Pagination & SEO

[BeckyKey]

Hi

In one of my other Q&A's someone mentioned I may need to look at pagination.

For instance, are these pages counted as 'new' pages in Google's eyes when clicking on pagination?

http://www.key.co.uk/en/key/plastic-storage-boxes

http://www.key.co.uk/en/key/plastic-storage-boxes#productBeginIndex:30&orderBy:5&pageView:list&

Does anyone have any advice on what I could do? It's not something I have had much experience with.

Thank you

Becky

[Ria_]

Usually with paginated pages, you will want to include rel="next/prev" in the link to tell Google that the link is going to the next page or previous page, but the content shown is part of the same group and not "different".

In Webmaster Tools, if you use URL parameters for pagination, you can also tell Google that the URL parameter is used for pagination and tell them what to do with that information. e.g. Let them decide what to do with it or just don't crawl it or whatever.

[GastonRiera]

I would try to avoid that complex URLs.

use the advice given by Ria Parish, include: Rel="nex/prev" in the link.

[DirkC]

Don't know if you did changes in the mean time - but if I check the url you seem to do it ok:

• you use canonical url's to strip the parameters from the faceted navigation
• you use rel next/previous to navigate between pages

The second url you mentioned will probably not appear in the index due to the canonical.

Dirk

[BeckyKey]

Thank you for your replies

So does this mean that any products on the pages 2 onwards will not be indexed as we have canonicals pointing to the first page?

[DirkC]

Was a bit to quick in my first answer - on first sight it looks ok - but you messed up the canonicals.

All variations of http://www.key.co.uk/en/key/plastic-storage-boxes#orderBy:5&pageView:list& have a canonical url http://www.key.co.uk/en/key/plastic-storage-boxes - which is great as it's strips away the parameters. It also has a rel next pointing to http://www.key.co.uk/en/key/plastic-storage-boxes?page=2 - which is fine as well.

However - the second page (if you start from the ugly url http://www.key.co.uk/en/key/plastic-storage-boxes#orderBy:5&pageView:list&) has url http://www.key.co.uk/en/key/plastic-storage-boxes#productBeginIndex:30&orderBy:5&pageView:list& - this page has a canonical url http://www.key.co.uk/en/key/plastic-storage-boxes - in fact that page should have the canonical url http://www.key.co.uk/en/key/plastic-storage-boxes?page=2

The coding on the "clean" (=canonical) versions of your url are fine. Check https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/1663744?hl=en - there is an example listed which is quite similar to your configuration.

Dirk

[BeckyKey]

Yep got it, thanks - will Google therefore not pay attention to those products on the second+ pages?

Also Ive seen on if you're on the second page of results we still have rel="next" href="http://www.key.co.uk/en/key/plastic-storage-boxes?page=2" >

And haven;t got the rel="prev" which I had requested,

Do you think the unfriendly URL may be a problem?

I've been looking at this site and wondered if having products when you scroll is better for SEO? http://www.dunelm.com/category/home-and-furniture/storage/storage-boxes