Content Cannibalization
Season: 2 | Episode: 20
Published: June 2, 2025
By: Byer Co
In this episode of the Digital Rage podcast we **explain content cannibalization**, a situation where multiple website pages target the same keywords, harming SEO. The article **defines the problem**, contrasting it with duplicate content, and **outlines common causes**, such as poor keyword planning and inconsistent linking. It further **details the negative impacts** on search rankings, click-through rates, and crawl budget. Finally, the piece **offers methods for identifying and fixing** content cannibalization, including content consolidation, differentiating intent, and using canonical tags, as well as preventative strategies.
Link: Content Cannibalization
Keywords: seo,digital marketing,content cannibalization
Episode Transcript
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Welcome back to the all new digital rage. I'm Jeff the producer here at Byer Company.
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Today we explain content cannibalization, a situation where multiple
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website pages target the same keywords, harming SEO. We define the problem,
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discuss common causes, show negative impact, and offer methods for identifying
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and fixing cannibalization issues. Here we go. Hey everyone, welcome back. Today we're
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going to tackle something that I think a lot of website owners don't even realize
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as a problem. Yeah, it's one of those sneaky SEO issues. Content cannibalization.
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Right. It's not as obvious as some other SEO mistakes, but it can really
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quietly sabotage your rankings. And we're going to make sure that doesn't
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get into you. Absolutely. So in this deep dive, we'll really break down what
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exactly content cannibalization is, you know, how it can happen, why it's bad for
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your SEO, and most importantly, how to fix it and prevent it from happening again.
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Where are you actionable steps you can take right away? All right, so to get us
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started, we've got a great article here by Jeff Byer titled content cannibalization,
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what it is, how it hurts your SEO, and how to fix it. And it was just published this
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past April. So it's right up to date. Perfect. So our goal today is to make sure that
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you come away from this deep dive fully understanding content cannibalization
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and have a game plan to make sure it's not holding back your website. No more
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accidental self sabotage. Exactly. All right. So let's jump right in. What
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exactly is content cannibalization? So basically content cannibalization
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happens when you have multiple pages on your site that are all trying to rank
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for the same keywords. Or, you know, they're all trying to answer the same
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question that someone might type into a search engine. So instead of having one
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really strong page that's super focused on that topic, you have a bunch of
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pages kind of all competing with each other. So it's like splitting your votes
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almost. Yeah, exactly. And Google gets confused like which page is the most relevant,
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which one should I show to searchers? And in the end, none of them really win.
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Right. And that's how your rankings can take a hit without you even realizing
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it's happening. Now, the article made a really important distinction between
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content cannibalization and duplicate content. Yeah. And it's easy to mix those
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up. Right. So just to be super clear, can you explain the difference?
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Absolutely. Duplicate content is literally when you have the exact same text or
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almost the same text on different pages. It can happen accidentally like if you
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have product description that's copied across multiple retailer websites.
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Or sometimes, you know, people try to do it intentionally to manipulate
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search engines, which is a big no no. Definitely a bad idea. Yeah. Google is
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very smart about detecting that. Now, content cannibalization on the other
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hand. It's not about having identical text. It's more about having multiple
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pages that cover the same topic, even if they use different words.
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Okay. I see. So it's not about the wording. It's about the intent. Yeah.
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It's like, what is the purpose of this page? What question is it trying to answer?
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And if you have multiple pages trying to answer the same question, that's when
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you run into trouble. The article had a good example with a fitness blog, right?
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Yes. They talk about a blog that had one article on, let's say, the best running
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shoes for beginners and another article on top running shoes for new runners.
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Now, those titles are different. The articles themselves might have completely
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different wording, but they're both essentially targeting the same keyword.
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Best running shoes. Exactly. And they're both aimed at the same audience,
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people who are new to running and need advice on shoes.
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So even though they might look different on the surface, they're actually
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competing against each other. Right. And neither one might end up ranking as
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high as it could. If all that effort was focused on just one really awesome
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guide to running shoes for beginners, that makes a lot of sense.
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And this isn't just a problem for blogs, right? Nope, not at all.
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It can happen on any type of website, like imagine an e-commerce site.
