Welcome to the Q&A Forum

Hi Chablau,

Yes 301 redirects DOES transfer link juice. Take a look at this article by Cyrus Shepard:

301 Redirects Rules Change: What You Need to Know for SEO

Hope I've helped.
GR.

Kevin,

You should know that measuring the PA/DA is not guarantee for better positions. You shold alway check other factors besides PA/DA and links.
PA/DA movements may be due to a lot of reasons. Here the official explanation and a question answered by Rand Fishkin.
Mozscape Link index update - Moz Domain authority get down significantly. Internal MOZ Issue? Google Algoritm Update?

Regarding the updates, you can check them out here: Mozscape API Update

Best of luck.
GR.

Hello Rosemary,
Yeap, it is possible to tell Google your sitemap. In this article (official Webmasters Central), they offer 3 options:

1. Via Search Console.
2. Via the robots.txt file.
3. Using a HTTP Ping.

Hope I've helped.
Best luck.
GR.

Hi Jeff,

Yes, you should remove the blank page from sitemap. This will not de-index the previuos indexed.
If there aren't lots of pages, after updating the sitemap and updating Search Console with that sitemap, send request to remove those from the index.
That can be done in the Search Console account too.

Best Luck.
GR.

Hello Jaro,

What Andy says is right, im backing him up. Remember to not include that URL in the sitemap.

Also is a good moment to say that with the robots.txt you just tell google bot not no follow it, that differs from indexing it. There are cases where URLs are indexed instead of being "blocked" in the robots.txt.

The fine way stop google from indexing a certain URL would be adding the meta robots tag including a noindex atribute.
Here there a quote from the Webmaster central help forum in Google:

If you block a file from crawling and Google discovers a URL for that file on another site, it may still index the file using whatever information it can find, even though crawling is blocked. So robots.txt disallow does not necessarily stop something being indexed.
(in the ets answer, a note below the Disallow part)

Hope it's clarifying.
Best luck.
GR.

HI there,

Remember that rankings movements, sometimes don't have much to do with algorithm updates. There are thousands of reason and variables to analyze.

About updates you can have very updated info here:

mozcast.com
Algoroo.com

Best luck!

Hi Kris,

This brings a bigger question: Why do you need a 20 point increase ?

You MUST know that having higher metrics will not make you rank higher. It will increase the chances of ranking higher and impress your clients/supervisors.
In my opinion, you should not focus in metrics, such as PA or DA. Focus in doing what google wants.

To answer your questions, just get (somehow) links with higher PA/DA than your page and make your link profile to have more and more of those links. Timeline? a few per week for the entire life.
Remember, moz's metrics look at the most, the backlinks pointing to your page and the links in the pages related to the backlink and you website... So the key in Moz' s metrics: BACKLINKS!

Hope I've helped.
GR.

Hello Cathy,

There is no harm in doing a 301 redirection. In my opinion, is the correct thing to do.
You might see some variations in DA/PA and/or some variations in the rankings. That´s normal, remember that HTTPS web is a totally new website to google and to any crawler.

Take a look on these three articles. They might help you.

The Big List of SEO Tips and Tricks for Using HTTPS on Your Website - Moz Blog
The HTTP to HTTPs Migration Checklist in Google Docs to Share, Copy & Download - AleydaSolis
Google SEO HTTPS Migration Checklist - SERoundtable

Best luck!
GR

Hello Gavo.

Yes! It is a problem for Google. Just make a 301 redirection to the HTTPS and problem solved!

Best luck!
GR.

Hello Aua,

Your problem is about Google or about leaving the page accesible for users?
Im thinking in some possible ways to handle this, depending in the case:

• Leave the page live and just make it non indexable with a robots no index tag. This way just prevent user to find the page searching in google.
• Edit the page just tell the visitors that the page will show information when it is needed.
• Delete the page (or unpublish it, if you are with a CMS like a wordpress) and create it again when neede. This way it will make Google to de index the page. Of course, the must be a personalized 404 error page in that site.

Did I help you? Or just offer you options that you´ve already considered?

Best luck.
GR.

Hi Becky,

Without knoing those relevant search terms, there's almost no analysis to be done.
I´ve noticed that it took very long time to load, here a GTmetrix report.

Remember that migrating to HTTPs makes google to re-crawl all your website's pages and re evaluate all ranking factors.
My advise is to wait a little longer. It might take a few weeks.

Also, always monitor the Google Search console profile, there could be some message. Take a look into indexed pages, there could be also that there are less pages indexed now than before migration.

Hope I've helped.
Best luck.
GR.

Hello floretweddings,

Dont panic, what you are seeing is the result of Google trying to understand what your new site is about (the https version is a completely new site for google).

Sadly, you've sent mixed signals to Google. First redicting to HTTPs then undoing that redirect. 
At the moment of writing this anwer the page is indexed, check it out using site: operator. Keep into consideration that right now both versions are live, the http and the https. Make the redirection (by plugin, by a hosting rule o by .htaccess file) or use a canonical to point every page to its https version.

Take a look on these three articles. They might help you.

