SEO & Online Marketing Acronyms & Terms

What does "Canonicalization" mean?

Canonicalization:: Canonicalization is Google's term for the naming of a web page. It comes from the Latin canon, meaning "name". If you have a dozen variants of a web page, you should tell Google which one is the main page (the canonical) and which pages are basically duplicate content versions of that main page. Google will index the canonical page, and will essentially ignore the rest. Figuring out which page is the main (canonical) page is part of SEO. You convey that information to Google in a canonical tag in the <head> of the page. Here's an example; it is the canonical tag for the page you are now reading:

<link rel='canonical' href='https://www.wordsinarow.com/glossary/canonicalization'>

It tells Google that this is the name of this page you are now viewing.

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