Daily SEO Fix: Investigating Keyword Cannibalization
Keyword cannibalization occurs when a website has too many similar keywords spread throughout the various pages on that site. This can harm the SEO potential of the pages involved, and can quite often go unnoticed for some time. When more than one page has the same, or a similar keyword target, those pages will then start to compete with each other, also creating confusion in the eyes of the search engine, resulting in a struggle to decide which page to rank for what term.
Remember: a single URL can rank for multiple keywords, which is 100% fine. The problem of keyword cannibalization occurs when two or more separate URLs are all competing for the same keyword.
To ensure that a website’s best content is ranking well, you should identify which of your pages are targeting the same keywords. You can then put together a strategy for monitoring and fixing these issues on a regular basis.