Why Is Keyword Cannibalization Bad? How Do I Fix Keyword Cannibalization?

What Is Keyword Cannibalization?

In the SEO world, keyword cannibalization is the process of one webpage targeting too many of the same keywords, which negatively affects the ranking of the pages.

For example, if you have a page about “red shoes” and a page about “blue shoes,” and you try to rank both pages for the keyword “shoes,” you’re essentially cannibalizing your SEO efforts.

The reason this can be a problem is that search engines might not know which page to rank higher for the keyword “shoes.”

If you have too many pages targeting the same keyword, the pages will compete with each other for ranking, and the page that ultimately wins will be the page that is the most relevant and has the best SEO.

How To Identify and Prevent Keyword Cannibalization

So, how do you know if you’re keyword cannibalizing your pages?

One way to check is to use the Google AdWords Keyword Planner. Type in a couple of the keywords you’re targeting and see how many keywords each page is targeting.

If you have a page targeting 10 keywords and another page targeting 5 keywords, you might be cannibalizing your SEO efforts.

If you’re not sure which pages are targeting which keywords, you can use the Google Search Console to find out.

In the Google Search Console, go to the “Search Traffic” tab and then select “Search Analytics.” In the “Query” column, you’ll see the keywords that each page is targeting.

If you see a lot of keywords being targeting by multiple pages, you might want to consider consolidating the content on those pages so that you’re not cannibalizing your SEO efforts.

There are a few things you can do to prevent keyword cannibalization:

1. Target one primary keyword per page.
2. Use keywords in the title, in the headings, and throughout the content.
3. Use the Google AdWords Keyword Planner to find keywords that your page might be targeting.
4. Use the Google Search Console to find out which pages are targeting which keywords.
5. Use the “Search Traffic” tab and select “Search Analytics.” In the “Query” column, you’ll see the keywords that each page is targeting.

Why Is Keyword Cannibalization Bad? And How Do I Fix Keyword Cannibalization?

Keyword cannibalization is when multiple pages on a website are competing for the same keyword or keyword phrase.

This can be bad for a website because it can create confusion among search engine crawlers, which can lead to lower rankings for all of the pages. In addition, cannibalizing your own traffic can result in wasted marketing efforts.

Fortunately, there are a few steps that you can take to fix this issue:

1. Choose one page to be the primary page for that keyword.

The first step is to choose one page to be the primary page for that keyword. You can do this by analyzing your website’s analytics and seeing which page has the highest organic traffic.

Once you’ve chosen the primary page, you need to make sure that all of the other pages on your website are optimized for different keywords.

2. Use the “rel=canonical” tag.

If you have multiple pages that are competing for the same keyword, you can use the “rel=canonical” tag to tell search engines which page is the primary page.

This tag tells search engines that all of the other pages are variations of the primary page, and that the primary page should be ranked highest.

3. Use 301 redirects.

If you have a page that’s no longer relevant, or if you’ve merged two pages into one, you can use a 301 redirect to redirect traffic from the old page to the new page.

This is a permanent redirect, which means that the old page will be completely deleted from the search engine results pages (SERPs).

4. Use the robots.txt file.

The robots.txt file is a file that tells search engines which pages on your website they should crawl and index.

If you have a page that you don’t want to be indexed, you can use the robots.txt file to tell search engines not to crawl it.

By following these steps, you can reduce the risk of keyword cannibalization and improve your website’s rankings.

Conclusion

Keyword cannibalization, also known as keyword slamming, is a term used in search engine optimization (SEO) to describe the situation where the same keyword or phrase is used on multiple pages on a website, resulting in those pages competing against each other for rankings in search engine results pages (SERPs).