What is URL Canonicalization & Why Does It Matter for SEO?

Canonicalization is the process of pointing all versions of a website to a single point of truth, usually the most secure and authoritative version of the site. This occurs because most websites have a variety of URLs that lead to the main site. For instance, if you owned https://www.website.com/ and people occasionally typed “website.com” to reach your site, one of those two sites is considered the original, while the other is a reroute or could even be its own separate page that directs to other content; there can be 4, 5, or more different versions of the site but only one has the html tag that marks it “canonical.”

Here are some variations of your domain you may have that, with the use of canonicalization, should all point to your single point of truth.

http://website.com/
http://www.website.com/
http://website.com/index.html
http://www.website.com/index.html
https://website.com/
https://www.website.com/
https://website.com/index.html
https://www.website.com/index.html

• Canonicalization is the process of being intentional about selecting the most authoritative version of your site and being consistent throughout your site. If you route viewers through the www version of your site half the time and the non-www version the other half, it can impact how your page ranking on search engines.
• Using a single point of truth allows you to consistently build authority with links to one domain, rather than splitting that equity across multiple versions of a domain.
• In order to know your site is canonicalized, inventory the internal links to your site (and any external links to your site, like Google ads) and make sure they are using the same canonical format. The more consistent you are, the more likely search engines are to grab your chosen canonical formation as the single point of truth rather than treating your results as separate sites.

Canonicalization is just one of many detailed methods that Intero Digital can use to improve the overall architecture of your website so that search engines find it and rank it highly. Intero Digital can help you audit your entire site to identify any duplicate content issues through all versions of your website. You want to get page rank “credit” for all your content, and you don’t want duplicate content to dilute your ranking. Search engines are optimized to show only one version, if duplicate content is detected, which may reduce the page ranking if the canonical copy wasn’t clearly tagged.

Intero Digital has the Search Engine Optimization expertise needed to help you perfect your website content architecture, as well as Social Media Services, Video Production Services, and Search Engine Marketing know-how. Contact us today, and we can get started on your project today!