Google Search: Results for Custom Domain AND user.smugmug.com

chaselton

I'm new to self-promotion and search result optimization (if that's what it's called) so I'm glad that my custom domain (www.indefiniteobjects.com or "indefinite objects photography") showed up the first time I thought to Google it.

However, my smugmug domain name (user.smugmug.com) ALSO shows up one to two results below. Is there an explanation for why this is happening and is there a way to prevent that domain name from appearing in searches?

If there's not a way to prevent it from appearing in searches, are there settings to keep it from the first pages of results?

HeroOfCanton

They are linked together but they are seen by search engines as two distinct domain names. I don't know of any way to force the .smugmug.com result down without affecting your custom URL. If someone else does, hopefully they will post about it.

EntropicTendencies

Hi Cyd,

My understanding was that when the custom domain is enabled it would supersede the nickname.smugmug.com site for the search engines (though that can take a while to happen).

Another possibility is that those pages are linked from other sites using the nickname.smugmug.com?

When did you apply the custom domain? (I'd also suggest adding Google's Webmaster Tools)

Barrie
Smugmug Support Hero

chaselton

HeroOfCanton wrote: »

They are linked together but they are seen by search engines as two distinct domain names. I don't know of any way to force the .smugmug.com result down without affecting your custom URL. If someone else does, hopefully they will post about it.

First: Please tell me your first name is Jayne...

Second: Thanks for the info. I'll recheck the fora to see if there are suggestions

--sent from mobile

chaselton

EntropicTendencies wrote: »

Hi Cyd,

My understanding was that when the custom domain is enabled it would supersede the nickname.smugmug.com site for the search engines (though that can take a while to happen).

Another possibility is that those pages are linked from other sites using the nickname.smugmug.com?

When did you apply the custom domain? (I'd also suggest adding Google's Webmaster Tools)

Barrie
Smugmug Support Hero

I applied the custom domain maybe a month ago, but I did remove and re-add it temporarily while troubleshooting a feed issue (which I'm still troubleshooting)

Are Google's webmaster tools different from Google Analytics? What do you mean when you say that the sites are linked?

--sent from mobile

EntropicTendencies

Hi Cyd,

Google's Webmaster Tools (https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools) work in conjunction with Analytics. You can see how your site is indexed and searched - it also lets you submit a site map, etc.

By linked, I mean that there is a site out there using a link to your nickname.smugmug.com address. The search engines crawl the other page, find that link, follow it and index your page (with the .smugmug.com URL).

I thought we'd resolved the feeds issue? (or am I just slow to follow-up here?)

Barrie
Smugmug Support Hero

chaselton

EntropicTendencies wrote: »

Hi Cyd,

Google's Webmaster Tools (https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools) work in conjunction with Analytics. You can see how your site is indexed and searched - it also lets you submit a site map, etc.

By linked, I mean that there is a site out there using a link to your nickname.smugmug.com address. The search engines crawl the other page, find that link, follow it and index your page (with the .smugmug.com URL).

I thought we'd resolved the feeds issue? (or am I just slow to follow-up here?)

Barrie
Smugmug Support Hero

You're slow...but then again I'm slow too. The feeds issue was resolved, much to my relief, and I believe I got an answer to the question in this thread to boot (I've added the ForceDomain=true parameter to my feed)

cman

chaselton wrote: »

... If there's not a way to prevent it from appearing in searches, are there settings to keep it from the first pages of results?

Searchengines see two completely different sites with the exact same content. All things being equal, SE will index these sites randomly. To avoid this, there should be ONLY ONE site - either a subdomain, or domain. As it is implemented in such services like Tumblr, Blogger, etc.

Unfortunately, the only service that does not want to understand this primitive thing - is SmugMug.