On the long road to web positioning, we’re likely to make beginner’s mistakes at first. SEO cannibalization is one of them. Have you heard this term before? You probably have, because it’s one of the mistakes everyone makes at some point. Let’s talk about it!
It all starts when a website’s SEO director’s common sense leads them to the following reasoning: “The more pages within the domain that compete for a given keyword , the more likely they are to rank for it.” Sounds logical, right? Well, that would be a big mistake! And that’s precisely what’s known as SEO cannibalization.
But to lay the cards on the table, let’s talk about a question that’s probably on your mind: What exactly is SEO cannibalization? We’ll tell you!
SEO cannibalization is the phenomenon that occurs when multiple URLs within a single website compete with each other for the same keyword . Therefore, the visibility achieved by one of those pages ends up affecting the rest. You’d be your own enemy! So it’s not a very smart course of action.
In fact, on the other hand, experts recommend putting all your chips on a single winning horse. Trust in what you have! And that way, you’ll be ready to take to the battlefield to face your external competitors.
Just imagine launching a website that achieved tremendous search engine rankings. So, to take advantage of that momentum, you decide to continue using the same keyword.
The result is that each of the posts you develop will diminish the impact of the first URL you managed to make visible to everyone. The best idea is to approach this topic from different perspectives and keywords .
Why should SEO cannibalization be avoided?
At first glance, the fundamental reason not to engage in SEO cannibalization is simple: They contribute nothing to your pages’ rankings! In fact, they significantly affect them. But now, getting a little more detailed, we can find many other reasons to avoid these practices. What are they? Check out the following list:
- You’d have a lot of average-quality content instead of just one high-quality one. Think about it! That would end up affecting the authority of each of them and, consequently, the entire domain. Remember that sometimes it’s better to prioritize quality over quantity. And when it comes to SEO cannibalization, that’s certainly a reality. Think carefully about how to group all the ideas you want to talk about so you don’t run into problems.
- In qualitative terms, it would be very difficult to understand your content strategy. This means that both users and Google would be confused when trying to get a general idea of the topics covered. Why repeat the same thing over and over again? Why not better summarize all that information in one place?
- By distributing the same keyword across different pages, you’ll be doing the same thing to the traffic arriving at them. Therefore, the CTR of each page will drop considerably. And as you well know, this is one of the key indicators Google considers when judging a URL’s performance!
- As a website owner, your job is to make it easy for Google’s crawlers to index your pages. When you engage in SEO cannibalization, you’re doing just the opposite: You’ll unnecessarily increase the number of URLs the crawlers must process, and therefore, they’ll take longer to become available in the SERPs. Avoid this mistake!
What should I do if I detect keyword cannibalization on my website?
As we’ve mentioned, it’s very important to detect potential keyword cannibalization in your URLs. But then comes the crucial moment: What to do in this scenario? It’s not always easy to adopt a preventive approach to a situation like this. But don’t worry, there is a solution!
Before you begin, you must clearly define the content strategy you’ll maintain on your website. Otherwise, you’ll be doomed to commit one SEO cannibalization after another: So, what do you want to do? You must have a clear answer to this question!
Typically, you opt for a centralized strategy in which each keyword relies on a single URL. Just one! But after reviewing your domain, you discovered that’s not the case: you’re facing SEO cannibalization. What to do? Start by listing which of your URLs are competing with each other.
After reviewing each one, select the best one. That entry will keep people on your website. Found it? Great! Now it’s time to figure out what to do with the rest.
Those other pages competing with the one you decided to keep are likely stealing some of your web traffic. But that doesn’t mean you should indiscriminately delete them. Not at all! Take advantage of the information they contain to enhance what the main URL for that keyword has to offer. In other words: gather all your valuable content in one place .
There are plenty of options to get rid of those pages you want to leave behind. From 301 redirects to using canonical tags. However, that’s a slightly more complex topic that you can leave to your webmaster . Just focus on what you do!
How to avoid SEO cannibalization?
To avoid keyword cannibalization , you need to be creative and think of alternatives to that keyword. This will create rich content and allow you to dedicate multiple pages to strengthening the domain’s overall ranking rather than competing with each other. Need some ideas? Here they are:
- Link building : We mentioned earlier that one of the main problems with keyword cannibalizationis the confusion it creates. A good way to guide both users and Google through your content is through link building. So, be sure to include both external and internal referral links.
- Use longtails : These are slightly longer keywords , which makes them more specific. They’re especially useful in cases where the main keyword is very generic, such as “car for sale.” Instead of using that text fragment, you can try being a little more specific: “car for sale in Madrid” or “new sports car for sale.” You’ll notice the difference!
- Use the ” no index ” tag: as its name suggests, it’s a tag that tells Google which of a domain’s URLs shouldn’t be indexed. It’s undoubtedly a fairly quick and effective solution that will help you focus everyone’s attention on the highest-value page.
- Another good idea to combat SEO cannibalization is to better manage your URLs. For example, if you need to publish recurring content during a certain period of the year, you can redirect to a single page instead of creating multiple separate ones. Now you know: don’t write keywords like “summer deals 2021” in your URLs. Instead, use “summer deals.” This way, you can use them continuously without having to create new, competing pages.
Tools to find keyword cannibalization
Finally, we’d like to introduce you to some resources that will help you better manage SEO cannibalization. Check out these tools we recommend:
- Google Search Console: With this specialized tool from the search engine giant, you can give the best possible treatment to SEO cannibalizations. Link your website to it, access the “Performance” panel, and create a filter with the commands + New – Query. Then type in the keyword you want to analyze and press “Pages.” There, you’ll have the information you need right in front of you!
- Ahrefs: This web tool couldn’t be left behind when it came to SEO cannibalization, so they developed a section to detect these cases. Access Ahrefs and go to “Site Explorer,” where you’ll enter the domain you want to inspect. As a second step, go to the “Organic Search” menu and select “Organic Keywords.” Create the following command: SERP Features-Exclude-All Features-Apply. Finally, export and you’re done.
