How Keyword Cannibalization Affects SEO

How Keyword Cannibalization Affects SEO

The act of targeting the same keyword across various posts or pages is known as keyword cannibalization. Although you may not be doing it on purpose, the way you have written the content and meta tags has resulted in both the pages being indexed and ranked. Google compares your pages and selects the one link that is most suitable for the keyword. It merely serves to lower the SEO authority of both pages.

Anyone with hands-on knowledge about digital marketing would be familiar with keyword cannibalization but beginners are unlikely to know. So here is how keyword cannibalization effects SEO.

When Does Keyword Cannibalization Happen?

When your website’s various web pages are optimized for the exact keywords, terms, or phrases, keyword cannibalization happens. Search keywords are liberally infused across the page to improve SERP ranking, such as anchor text, title, and header tags. It confuses your search engine as to how to order the many web pages in response to the search query.

How It Affects SEO

  1. It Affects The Page Authority

You convert your pages into competitors when you have many pages ranking for the same keyword. Instead of having one highly authoritative page, you split your page’s SEO authority among a few relevant pages. This has a direct impact on your SERP rank and your CTR (click-through- rate).

Furthermore, when consumers leave a website to return to Google, Google considers it a negative experience. They believe the page they landed on was unrelated to their search. As a result, if users leave one of your pages right away, they may push your site down the SERP.

  1. It Distributes The Value Of Links

Backlinks are the basis for increasing page authority. You distribute backlinks over two or more pages rather than putting them all on one authoritative page. Your rankings for both pages may suffer as a result of this. Furthermore, having a lot of internal links sends users to many different pages when they should be led to a single authoritative website on the issue.

  1. Conversion Rates Are Lower

Not all pages convert at the same rate. However, when you separate your pages, your visitors will be directed to many pages, some of which may be less important than others. As a result, your irrelevant page may rank higher, but it will not convert as well as the main page because it is irrelevant.

How to Fix Keyword Cannibalization

If your site is suffering from keyword cannibalization, then the most important thing to remember is that you should modify part of your content. Each page or post should be unique and not repeat the same information.

Here are some strategies to fix keyword cannibalization on your site now that you know what to search for.

  1. Merge Duplicate Content

Combine the content of two or more web pages that address the same topic/keyword and are highly similar into one page. The combined page should appear higher in search results than the two individual pages.

  1. Delete Any Content That Isn’t Required

Consider eliminating one of the two pages if one is cannibalizing traffic from the other. This is particularly crucial if your website has outdated content. To direct traffic to the newer, more relevant page, delete the older, less relevant ones. When you delete the content, make sure you can check the page’s inbound link. You can delete it if there are no backlinks.

  1. Eliminate Keywords

If a keyword on one page is cannibalizing traffic from another, try eliminating or reducing the frequency with which the keyword appears on the less relevant page. This can take some time, but it’s well worth it in the end.

  1. Modify The Link Structure

When you link from one page on your website to a less important page, Google may give the connected page a higher ranking than the original. Rework your website’s integral linking to the less important pages and always link to the more significant ones.

Final words

In today’s digital marketing world, keyword cannibalization is quite common. SEO analysts and developers frequently confuse website optimization with keyword cannibalization. Without keyword cannibalization and with high-quality content, you can quickly meet your SEO goals.

If any of this went over your head, you can ask for help from a digital marketing agency in Perth. The experts of these digital marketing agencies can meet your needs and give you desirable results. For more information, check out the Ad Impact website.

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