Duplicate Titles - Do they matter or not?

[azn romeo 4u]

Does it matter a lot? Or no?

I see a lot of sites, have the same titles, for multiple pages. Like for example, a shopping site, that lists "TV" and it shows like 6 pages of different TV's. But the title is always "TV"

I was thinking of adding "TV" as the title on page 1, and then on page 2, it will be "TV page 2" I don't think it's a good idea though.

I have never seen a ranking in the top 5 or 10 with a title of "Widget Page 33" It's always just "Widget"

But my site, has like 600 duplicate titles because of all the pages of certain categories. What should I do?

[aakk9999]

We also add "- page n" (or "- Listing 11 - 20" or similar) to title element for subsequent pages. The first page does not have "page 1" in the title.

We do the same to page meta descriptions if they are automatically generated.

The idea is that you try to rank the first listing page for each of categories and use robots noindex, follow for subsequent pagination (pages 2 onwards) of the same category.

[goodroi]

having relevant and unique titles only matters if you want to improve your seo.

[azn romeo 4u]

Do you guys see ever your site on the serps "Keywords Page x"?

[goodroi]

I do not understand what you are asking.

[aakk9999]

What I think he is asking is have you ever seen your subsequent listing pages in the SERPs, with the title:

"Some listing title - page 2"

In theory it could happen. If your items on the second listing page have (for example) more rounded item description (more words, more text), then Google may decide to rank page 2 of listing above the first page of listing. Eg. your first 10 products have one line description each and your second 10 products (shown on page 2) have 3-4 sentences description each, giving the page 2 more relevant content.

But this is more exception and I have seen it rarely.

[epmaniac]

wouldnt it hurt your seo if you will do follow, no index subsequent pages (2,3,.. onwards) ?

you would want to show all of your content to google,..no?

[TheMadScientist]

epmaniac: noindex,follow does let Google see all of your content... It just keeps some pages from being indexed. IOW: When you noindex a page Google still spiders the page and knows the content is there, but that page is not shown in Google's results.

[epmaniac]

but it doesnt transfer PR juice and doesn't help in internal linking.

with more pages internal linking could be stronger, no?

[TheMadScientist]

but it doesnt transfer PR juice and doesn't help in internal linking.

Says who?

[tangor]

Some of this makes me scratch head... a page is a page... each page should have a title... in most sane contexts that page title will refer to the page content. As regards what is served (as a page) there should be no confusion, the page should have an appropriate title.

At least that's the way I'e always done it and so far all pages index, and some of them rank :)

(t)(r)anking is a different subject!

[azn romeo 4u]

i get what you are saying tangor, but what about multiple pages. Google doesn't like duplicate titles.

But if you go to newegg.com for example, show power supply units. It has like 1000 results split into 100 items per page. Each page has the same title. Don't think that helps the serp. So that was what I was wondering about that. But then again I don't think having "Title - Page X" helps either.

[aakk9999]

It really depends whether you want to give a meaningful title to all of your multiple listing pages of the same product category OR you want to rank in SERPs each of the multiple listing pages of the same product category on its own merit.

I can see nothing wrong with having "- page x" added as this IS the meaningful and rightful title for such page. E.g. you may have

Televisions
Televisions - listing page 2
Televisions - listing page 3
etc.

It is meaningful to users and will not result in duplicate titles in WMT. Google will not penalise you for this nor will "devalue" first page of listing because of adding "- listing page 2" etc. to the title for subsequent listing pages.

Whether you can RANK "Televisions - listing page 2" etc. in SERPs is a different questions alltogether.

[incrediBILL]

I don't think having "Title - Page X" helps either.

I have them, it works, it makes Google happy.

[tangor]

There are pages and there are index pages. Google and most SEs recognize the difference, and in most cases discounts "ranking" for index pages or toc pages or link pages to get to the CONTENT PAGE(s). What I said earlier remains true. I generally make sure my "link/toc" pages are "about" 100 links (some as few a 2 most around 100, some as high as 175) so there is only 2 steps from HOME1STLINKS 2NDTOCLINKS FINALPRODUCT

That page in between (Second Table Of Contents Links) has nothing to rank as it is not a content page in the first place. Can't get PR from something that has nothing to track... but each one does have a unique title.

Widget TOC 2 (or appropriate)

[Jonny6]

Yes it matters a lot, non unique page titles within a site are sub optimal, if google chose to list a few of your pages first in its results, the same page titles will get all but one filtered out.
If the pages are that similar, do not use noindex, instead use the canonical element.

[aakk9999]

I am not sure if canonical tag would be the best solution in case of listing pages. Whilst these pages are similar, they are not the same as they list different products. I am not sure if use of canonical on page 2 onwards may cause links to products on subsequent listing pages to be ignored.

Or to try to explain my view better:

The use of canonical on listing pages is recommended in cases where there are sort criteria, multiple groupings by category or similar, i.e. where you could get same products listed in a different order / different breakdown depending on the search criteria.

But if you (for example) have only one criteria of listing the products, then I am not sure whether it is a good idea to canonicalise all subsequent listing pages to the first page of listing. Eg, if you only ever can have "Televisions" products listed alphabetically on your site (and no other way of re-grouping / listing these), and you have 35 of them, then I would not canonicalise page 2, 3 and 4 to page 1 of listing.

This is however only my "gut feeling" and I have no proof one way or the other.