How do I fix a bad link in Google?

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How do I fix a bad link in Google?

ace2000

10:03 am on Nov 6, 2005 (gmt 0)

I have a very important page on my site for a very hot product. It is indexed in Google at #3. I should be getting lots of traffic, but I found out that Google messed up on the link in their search results!

A user id was tacked on the url by mistake (this is the first time this has happened), and now whenever you go to my product page from Google using internet explorer the product can't be added to cart and errors show up on the page.

Is there anyway that I can get Google to fix this link so that it is correct?

bizeu

10:05 pm on Nov 6, 2005 (gmt 0)

I have the same problem. Think google removal tool would help. I'm trying it today :)

www.google.com/webmasters/remove.html

g1smd

10:23 pm on Nov 6, 2005 (gmt 0)

If your site is scripted then make sure that each page of your site "tests" what its own full URL is as it is served to the user, and adds the <meta name="robots" content="noindex"> tag to the <head> section to keep the URL out of the index.

I see several sites that do that with all of their &pf=1 (print friendly) pages.

ace2000

1:13 pm on Nov 7, 2005 (gmt 0)

If I use the removal tool, will google then re-index the page again? I want google to trash the messed up url it has now and then index the page again so it will get it right. I think it was just a mistake, because this error in the url has only happened with this one page on my site. I really want this page in the SERPS, but I want it to be in the serps with the right url!

phpmaven

3:20 pm on Nov 7, 2005 (gmt 0)

I wouldn't recommend using the removal tool. You should 301 the offending url to the correct url and then implement something similar to what g1smd recommended to keep it from happening again.

Max_M

3:32 pm on Nov 7, 2005 (gmt 0)

use .htaccess to do a permanent redirect (301) to the correct url

g1smd

8:22 pm on Nov 7, 2005 (gmt 0)

If you use the redirect, then you have not fixed the root cause of the problem.

You will find that some other page(s) appear with exactly the same problem, next week, or next month.

Get the site to actually serve a "noindex" meta tag for all page URL variations that you do not want to be indexed. That will fix the problem for all time, for all pages.

ace2000

3:25 am on Nov 8, 2005 (gmt 0)

I should probably make this clearer. I DO want this page indexed. However, google somehow added this to the end of the url:

?sid=

usually that doesn't happen with my session id's, but with this particular url google for some reason happened to add it to the url. All I want is the page to be reindexed with the '?sid=' removed. Having a blank session id like that makes the page crash in internet explorer.

Ouroboros

4:51 am on Nov 8, 2005 (gmt 0)

There's a background question here, the answer to which is being assumed by some, maybe all, rather than being addressed explicitly. Personally, I'd like to know the answer to it:

Does Google consider the following two urls to be identical? Or does Google consider them to be two completely separate pages?

1) [whateversite.com...]
2) [whateversite.com...]

My own guess is that Google considers them to be two completely different pages, period. If they have duplicate content, then one will score higher than the other. In the current case, Google is ranking page #2 very high (at position 3...super).

If ace2000 wants the page at URL #1 to rank high, then he's going to have to get page #2 out of the index (so, despite his claim that he wants it indexed, the truth is that he really doesn't). That'll solve the duplicate content problem, and with any luck, the page at URL #1 will take its place in position 3.

That's just my guess at how it works. If you're guessing different, why? Can what I'm asserting, or a contrary, be supported by any tests anyone knows of here?

ace2000

3:32 pm on Nov 8, 2005 (gmt 0)

I realize that another option I have is to modify the code in my site so that if it gets a url with a blank/no session id then to assign one. However, supposing I don't have that option, what are my alternatives?

ace2000

3:45 pm on Nov 8, 2005 (gmt 0)

Well guess what? I emailed Google about the offending url 2 days ago, and it appears that they have fixed it. The page and url show up at the same spot in the serps, but the "?sid=" that I was telling you about has been removed!

Google never sent a reply to my email. They just made the change. It's nice to know that they are responding to webmasters' needs.

BTW, I also sent an email to Yahoo 2 days ago to find out if my site had been banned. I also received a quick reply within 24 hours that it was not banned, with a whole email about ways to get higher up in the serps, as well as a link to webmasterworld.com. Maybe I should post that email in the Yahoo forum...

g1smd

12:00 am on Nov 9, 2005 (gmt 0)

Modify the script for your site so that IF, and ONLY if, the URL contains the &sid= parameter then the page ALSO has the <meta name="robots" content="noindex"> within the <head> section.

That will allow the page (and all other pages of the site) to be always indexed under the correct URL, and never under the incorrect URL.