Vanity URLs are being indexed in Google

[seogirl22]

We are currently using vanity URLs to track offline marketing, the vanity URL is structured as www.clientdomain.com/publication, this URL then is 302 redirected to the actual URL on the website not a custom landing page. The resulting redirected URL looks like:  www.clientdomain.com/xyzpage?utm_source=print&utm_medium=print&utm_campaign=printcampaign.

We have started to notice that some of the vanity URLs are being indexed in Google search. To prevent this from happening should we be using a 301 redirect instead of a 302 and will the Google index ignore the utm parameters in the URL that is being 301 redirect to?  If not, any suggestions on how to handle?

Thanks,

[OlegKorneitchouk]

1. Yes, use 301 instead of 302. 301 would pass any authority (i.e. any backlinks) that the vanity URL gains to the actual page whereas a 302 doesn't.

2. Add a canonical URL to www.clientdomain.com/xyzpage so that search engines only index 1 version of the page

That should do it!

[seogirl22]

Thanks for your quick response and your recommendations!