Canonical URL Tag: Confusing Use Case

[GregSims]

We have a webpage that changes content each evening at mid-night -- let's call this page URL /foo.  This allows a user to bookmark URL /foo and obtain new content each day.  In our case, the content on URL /foo for a given day is the same content that exists on another URL on our website.  Let's say the content for November 5th is URL /nov05, November 6th is /nov06 and so on.  This means on November 5th, there are two pages on the website that have almost identical content -- namely /foo and /nov05.  This is likely a duplication of content violation in the view of some search engines.

Is the Canonical URL Tag designed to be used in this situation?  The page /nov05 is the permanent page containing the content for the day on the website.  This means page /nov05 should have a Canonical Tag that points to itself and /foo should have a Canonical Tag that points to /nov05.  Correct?

Now here is my problem.  The page at URL /foo is the fourth highest page authority on our 2,000+ page website.  URL /foo is a key part of the marketing strategy for the website.  It has the second largest number of External Links second only to our home page.   I must tell you that I'm concerned about using a Cononical URL Tag that points away from the URL /foo to a permanent page on the website like /nov05.  I can think of a lot of things negative things that could happen to the rankings of the page by making a change like this and I am not sure what we would gain.  Right now /foo has a Canonical URL Tag that points to itself.  Does anyone believe we should change this?  If so, to what and why?

Thanks for helping me think this through!  Greg

[Devanur-Rafi]

Hi Greg, first things first.

The page /nov05 is the permanent page containing the content for the day on the website.  This means page /nov05 should have a Canonical Tag that points to itself and /foo should have a Canonical Tag that points to /nov05.  Correct?

For the page /nov05, why would you need to place a canonical tag? Canonical tag has to be placed on a non-canonical page (page that is not preferred to appear in the search results) pointing to the canonical page which is the preferred one. In case of a home page where it can have multiple variations like, www, non-www, index.html etc, you can go for a canonical tag pointing to itself. In case where someone copies your page as it is along with source code, a canonical tag pointing to itself can be beneficial as no matter where it is, the page would be pointing to the original page on your website. But in general, you don't need to have a canonical tag pointing to the same page on which it resides. This is not mandatory.

Coming to your original issue at hand. It is not a sin to have duplicate content on the website and the intention behind it matters way more than the duplication itself. I don't think you are doing anything wrong here. In a situation like yours, considering the importance of the page /foo, you should not be placing a canonical tag on it. The best solution would be to leave it as it is and don't bother about the issue. Search engines like Google are very well aware of situations like this and can handle very well. Those were my two cents in this regard.

Best,

Devanur Rafi

[Kurt_Steinbrueck]

I agree with Devanur and will add another possible solution.

What if you only put an abstract on the /foo page?  That way you only have a compelling description/summary of the which is on the dated page, /nov05, and the full content is on the dated page.  There would be no duplication then, though it would be an extra step for users.

Kurt Steinbrueck
OurChurch.Com

[GregSims]

Thank you for your responses Davanur and Kurt.  The page /foo is copied a great deal across the Internet.  I believe the Canonical Tag pointing back to our website helps as Davanur mentioned.  The content of the page is fairly short -- only one screen.  Kurt's idea of using an abstract on /foo and linking to /nov05 would work if the page contained more content.

I believe we will leave things as they are based on these two responses.  It is easy for us to change these design points (the use of Canonical on every page for example) with little effort as the website is dynamically generated.

Thanks again! Greg