Thoughts on blog optimisation... to noindex or not?

[FranticFish]

I help run a couple of blogs - the site owner writes the content, I edit and publish. So I manage the tags, which means there is only one tag per post.

Standard practice is to noindex tag pages, but that's for people using them with a scatter-gun approach. My tags are effectively exclusive categories.

I'm thinking of allowing indexing on tag pages once I have a certain number of posts on that topic, because I think that's a better way to present the content to Google compared to all jumbled together on the main blog page and paginated archive.

However, if I do that, then I have to certainly noindex the paginated archive.

My question is should I also noindex the main blog page? On neither site does it pull in any traffic and (as neither site is actively marketing the blog) we're not exactly in the running to be found for '[niche] blog' - assuming that people even search for that!

I'm leaning towards noindexing the main page and archive. I have never searched for a blog, I've searched for answers to questions, so I think that having Google index the content by topic is preferable.

Would welcome thoughts / experiences.

[aakk9999]

that's a better way to present the content to Google compared to all jumbled together on the main blog page and paginated archive

It appears you are using tags in a similar way others use categories. In your case it would make sense to let the tag pages being indexed.

should I also noindex the main blog pageshould I also noindex the main blog page

If the main blog page is at the domain root then I would leave it indexed even though it is a mashed up content of latest articles. If the blog is located as a subsection within the site then you may consider noindexing it, but before doing this, check your analytics and logs to see if you have visitors landing on main blog page from SERPs, if you do, leave it indexed, one page with duplicate content will not harm you.

[robzilla]

I'd find that a strange signal to send: "please don't index my main page, nobody should want to go there". You may not get a lot of search traffic to these pages, but does that justify noindexing them? What benefit do you see?

[tangor]

I think the fear of duplicate content has turned basic search on its ear. Main pages should be indexed. Most other pages as well. A well-crafted site does not have a lot of duplicate content.

Every page is a potential landing page. Every page nonindexed is NOT a potential landing page.

I tend to opt for landing pages. And that includes second level index/category menus, etc.

YMMV

[FranticFish]

Thanks for replies.

@ aakk9999 - on both sites the /blog/ is an internal page and neither receive visits. Articles within the blog do, so my hope is that tag pages could too.

@ tangor and robzilla - I'm inclined not to let Google index everything, because then I would have my article introductions indexed on:
A - pages with unique title and meta description, where all articles relate to each other more closely,
but also:
B - pages with a unique title and meta description only for the first page in the archive, where articles relate to each other less closely.

I don't want to send them mixed signals, and I don't want them preferring the archive pages to the tag pages in results (although if they did, it would probably be interesting to find out why).

People lock down tag pages because too many tags and the combination of thin page / duplicate content they lead to causes problems. Choosing either/or in this situation seems to be the best way to be as far away from that as possible.

[not2easy]

Are these Wordpress blogs? Most people no-index tag pages because tag pages contain the same articles (pages/posts) found through categories and archives. It sounds like you are using tags as categories, but it is not a good idea to try to get both indexed separately. Tags are used for internal site search functions, that is why most people use multiple tags. The articles listed on tag pages should have canonical meta-tags to the original article. An SEO plugin like Yoast's make that automated.

[FranticFish]

Thanks - no they're not WordPress, it's a custom CMS which works like a stripped down version of WordPress with the basic features that everyone needs and an SEO plugin built in. Not as swish in the admin area, but orders of magnitude faster.

When we first developed the system we used exclusive categories (with the url of the article including the category url), but then switched to tags as that's what people wanted - write first, organise later. When we did that we moved all articles into root (so /blog/article-1) to avoid having to add canonicals, and to avoid ugly/confusing url issues too.

My view is also that it should be either/or when it comes to what pages to have indexed.

[not2easy]

Sounds like an improvement, an unfair advantage then. ;)

[FranticFish]

Haha - well, I don't know about that. No version control, no auto-save. Those are nice features.

[Planet13]

QUESTION:

Could you not add unique, compelling content to the main page OTHER THAN the latest blog posts that appear (I am assuming automatically)?

Maybe put your "about us" content on the home page instead? Maybe summaries of your author bios? Maybe user polls and results? (I am just throwing stuff at the wall and seeing if it sticks).

[FranticFish]

It's an interesting idea, and if we were doing surveys and polls I'd definitely find space for them somewhere on the page. Author mini-bios, the same, but I think both of these would be trying to shoehorn content in if they were anywhere else but a column off to the side of the article introductions. These blogs are about the content, not who's providing it - and even with these features, we'd still be looking at a sizeable proportion of duplicate content.

When I come here to read threads, I can click through to a member's profile, or a mod's profile. But it's there as a click-through - I don't have to scroll past it to get to the content I want to read.

[Planet13]

Well... I am sure that you will be able to come up with SOMETHING that would be appropriate for the homepage.

Just think a lot about your core demographic and think about what might appeal to them that you could put on the home page. Even if it is BELOW the links to the latest blog posts.

I am sure you will come up with something! Heck... even webmasterworld has a home page ;-)