The Big List of SEO Tips and Tricks for Using HTTPS on Your Website - Moz Blog
The HTTP to HTTPs Migration Checklist in Google Docs to Share, Copy & Download - AleydaSolis
Google SEO HTTPS Migration Checklist - SERoundtable

Hope I've helped.
Best luck.
GR.

Hello mag777,

TL;DR;
In a SEO perspective, there is no difference.

In my experience for the companies I've worked (and those im working) there is no difference in SEO for having www or non-www site.
How do we decide?

1. (as stated in the article you share) using the one that complies all the technical need of the website.
2. Understanding all online competitors and trying to see which version they use and why
3. For some companies its a commercial and branding thing. Just love to use one version.
   In my opnion this is the case of the really big brands, they follow the wave that in the begginings(arround 2000's) every website used www so as the general public understad that was an internet direction.

That last point is backed by me asking them why they use that version and them saying: "because Coca-cola, Ebay and every big company uses www. So we want to imitate them"

Hope it helps.
Best Luck.
GR.

Hello Bee,

As for internationalization purposes, leave them in their own ccTLD. Just add hreflangs to the other country websites and you'll be just fine.

If you choose to go down the road of having all under a .com/country/ configuration, I'd suggest you installing separate wordpress on each country. Also, if you plan on expanding on more countries and having an overall control, take a look at Wordpress Multisite Network Administration.

Also, just for clarifying, take a look at these articles:
Multi-regional and multilingual sites - Google Search Console
International checklist - Moz Blog
Using the correct hreglang tag - Moz Blog
Guide to international website expansion - Moz Blog
Tool for checking hreflang anotations - Moz Blog

Hope it helps.
Best Luck.
GR.

Hi Brian,

Keyword cannibalization is always a dilemma. I've checked those URLs in SEMrush and /investments/ doesnt rank high for any relevant kws.
My approach would be improving /developments/ trying to improve that high ranks and with a keyword research focus /investments/ towards other search terms.

I dont recommend redirecting one to the other neither merging them, because you have the potential gain with other keywords and long tails.

It could be benefitial to write some blogposts about one or several topics related to those pages and point a backlink to /developments/ or /investments/ with the focus keyword so as tell google that its content relevant to that search term.

Hope it helps.
Best luck.
GR.

PS: It would be awesome to hear back from you with the selected option and the results!
PS2: Some resources:
How to Identify & Eliminate Keyword Cannibalization to Boost Your SEO - SEJ
Keyword Cannibalization and SEO: What You Need to Know - Stone Temple
Why You Might Be Cannibalizing Your Own Keywords – Here’s Why #125 - Stone Temple

Hi!

What billbill369 said is correct, but will only prevent google from crawling those pages.
My suggestion is to use canonical tags in every URL with a parameter pointing to the correct url (the one without parameters)

For further reading:
SEO Best Practices for Canonical URLs + the Rel=Canonical Tag - Whiteboard Friday Consolidate duplicate URLs - Google Search Console Help

Hope it helps.
Best luck.
GR.

Hi there!

There are some theories that include a single H1 as a best practice.
Although, a few months ago, google said that its just fine to have several H1 tags.
My site's template has multiple H1 tags - Google Webmasters Youtube Channel

Of course, those multiple H1 tags must be correctly used. Google does understand those tags and comprehends whether are correctly used. Try using h2, h3 or other, as long as the content requieres them.
Your principal concern should be creating exceptional content, not having more than one H1 tag.

Hope it helps.
Best luck.
GR

Hi XLMarketing,

I'd go with the option 2.
Keep into consideration that Google said redirects 3xx does not loose any PR, linkjuice or whatever ranking power. Also there are some experiments performed by great people that stated there is a 10-15% loss in the redirect.
Why am I saying this? Just for you to know it in other situations.

More info: 
Google: Any 3xx Redirect Does Not Lose PageRank At All - SearchEngine Round Table
301 Redirects Rules Change: What You Need to Know for SEO - MozBlog

Hope it helps.
Best luck.
GR.

Hello Kev!

your homepage IS INDEXED. Sometimes googles confuses itself and doesnt show the homepage in first place when searching with "site:" Also, John Mueller said that these searches (with "site:" parameter) doent always represent the indexation status.

Check the image attached, you´ll see the result of your site.

Hope it helps.
Best luck.
GR.

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Hi Aleksandra,

Yes, its completely possible to keep the traffic when migrations. Of course YOU MUST BE REALLY CAREFULL when migrating.

In my experience, i and my team hace succesfully performed site migrations with millions of visits per month and we only saw a drop in visits the first 3-4 weeks right after the migration.

There is a lot of information about successful migrations. If you are not in a hurry to migrate, take a look at these resources.
Even, if you are in a hurry to migrate, please, pretty please **TAKE YOUR TIME TO ANALYZE, **so nothing gets lost in the middle.
It happend to me and my team that migrations were done taking just a few considerations and we are facing a 10% lost in organic traffic in the last 3 months.

Here those resources:
The Website Migration Guide: SEO Strategy, Process, & Checklist - Moz Blog
The Ultimate SEO Guide for Successful Web Migrations at #DigitalOlympus - AleydaSolis
Migration Best Practices - SMX London 2018 <- backedup by JohnMu in this tweet

Hope it helps.
Best luck.
GR