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You might have a category page for say dog collars, right?
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But then you also have individual product pages for all the different kinds
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of dog collars you saw. And some of those product pages might also be targeting
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the keyword dog collars. So you've got your category pages fighting with your
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product pages. Exactly. Or you might have a services business and you've got
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different pages for each of your locations. And they could all be optimized for
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something like plumber and city name. Exactly. So it can definitely be a sneaky
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issue. It's not always as obvious as just looking for duplicate content.
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You really need to think about the keywords and the search intent behind those
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keywords. Right. What is the searcher actually trying to find?
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And are you sending mixed signals with multiple pages that are all kind of
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vying for that same search term? Okay. So now that we have a good handle on what
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content cannibalization is, let's talk about how it happens. Yeah.
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Like how does this even start? It's not like people were sitting down saying,
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I'm going to create content that competes with itself. Right. Exactly.
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So what are some of the most common causes? Well, the article highlighted a few
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key culprits. One is poor keyword research or planning.
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Meaning you don't have a solid strategy in place before you start creating
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content. Yeah. And that's so important. Like if you haven't taken the time to
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figure out what keywords you're targeting with each page, you can easily end up
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with a bunch of pages that are all unintentionally competing for the same
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terms. The article gave the example of like a content team that rushes to put
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out an article on how to train for a marathon. And then later publishes another
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one called like marathon training tips. Right. And they might not even realize
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that those two topics are essentially the same thing from a keyword perspective.
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Yeah. So you end up with two pieces of content that are both trying to rank
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for those same marathon training keywords. And another common cause is
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overlapping topics, which I think is something that happens naturally as a
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website grows. Right. You start out with a few basic articles. And then as you
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create more content, you naturally start to explore those topics in more depth.
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Exactly. And you might end up with multiple pages that, you know, they're not
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identical, but they do cover a lot of the same ground. Like maybe you start out
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with a basic overview article on, let's say SEO basics. Right. And then later on
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you add more introductory content like SEO for beginners or introduction to SEO.
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Again, the titles are different, but they're all essentially targeting that same
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core audience and those same fundamental SEO keywords. Right. And then another
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big one is inconsistent internal linking. Yes. Internal linking can be tricky.
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So how does that contribute to content cannibalization?
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Well, your internal links, those are the links that point from one page on your
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site to another page on your site. Those are really important signals for Google.
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They help Google understand the structure of your website and what pages are the
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most important for different topics. Okay. But if you're using the same keyword
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to link to multiple different pages, that can send mixed signals to Google.
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Like if you're using the anchor text SEO tips to link to three different blog
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posts, yeah, Google's going to be like, wait a minute, which one of these is the main
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SEO tips page? Right. So inconsistent internal linking can definitely make the
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content cannibalization problem worse. And then the last major cause that the
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article talked about was scaling without structure. And I think this is a
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really big one for e-commerce sites, especially. Yeah. As e-commerce stores
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add new products and categories, it's really easy to end up with a lot of
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pages that are all kind of vying for the same keywords.
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Like we were saying before, you've got category pages that might be competing
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with product pages. Exactly. And without a clear keyword strategy and a
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well thought out site structure, it's almost inevitable that you're going to run
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into some content cannibalization issues. Now, the article also gave a couple of
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really specific examples to illustrate these causes. Do you remember the pet
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store example? Oh, yeah, that was a good one. They had a category page for was
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it dog collars? Yes, dog collars. And they had optimized that page for the
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keyword dog collars. But then they also had a blog post on like best dog collars
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for training. Right. And then of course, they had individual product pages for all
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the different training collars they sold. So they had three different types of
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pages that were all essentially targeting the same keyword. Exactly. And as
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result, none of those pages were ranking particularly well. They were all kind
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of stuck in the middle of the search results because they were splitting the
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potential ranking power. Right. And then there was the travel blog example.
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Yeah, with the two posts on things to do in Paris. One was called things to do in
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Paris. And the other one was Paris activities for tourists.
