{"id":4718,"date":"2021-12-29T06:29:23","date_gmt":"2021-12-29T06:29:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/seobuddy.com\/blog\/?p=4718"},"modified":"2023-05-11T04:07:09","modified_gmt":"2023-05-11T04:07:09","slug":"canonicalization","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/seobuddy.com\/blog\/canonicalization\/","title":{"rendered":"What is Canonicalization? A Complete Guide on Canonical Tags"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Canonicalization <\/strong>is a necessity if you\u2019ve got multiple pages that feature similar content. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, if you think that you\u2019ve not created duplicate versions of pages, hold it right there. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a website grows, it often becomes challenging to stop the duplication (or near-duplication) of pages. Even the content management system you use plays a role in this, so it\u2019s really not in your control. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s where the problem arises. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Google looks down upon duplicate content and it won\u2019t know which page is the original one. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s where canonicalization helps. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It helps you mark a page as canonical<\/strong> so that the search engine knows which page to crawl, index, and send traffic to. All the others would be crawled less frequently.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And if you don\u2019t, Google will choose one for you, or even give equal weight to all, which might not be ideal. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s why it\u2019s critical that you understand canonicalization and how to use canonical URLs well to boost your SEO<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, let\u2019s get started.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"What<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Canonicalization and Canonical URLs: An Introduction<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Canonical tags were first introduced in 2009 when the canonicalized URLs started getting marked by the rel=\u201dcanonical\u201d<\/em> tag<\/strong>. This tag essentially communicates to the search engines that the particular URL has to be considered as the main version of a specific piece of content or page. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

To understand canonicalization better, it\u2019s important to learn the dissimilarity between canonical URLs and canonical tags. Let\u2019s take a look at them.<\/p>\n\n\n

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John Abott<\/strong> The SEO Checklist by SEOBuddy is awesome. It doesn\u2019t just tell you what you need to do, it walks you through the process.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t

4<\/div>\r\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\r\n\t\t <\/div>\r\n <\/div>\r\n\n\n\n

Canonical Tags<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

These are tags that are placed in the header of your web page\u2019s HTML code and typically look like:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<link rel=\u201dcanonical\u201d href=\u201dhttps:\/\/www.yourwebsite.com\/blog-post-name\u201d \/><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The URL in this tag can be that of the page on which the tag appears or that of another page you want as the main page for the content. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For instance, note how we\u2019ve added a canonical tag to the header of our post.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Canonical URL<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

A canonical URL is the URL link that\u2019s selected as the main page for a piece of content. All the other versions of the same content are considered duplicates. By using a canonical URL, you can prevent duplicate content issues as you can specify which is the preferred version of a particular page. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

What else?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The canonical URL of a page can be on different domains as well. However, it\u2019s important to understand that Google may not always choose your selected canonical URL as the main one. In a few cases, it may choose another one that seems to deliver a better user experience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the above case, https:\/\/www.yourwebsite.com\/blog-post-name<\/em> is the canonical URL. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Canonicalization<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Now that you know what a canonical tag and URL is, you can understand canonicalization better. Canonicalization is the process of adding a canonical tag to a particular URL to indicate your preference for it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But why should you use canonical URLs and do canonicalization, after all?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Importance of Canonicalization<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

As mentioned before, canonicalization has tremendous SEO benefits and that\u2019s why it finds a mention in our exhaustive SEO Checklist<\/a>. This is because search engines should always know which version of a particular page is canonical. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, let\u2019s take a look at a few reasons why you should consider doing canonicalization. Here\u2019s a short video by Google that delves into the reasons as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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