Canonical Tags

Canonical Tags are a technical solution to a common problem: Duplicate Content. If you have an e-commerce store in Niagara selling t-shirts, you might have separate URLs for “Blue Shirt,” “Red Shirt,” and “Small Shirt,” even though the content is identical. Google hates duplicate content and might penalize you for it. The Canonical Tag tells Google: “This is the original, master version of the page. Ignore the others.”

In this section, we explain how to use `rel=”canonical”` to protect your SEO. We discuss common scenarios, such as print-friendly versions of pages or syndicated blog posts (e.g., if the *Niagara Falls Review* republishes your article). Setting this tag correctly ensures that all your “link juice” is consolidated to one single, powerful URL rather than being diluted across five similar pages.