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Mostly again, pretty much the same intent, very similar keywords, and
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probably a lot of overlap in the actual content. Yeah. And again, that's just
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going to lead to deluded ranking potential. So these examples, you know, they
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really show how easy it is for content cannibalization to happen. If
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you're not careful. Absolutely. Okay. So we've talked about what content
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cannibalization is and how it happens. Now let's get to the why should we care
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part. Right. Because knowing what it is is one thing, but understanding why it's
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bad is what's really going to motivate you to fix it. Exactly. So how does
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content cannibalization actually hurt your SEO performance? Well, there are a few
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key negative impacts at the article outline. Okay, let's go through them one by
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one. The first one is deluded keyword rankings. Yeah. And that's really the
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core problem here. When you have multiple pages competing for the same keyword,
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Google has a hard time deciding which one is the most relevant and authoritative.
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And so instead of all those ranking signals being concentrated on one really
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strong page, they get spread out across multiple pages. Exactly. And as a result,
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all of those pages might end up ranking lower than they would if you just had
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one really focused page. So you're basically working against yourself. Right.
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You're dividing your own ranking power. And then that leads to the second
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negative impact, which is reduced click through rates. Yeah. Because if a user sees
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two or more of your pages in the search results for the same keyword, they might not
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know which one to click on. Right. It's confusing. Like, are these pages the same?
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Are they different? Yeah. And if they're not sure, they might just skip over your
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pages altogether. And plus, because your pages are probably ranking lower due to
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the diluted authority, they might be further down the search results page
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anyway. Right. So they're less visible and less likely to get clicked on. Less
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visibility equals less traffic. Exactly. And then there's the issue of
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wasted crawl budget. Now, for people who are not familiar with the term crawl
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budget, can you explain what that is? Sure. So crawl budget refers to the amount of
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time and resources that Google is willing to spend crawling and indexing your
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website. It's like Google has a limited amount of attention to give to each
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site. And if it's spending all its time crawling through multiple pages that
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are basically the same. And it might not have time to find an index other
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important pages on your site. So it's a waste of Google's time and a waste of
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your potential traffic. Right. And then finally, there's the issue of confused
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user experience. And this one just makes intuitive sense. Yeah. If someone clicks on
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a link in the search results, expecting to find information on a specific
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topic. And then they land on a page that doesn't really give them what they
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were looking for. They're probably going to leave pretty quickly. Right. And
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that high bounce rate, that's a signal to Google that your page might not be a
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very good match for that search query. Which can then hurt your rankings even more.
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So vicious cycle. So the article really stress that the real-world
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consequences of content cannibalization can be pretty brutal. Yeah. This isn't
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just some theoretical SEO problem. It can have a real impact on your website's
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performance. Like for a blogger, it could mean that your traffic just stagnates.
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Even if you're putting out new content consistently. And for an e-commerce site,
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it could mean lower sales. Because your product pages never quite make it to the top of the
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search results where people are actually buying. Right. And over time, that can really erode
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your website's authority. Yeah. If Google is constantly seeing these mixed
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signals from your site, it's going to start to think, well, maybe this website isn't the best
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source of information on this topic. And that's exactly what you don't want. Definitely not.
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The article had a really good case study about a tech website that was struggling with this.
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Oh, yeah. The one with the laptop articles? Yes. They had two separate articles, one on
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like best budget laptops and another one on affordable laptops under $500.
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And they were both ranking, but not very well. Right. They were both kind of stuck on page two
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of the search results. So they decided to merge those two articles into one really comprehensive
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guide. And the results were pretty amazing. Yeah. They saw huge jump in rankings. They went from
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page two all the way up to the top five. And their organic traffic tripled within a few weeks.
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That's a pretty compelling case for taking content cannibalization seriously. Definitely.
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All right. So now we know how to recognize the problem. But how do we actually go about
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finding it on our own websites? Yeah. What are some practical tips for identifying content
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cannibalization? Well, the good news is that there are a few different methods you can use.
