E1 · The 5 thinnest
30 minPick the 5 thinnest pages on your site and fill in the list: own words, whether it repeats a sibling, and how many links point to it.
Done when: the list has 5 rows and each one ends with a decision.
Lesson 7 · 15 min
A thin page leaves the index (noindex until it has a body)
Publishing many similar, thin pages does not give you more chances. It usually does the opposite. The search engine stops crawling the batch and starts to distrust the site. This lesson shows you how to find a thin page, take it out of the index and the sitemap, and bring it back only when it has something to say.
Start the lesson
In this lesson you will
- 1The real case of the 283 listings that would not index
- 2Three signs of a thin page
- 3noindex and out of the sitemap, together
- 4When the page comes back
Goal: identify thin pages and take them out of the index and the sitemap until they have a body of their own.
01The thin page cycle
Tap each block.
Click each block in the diagram to see what it does.
Indexing a thin page weighs on how the whole site is judged, not just that page.
02The case of the 283 listings
What happened at INEMA and what you can learn from it. Tap each step.
1. The batch
283 course listings were published in a single commit. Of the 6 listings in the sample, 5 were "discovered, not indexed" and had never been crawled.
2. Why
Each listing had 170 to 240 words. Two randomly picked listings shared 47% of their vocabulary, and the description was copied from the course page.
The /cursos/ index page was 481 KB of HTML.
Takeaway
To a search engine, these were hundreds of variations of the same page.
3. The rule
A page without enough content gets noindex and stays out of the sitemap until it has a body. A page in a series only goes into the sitemap with unique content and data specific to that item.
Enriching the listings, with real data and an anti-invention lock, is the topic of course 2.
4. The warning sign
A site-wide drop after publishing a lot is a sign of content at scale. What to do: stop, audit, merge or remove the weak pages, and slow down your pace.
03Mark and check
The tag goes in the head of the thin page. The X-ray checks it.
HTML · in the head of the thin page
<meta name="robots" content="noindex">
Terminal · check with the X-ray
bash tools/auditoria.sh https://www.seusite.com /pagina-rasa-1/ /pagina-rasa-2/ | grep -E '^-- |robots:'
List of the thinnest pages (template)
| page | own words | repeats its sibling? | incoming links | decision | |---|---|---|---|---| | </pagina/> | <nº> | <yes/no> | <nº> | <keep / noindex until it has a body / merge> |
Simulation: illustrative example
-- /pagina-rasa-1/ [200] robots: noindex -- /pagina-rasa-2/ [200] robots: noindex
The page returns 200 (it stays online) and the robots line shows the noindex. Also check that it has dropped out of the sitemap.
- noindex and staying in the sitemap: contradictory signals.
- Blocking in robots.txt instead of noindex: the crawler can't read the page and never sees the noindex.
- Deleting a page that has an external link: you lose the link; prefer noindex or merge it with a redirect.
04Practice: clean up the thin pages
Start with the pages generated in a series, if your site has any.
E2 · noindex checked
20 minFor the ones you marked "noindex until it has a body," apply the tag and remove them from the sitemap. Run the X-ray on them.
Done when: the X-ray shows robots: noindex on those pages and they no longer appear in the sitemap.
05Test what you learned
The explanation appears after you answer.
Question 1 of 4
Why were the INEMA 283 listings not getting indexed?skill
Correct
Published all at once, short and repetitive, they looked like variations of the same page. Of the 6 in the sample, 5 had never been crawled.Not that one
Published all at once, short and repetitive, they looked like variations of the same page. Of the 6 in the sample, 5 had never been crawled.Review: The case of the 283 listingsQuestion 2 of 4
What should you do with the thin page?
Correct
The page stays live, leaves the index and the sitemap, and comes back once it has content of its own.Not that one
The page stays live, leaves the index and the sitemap, and comes back once it has content of its own.Review: The thin page cycleQuestion 3 of 4
Why not use robots.txt to remove the page from the index?
Correct
The noindex has to be read. Blocking the crawl hides the very instruction.Not that one
The noindex has to be read. Blocking the crawl hides the very instruction.Review: Mark and checkQuestion 4 of 4
The site dropped after you published a lot. What is the first step of Plan B?
Correct
It's the symptom of content at scale. More volume only makes it worse.Not that one
It's the symptom of content at scale. More volume only makes it worse.Review: The case of the 283 listingsQuiz complete
You got {a} of {n} right. If you get them all right, the lesson is marked as complete.Pick an answer. The explanation appears after you try.
06Takeaways
Three signalsFew original words, repeated text, no links coming in.
Two actions togethernoindex on the page and out of the sitemap.
ReturnOnly with your own data, and then you notify the search engines.