Has anyone ever seen this canonicalization problem with Google?

[leatherhidestore]

I recently move my site  (www.leatherhidestore.com/servlet/StoreFront) off of the ProStores platform because I could never get Google to show my homepage in SERP results - instead always selecting random product pages to rank.  However, I never had this problem with Yahoo and Bing as they always defaulted to the homepage except when the category was a better match.

Fast forward and I have just launched the site (www.leatherhidestore) on Magento Community and I STILL CANNOT GET GOOGLE TO USE MY HOMEPAGE FOR SERP RESULTS although I'm getting okay SERPS for random pages.....ERRRRRR!  Of course, as if to rub salt in the wound, Yahoo and Bing are behaving just perfect.  Still, I must think that if my Google would recognize my homepage (where the PR is and backlinks point to) I would be doing 10x better.

I am showing duplicate page content and title problems which the developer is trying to solve but I do not know if this will fix the homepage Google issue.  I feel like I must be in some sort of canonicalization death spiral.  Has anybody dealt with this issue before and will mercifully share what I should do to fix it...please!

Hunter

[irvingw]

Something very screwy with your URL. Open site explorer says its redirecting back to the old URL - The URL you've entered redirects to another URL. We're showing results for www.leatherhidestore.com/servlet/StoreFront since it is likely to have more accurate link metrics. See data for www.leatherhidestore.com instead? I would look into htaccess settings and your configuration settings on magento and your hosting provider.

Also, I would disavow your links from the link exchanges.

[leatherhidestore]

Hey Irving,

Thanks for responding and I have forwarded the info to my developer (who also host the site).  Open site explorer can lag behind so I am not sure if it is picking up something that is no longer there.  I do know that my old URL is of course no longer indexed in Google so I am not sure how my new URL could redirect to it and it not throw some sort of page not found error?   Do you think duplicate content could be playing a role or is that incidental to this issue?  Lastly, I wouldn't know the problem with the htaccess is I was looking right at it. Can you recommend someone who would be especially capable at resolving such an issue?

Thanks again!

Hunter

[leatherhidestore]

Hey Irving,

It turned out that the Open site explorer info was erroneous.....errr.  My developer spent a couple of hours trying to find something wrong.

He sink me these links to third party redirect verifications that don’t show anything like what seo moz is saying.

http://www.seologic.com/webmaster-tools/url-redirect?utf8=✓&url=www.leatherhidestore.com

http://www.internetofficer.com/seo-tool/redirect-check/

Any other advice regarding the homepage not ranking for keywords?  Pretty frustrating when even the moz tools are working as they should.  I did disavow some of those link exchanges per your advice.

Happy Holidays!

[irvingw]

Removing links may help.

some other tips:

1. add a robots.txt to the site

2. using htaccess force https to redirect to http (perhaps share your the contents of your htaccess for review)

https://www.leatherhidestore.com/ should not resolve ...

3. get rid of the meta name="keywords" tag

4. Some tips from SEO moz report card for your home page.

• Avoid Keyword Stuffing in Document

  Easy fix

  <dl>

  <dt>Occurrences of Keyword</dt>

  <dd>21</dd>

  <dt>Explanation</dt>

  <dd>We've seen evidence that excessive use of keywords can negatively impact rankings and thus suggest moderation.</dd>

  <dt>Recommendation</dt>

  <dd>Remove instances of the targeted keyword(s) from the document text of this page to bring it below 15</dd>

  </dl>

  <a class="more expanded">Minimize</a>

• Avoid Keyword Stuffing in Page Title

  Easy fix

  <dl>

  <dt>Page title</dt>

  <dd>"Upholstery Leather - Buy Wholesale Leather | Leather Hide Store"</dd>

  <dt>Explanation</dt>

  <dd>Using the targeted keyword(s) more than twice in the title tag may be perceived as keyword stuffing (a form of search engine spam) by the engines, and thus we recommend against it.</dd>

  <dt>Recommendation</dt>

  <dd>Do not employ more than two instances of the targeted keyword(s) in the title tag.</dd>

  </dl>

  <a class="more expanded">Minimize</a>

Avoid Keyword Self-Cannibalization

Easy fix

<dl>

<dt>Cannibalizing link</dt>

<dd>"Leather Buying Guide", "Our Leather Collection", and "Leather Remnants"</dd>

<dt>Explanation</dt>

<dd>It's a best practice in SEO to target each keyword with a single page on your site (sometimes two if you've already achieved high rankings and are seeking a second, indented listing). To prevent engines from potentially seeing a signal that this page is not the intended ranking target and creating additional competition for your page, we suggest staying away from linking internally to another page with the target keyword(s) as the exact anchor text. Note that using modified versions is sometimes fine (for example, if this page targeted the word 'elephants', using 'baby elephants' in anchor text would be just fine).</dd>

<dt>Recommendation</dt>

<dd>Unless there is intent to rank multiple pages for the target keyword, it may be wise to modify the anchor text of this link so it is not an exact match.</dd>

</dl>

Canonical URL Tag Usage

Moderate fix

<dl>

<dt>Number of Canonical tags</dt>

<dd>0</dd>

<dt>Explanation</dt>

<dd>Although the canonical URL tag is generally thought of as a way to solve duplicate content problems, it can be extremely wise to use it on every (unique) page of a site to help prevent any query strings, session IDs, scraped versions, licensing deals or future developments to potentially create a secondary version and pull link juice or other metrics away from the original. We believe the canonical URL tag is a best practice to help prevent future problems, even if nothing is specifically duplicate/problematic today.</dd>

<dt>Recommendation</dt>

<dd>Add a canonical URL tag referencing this URL to the header of the page</dd>

</dl>

[leatherhidestore]

Hey Irving,

Thanks for these insights...I have been doing the keyword optimization on the site and perhaps that is not such a great idea.  I was happy when the moz page analyzer gave me an A for the homepage but I was looking at keywords and not overall page health.

I think I need a good on-site SEO person who can systematically work through these issues and implement solutions.  Naively, I thought my developer of the Magento site would bring these skills to the table but  perhaps that is a very different skill set.  Do you agree?  If so, are there some folks you can recommend (that are reasonable and available....difficult combination I know)?

I really appreciate your time...it is kind of like therapy as I feel like I am on my own out here!

Hunter