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Okay. Great. Let's talk about them. The article mentioned a new AI-powered tool from Kevin
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Indig that sounds really promising. I think I saw something about that. Yeah. It's supposed to make
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it super easy to identify content cannibalization issues. You just enter your websites URL
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and the tool does the rest. So that could be a real time saver. Yeah. Especially if you have a
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large website with a lot of pages. But even if you don't have access to fancy AI tools,
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there's still plenty of other ways to find content cannibalization. Like what? Well, you can use
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good old Google search console. That's a free tool from Google. Yep. And it gives you a ton of
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valuable data about your website's performance and search results. Okay. So you can use the
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performance report in Google search console to see which pages on your site are ranking for the same
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queries. Oh, I see. Yeah. And you could also use paid SEO tools like Arrests or Semrush. Those are
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great for doing in-depth keyword research and site audits. Right. And those tools can help you spot
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any overlapping rankings and potential content cannibalization issues. And then there's always the
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manual approach, right? Oh, yeah. You can always just use Google itself. Just type in your TART
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keywords and see what comes up. Exactly. And you can use specific search operators to make your
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search even more precise. Like site.yourdomain.com followed by the keyword you're checking.
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Right. So that'll show you all the pages on your site that Google has indexed for that keyword.
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Okay. Good to know. And then on top of all that, you can also just keep an eye out for certain
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signs that might indicate content cannibalization. Like what kinds of signs? Well, if you see that your
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rankings for a particular keyword are fluctuating a lot, that could be a sign. Like if you have
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multiple pages that are all kind of bouncing around in the rankings, but none of them are consistently
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in a top position. Okay. That makes sense. Or if you have a bunch of pages ranking for a keyword,
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but none of them are breaking into the top five, that's another red flag. And then of course,
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if you see an unexpected drop in organic traffic to a key page, that's definitely something to
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investigate. Right. Because content cannibalization could be the culprit. Okay. So if we suspect we might
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have a content cannibalization problem, what's the best way to approach it? Is there like a step-by-step
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process we can follow? Yeah. The article outlined a really good process for auditing your content.
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Okay. Perfect. Let's walk through it. So the first step is to map your keywords to your URLs.
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So that means creating a spreadsheet or something where you list out all your important pages.
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Yeah. And next to each page, you list the primary keyword that you're targeting with that page.
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And then you go through that list and look for any instances where you have the same keyword
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assigned to multiple pages or even very similar keywords. Right. Like running shoes versus
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best running shoes. Okay. So that's step one keyword mapping. What's next? Once you have your keyword
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map, then you need to analyze the ranking performance of those potentially competing pages. Okay.
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So you can use your SEO tools to see which pages are actually ranking for those keywords you
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identified. So if you see that you have two or more pages showing up in the search results for
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the same keyword, that's a pretty clear indication that they might be cannibalizing each other.
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Exactly. And then the last step is to check your internal linking. Right. Because we talked about how
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inconsistent internal linking can make the problem worse. Yeah. So you can use a website crawler
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like screaming frog to see how your internal links are structured. Okay. And you're looking for
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instances where you're using the same keyword as the anchor text to link to multiple different pages.
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Gotcha. So if you're doing that, that's a sign that you might need to clean up your internal
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linking to make it more consistent. Right. And that will help to reduce the content cannibalization
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problem. All right. So we've identified the problem areas. Now let's talk about how to fix them.
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What are the best solutions for dealing with content cannibalization? Well, the article offered
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several strategies depending on the specific situation. Okay. Great. Let's go through them.
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So one of the most common and effective solutions is to consolidate your content. So if you have
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multiple pages that are all kind of covering the same topic, you can just merge them into one
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really awesome comprehensive page. Exactly. Take the best parts of each page, combine them at any
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new information or insights, and then redirect the old pages to the new consolidated page.
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That makes sense. Yeah. Like in that running shows example, we talked about earlier. Yeah.
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They could just take those two separate articles and merge them into one ultimate guide to running
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shoes for beginners. And that way all the ranking power is concentrated in one place. Exactly.
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No more splitting the vote. But what if merging the content isn't the best solution?
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Yeah. Sometimes it might not make sense to combine everything.
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Right. Like if the pages are actually different enough that they warrant separate URLs.
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Yeah. In those cases, what you want to do is differentiate the intent of each page.
