The business problem
A website may be reachable with or without “www,” through old campaign links, or at several versions of the same page. If those versions disagree, reports split, old pages remain visible, and search engines must decide which address represents the business.
Choose one official address
A canonical address is simply the version you want customers and search engines to treat as official. Navigation, old-link forwarding, shared-link previews, and the site map should all point there.
- Old addresses forward directly to the current page.
- Navigation uses the official address.
- The site map lists only official pages.
- Shared links use the same version.
- Secure addresses, the “www” choice, and ending slashes remain consistent.
Consistency protects measurement, reduces duplicate pages, and keeps customers from landing on outdated versions.
Check the published website
Test alternate addresses and confirm each one reaches the correct page in a single step.
Five-minute address check
Confirm every route leads to the official page.
- Open the secure, non-secure, “www,” and non-“www” versions.
- Confirm every version lands on one official address.
- Check that navigation, the site map, and shared-link previews use that same address.
- Verify old campaign and retired page addresses forward directly to the correct page.
Conflicting addresses can divide measurement, preserve outdated pages, and make search systems choose a version you did not intend.