the same issue on my website AmazingFactsHindi. As per our expert discussion and after reading this forum, I decided to de-index all the Tags and Category pages that are creating duplicate issues on our website.
-
We had similar questions on SEO. We experimented with disabling tags for the last 4 weeks. The only impact so far, I was able to find is that the [thecodebuzz(https://www.thecodebuzz.com/) website did not get hits for a few impressions which were based on tags keys. We are still evaluating the impact.
-
Heyo,
If your tags and categories are providing value to your users or helping with your site's SEO, you might not want to remove them from search engine indexes. I disabled it on my site OceanXD, And it was a good decision for me. -
I have a same question but I have found blocking category and tag is good for SEO.
I have blogsite Tech News Blog I have crated around 400 tag but I have seen this was crating duplicate issue.My personal opinion tag and category de index will be better for SEO.
-
@JCN-SBWD You can index your tags in as much as it doesn't affect the indexing of your posts. Tags do get traffic as well. The only reason why I stopped indexing my tags is because it affects the indexing of my post. Tags got indexed in a matter of minutes while it takes hours, sometimes days before my posts get indexed.
-
I would recommend to disable tags indexing as there are cases where you are multiple tags for same topic. You can index categories as mentioned above that they are more structure and define your website in some way. If you write custom excerpt for each post, it helps categories to have unique content for each post except.
-
It’s a good idea to block tags, since they are duplicate content and may dilute the performance of your real pages. But if you find certain tag or author pages bring valid traffic, you can make an exception for them. It's up to you
-
Can you please explain what exactly you do.
-
-
Many thanks for the prompt response and also for confirming my suspicions, it is much appreciated.
The robots suggestion is handy too.
-
Personally I usually do this as well as robots.txt blocking them to save on crawl allowance, but you should no-index first as if Google is blocked from crawling (robots.txt) then how will they find the no-index tags? So it needs to be staggered
I find that the tag URLs result in quite messy SERPs so I prefer to de-index those and then really focus on adding value to 'actual' category URLs. Because categories have a defined structure they're better for SEO (IMO)
Categories are usually good for SEO if you tune and tweak them up (and if their architecture is linear) but tags are very messy
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
-
Weird Indexing Issues with the Pages and Rankings
When I found the my page was non-existent on the search results page, I requested Google to index my page via the Search Console. And then just a few minutes after I did that, that page rose to top 3 ranking on the search page (with the same keyword and browser search). It happens to most of the pages on my website. Maybe a week later the rankings sank again, and I had to do the process again to make my pages to the top. Any reasons to explain this phenomenon, and how I can fix this issue? Thank you in advance.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | mrmrsteven0 -
Removing index.php
I have question for the community and whether or not this is a good or bad idea. I currently have a Joomla site that displays www.domain.com/index.php in all the URLs with the exception of the home page. I have read that it's better to not have index.php showing in the URL at all. Does it really matter if I have index.php in my URL? I've read that it is a bad practice. I am thinking about installing the sh404SEF component on my site and removing the index.php. However, I rank pretty high for the keywords I want in Google, Bing and Yahoo. All of the URLs that show up in the searches have index.php as part of the URL. Has anyone ever used sh404SEF to remove the index.php and how did you overcome not loosing your search engine links? I don't want an existing search showing www.domain.com/index.php/sales and it not linking to the correct page which would now be www.domain.com/sales. I guess I could insert the proper redirects in the htaccess file. But I was hoping to avoid having every page of my site in the htaccess file for redirecting. Any help or advice appreciated.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | MedGroupMedia0 -
Title Tag Best Practices
In light of all the Google updates in 2013, have you updated/changed your title tag best practices? Is the format of (Keyword | Brand) still working well for your optimization efforts or have you started incorporating an approach similar to this format . (Keyword in a Sentence | Brand) Thanks in advance for your opinions.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | SEO5Team0 -
Change Joomla to Wordpress (Better SEO)
Hi, I'd like to change my cms but I am afraid 😞 I have lots of content in Google, so I know I should make 301 list but what do you think about the change? Now I am in good position and I don't want to make bad my rank 😞 Please let me know which way is the best and secured 🙂 Thanks, Misi
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Netkreativ0 -
No index.no follow certain pages
Hi, I want to stop Google et al from finding a some pages within my website. the url is www.mywebsite.com/call_backrequest.php?rid=14 As these pages are creating a lot of duplicate content issues. Would the easiest solution be to place a 'Nofollow/Noindex' META tag in page www.mywebsite.com/call_backrequest.php many thanks in advance
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | wood1e19680 -
Wordpress Blogs and SEO
So far we have been creating separate blogs on wordpress.com for our sites, and writing there. Today I was told that there was better SEO hosting the blog on the actual domain. i.e. www.widgets.com/blog instead of widget.wordpress.com Is this true? Oddly I have had my WP beat my own URL on one account. So I am not sure if this is valid. Can someone tell me pros and cons of both? Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | greenhornet770 -
Right SEO strategy for Wordpress
Hello all, I am working on my SEO strategy for a WordPress site. I am trying to cover all my keywords in: 1.a) Page title trying to have a length <70 1.b) Page url trying to have a length<115 My question is: should i try to focus all my keywords in both name and url page path? or only in the Page title as the SEOMOZ's guide suggest? I would go for a mix strategy with my keywords in both page title and url path name, but I do not know if the search engines PAY MORE ATTENTION TO THE PAGE TITLE, so mixing 1.a) and 1.b) would mean I am loosing keywords. I am using the WordPress All in ONE SEO Plugin. Do you recommend me this or any other plugin? This plugin has 3 input fields: a) Title tag b) Description tag c) Keywords My questions here are: a) If these tags replace the standard settings of WP as described in point 1.a) b) If the description and title tags are META TAGS that are not taken into account in terms of SEO but in terms of customer description of the contento of the page. c) Where are the keywords listed inserted in the page? In H1, H2, H3 and H4 tags? My feeling after reading the SEOMOZ guide is that this plugin is not providing any added value for SEO any more??' Thank you very much, Best regards, Antonio Alcocer
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | aalcocer20030 -
De-indexed by Google! ?
So it looks as though the content from myprgenie.com is no longer being indexed. Anyone know what happened and what they can do to fix it fast?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | siteoptimized0