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Okay. So how do you do that? Well, you need to really think about what specific question each page
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is trying to answer. And then you need to refine the content and keywords to make sure that each page
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is super focused on that specific question. So instead of having two pages that both broadly target
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running shoes for beginners, you could have one page that specifically focuses on running shoes
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for beginners who are training for a marathon. And another page that focuses on running shoes for
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beginners who just want to jog a few miles a week. Exactly. You're creating more targeted niche pages
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that are less likely to overlap. Okay. That makes sense. And another technique you can use is
00:18:31 - 00:18:36
canonical tags. I've heard of those, but I'm not really sure what they do. So a canonical tag
00:18:36 - 00:18:42
is a piece of code that you can add to the HTML of a page. And it basically tells Google,
00:18:42 - 00:18:47
hey, this page is similar to another page on my site. But this is the main version that I want you
00:18:47 - 00:18:53
to focus on. So it's like saying, this is the original and this is the copy. Right. And by using
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canonical tags, you can consolidate the ranking signals and prevent Google from getting confused
00:18:58 - 00:19:03
about which page to prioritize. And then of course, we have to talk about internal linking again.
00:19:03 - 00:19:08
Yep. Internal linking is super important for preventing content cannibalization. So once you've
00:19:08 - 00:19:13
identified your primary pages for each keyword, you need to make sure that you're consistently linking
00:19:13 - 00:19:18
to those pages from other relevant content on your site. Exactly. Use those keywords as the anchor
00:19:18 - 00:19:24
text for your internal links. And that will send a strong signal to Google about which page is
00:19:24 - 00:19:30
the most important for that particular topic. Okay. That'll make sense. But what about larger websites?
00:19:30 - 00:19:34
The article mentions some more advanced fixes that might be necessary in those cases. Yeah. If you
00:19:34 - 00:19:39
have a really big site with tons of pages, you might need to take some extra steps. Like what?
00:19:39 - 00:19:44
Well, one thing you might need to do is use 301 redirects. Those are permanent redirects, right?
00:19:44 - 00:19:50
Yep. So if you have pages that are outdated or redundant, you can use a 301 redirect to send all
00:19:50 - 00:19:56
the traffic from that old page to a more relevant page. So you're not just deleting the old page,
00:19:56 - 00:20:01
you're actually telling Google, Hey, this page no longer exists. Go here instead. Right. And that
00:20:01 - 00:20:06
helps to preserve your link equity. So you don't lose any of the ranking power that you've built up.
00:20:06 - 00:20:12
Okay. And then another thing you can do is use Noindex tags. So what do those do? A Noindex tag basically
00:20:12 - 00:20:19
tells Google, don't show this page in the search results. Okay. So if you have pages that are really
00:20:19 - 00:20:24
thin content or pages that are automatically generated, you can use a Noindex tag to prevent them
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from showing up in the search results. That way, you're not cluttering up the search results with
00:20:28 - 00:20:33
pages that aren't really valuable to users. Right. And then finally, you might want to consider
00:20:33 - 00:20:39
restructuring your site architecture. So that means reorganizing your content into clear content silos.
00:20:39 - 00:20:44
Yeah. So you're grouping related content together in a way that makes sense both for users and
00:20:44 - 00:20:48
for search engines. Like having a separate section for your blog, a separate section for your
00:20:48 - 00:20:53
product pages, a separate section for your resources, that kind of thing. Exactly. And that can go
00:20:53 - 00:20:57
a long way in preventing content cannibalization from happening in the first place.
00:20:57 - 00:21:02
The article had an example of an e-commerce site that used some of these advanced fixes, right?
00:21:02 - 00:21:09
Yeah. They had a category page for women's sneakers and a blog post on best women's sneakers,
00:21:09 - 00:21:14
which were basically competing with each other. Right. So what they did was they took all the good
00:21:14 - 00:21:18
stuff from the blog post, like the product recommendations and the insights, and they merged that
00:21:18 - 00:21:24
into the category page. So they made the category page more comprehensive and valuable? Exactly.
