Using rel canonical for non-duplicate content

Question

I have 4 types pages:

1. Companies
2. Products
3. Services
4. Main landing pages that contains part of 3 other types with links to its.

The top 3 types have pagination, but landing pages don't. They a each a single page. I want to rank with the landing pages, not other pages.

First Question: Right now many of my companies or products pages have good ranking. I can 301 redirect well ranked companies or products pages to related landing pages and then set new URLs for other pages. For example setting ../x/Products to ../x/Product. and then set rel canonical for new URLs of products and companies and services pages.

Is this right way? Is it a good idea? Is the 301 redirect not required?

Second Question: My pages types are not completely duplicated. My main landing pages are just summary and part of other 3 pages types, but I don't want rank those. I want rank just with landing pages.

Should I use rel=canonical?

Answer 1

Google can understand that content is a series of pages with rel=prev and rel=next

On your site where you have the links pointing to the previous and next page, just inject the above keywords in the anchor tags.

Here's an example:

Make index.htm contain this:

<p>Page 1. The HOME PAGE</p>
<p>aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa</p>
<a href="page2.htm" rel="next">Go to page 2</a>

Make page2.htm contain this:

<p>Page 2. some middle page</p>
<p>lalalalalalalalalalaaaaaaaaaaaaaa</p>
<a href="index.htm" rel="prev">Go to page 1</a>
<a href="page3.htm" rel="next">Go to page 3</a>

Make page3.htm contain this:

<p>Page 3. near the end</p>
<p>nononononononooooooooooooooooooooooo</p>
<a href="page2.htm" rel="prev">Go to page 2</a>
<a href="theend.htm" rel="next">Go to page 4</a>

Make theend.htm contain this:

<p>Page 4. The end</p>
<p>Its all over my friend</p>
<a href="page3.htm" rel="prev">Go to page 3</a>

Of course the body text of each page is rather silly, but its an example of how the rel tags are to be implemented to make search engines understand that the pages are linked together. The most important parts of each page to pay attention to is the anchor tags.

The only other option is to put the tags in the LINK tag like this:

<link rel="prev" href="lastpage.htm">
<link rel="next" href="nextpage.htm">

But the problem with that way is that it consumes more bytes and that it is only valid in the head tags of the HTML document.

Google has more info as well:

http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.ca/2011/09/pagination-with-relnext-and-relprev.html

Answer 2

I can 301 redirect well ranked companies or products pages to related landing pages and then set new URLs for other pages. For example setting ../x/Products to ../x/Product. and then set rel canonical for new URLs of products and companies and services pages.

This doesn't sound like a good idea to me. This could reduce your ranking IMO. A 301 redirect tells search engines (and users) that the page have moved. But it hasn't moved, you are just redirecting it to another page. If the page is significantly different then I would think Google will realise and the page won't be "well ranked" for long. What about users who have bookmarked the page - confusing. You are then going to have to build up the ranking of the new product page - from scratch.

My pages types are not completely duplicated. My main landing pages are just summary and part of other 3 pages types, but I don't want rank those. I want rank just with landing pages. Should I use rel=canonical?

rel=canonical links are only advisory. If Google determines that the canonical link you've given doesn't look right (ie. the page you are linking to is not a close match) then it's likely to be ignored.

What is a "landing page"? If a user searches for "product X" then why shouldn't the user be able to find the page for "product X" and go directly to it? Is that not more relevant and useful for the user? Why should they be directed away to a less relevant "landing page"?

It would seem to make more sense that if a user is finding your "product" page over the "landing page" then the "product" page should be made into a more suitable place to "land"?