00:21:24 - 00:21:30
And then they used a canonical tag on the blog post to point to the category page. And they redirected
00:21:30 - 00:21:34
the blog post to URL to the category page. Yep. And as a result, their organic traffic to the
00:21:34 - 00:21:41
category page increased by something like 40%. Wow. That's impressive. So fixing content cannibalization
00:21:41 - 00:21:46
can really make a difference. Absolutely. But ideally, we want to prevent it from happening in the
00:21:46 - 00:21:51
first place. Right. Prevention is always better than cure. So what are some proactive strategies we
00:21:51 - 00:21:57
can use? Well, the most important thing is to develop a solid keyword mapping strategy. We talked
00:21:57 - 00:22:02
about that earlier as part of the audit process. Right. But you need to do this before you even start
00:22:02 - 00:22:08
creating new content. Okay. So take the time to do your keyword research and figure out which key
00:22:08 - 00:22:13
words you want to target with each page on your site. That way you can avoid accidentally creating
00:22:13 - 00:22:19
multiple pages that target the same keywords. Exactly. And it's also really helpful to use content
00:22:19 - 00:22:24
silos. We talked about that earlier too, right? Yep. So you're organizing your content into those
00:22:24 - 00:22:30
clear, thematic groups, which helps to create a logical structure for both users and search engines.
00:22:30 - 00:22:34
And it makes it much less likely that you'll end up with overlapping content. Makes sense. And
00:22:34 - 00:22:38
then of course you need to do regular content audits. Right. To make sure that things haven't
00:22:38 - 00:22:44
gotten out of control. Yeah. Even with the best planning content cannibalization can still sneak
00:22:44 - 00:22:50
in over time. Especially if you have a large team creating content. So it's important to schedule
00:22:50 - 00:22:56
regular audits maybe quarterly to review your content and make sure that you're not accidentally
00:22:56 - 00:23:02
cannibalizing yourself. And speaking of content teams, are there any best practices that content
00:23:02 - 00:23:08
creators can follow to prevent content cannibalization? Yeah. Communication and clear guidelines are key.
00:23:08 - 00:23:13
So content writers need to be aware of the overall SEO strategy. Right. They need to know what key
00:23:13 - 00:23:17
words they should be targeting and what keywords they should avoid. And it's helpful to have some
00:23:17 - 00:23:22
editorial guidelines in place. Yeah. Like a rule that says one primary keyword per page.
00:23:22 - 00:23:26
That way everyone's on the same page. No pun intended. All right. So I think we've covered a lot of
00:23:26 - 00:23:31
ground here. Just to quickly summarize, the main takeaway is that content cannibalization is a
00:23:31 - 00:23:37
serious SEO problem that can really hurt your website's performance. It can prevent your pages from
00:23:37 - 00:23:42
ranking as high as they could. It can lead to lower click-through rates. It can waste your crawl budget.
00:23:43 - 00:23:48
And it can create a confusing experience for users. And the good news is that there are things you
00:23:48 - 00:23:53
can do to fix it and prevent it from happening again. Yeah. Like consolidating content,
00:23:53 - 00:23:59
differentiating the intent of your pages, using canonical tags, and cleaning up your internal
00:23:59 - 00:24:05
linking. And don't forget about those proactive measures. Keyword mapping, content silos,
00:24:05 - 00:24:10
and regular content audits. By taking those steps, you can make sure that your website is sending
00:24:10 - 00:24:16
clear, consistent signals to Google, which will ultimately help you rank higher and attract more
00:24:16 - 00:24:20
organic traffic. All right. So as you're listening to this, I want you to think about your own website
00:24:20 - 00:24:26
for a minute. Are there any topics or keywords where you might be cannibalizing yourself?
00:24:26 - 00:24:31
What's one thing you can do today to start investigating those areas? Take a look at your Google
00:24:31 - 00:24:37
Search Console data. Run a site audit with your favorite SEO tool or just do some manual searches
00:24:37 - 00:24:42
on Google. And most importantly, start thinking about your keyword strategy and how you can make sure
00:24:42 - 00:24:47
that each page on your site is serving a clear and unique purpose. Thanks for joining us for this deep dive.
00:24:47 - 00:24:53
We'll see you next time. Reach out to us at jbuyer.com for comments and questions.
00:24:53 - 00:24:58
Follow us at buyer company on social media. And if you'd be so kind, please rate and review us
00:24:58 - 00:25:01
in your podcast app.