How to Noindex a Page in WordPress?

instafollowers
3 min readDec 25, 2020

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Sometimes we want some pages on our site or the entire site not to be added to the index of search engines. In such cases, we must use the noindex tag. So what is noindex?

What is noindex?

The page where you put this code will not be in the search engines’ indexing directory. Big search engines like Google care about these Meta tags and do not index the page you don’t want.

The Noindex meta code is:

<meta name = ”robots” content = ”noindex”>

What is the Robots Meta Tag?

Robots meta tags are in the Robots.txt file, and their location is the main directory of our site. You can write robots meta tags not only in this file but also in the pages as code. If you want to determine the meta tags of a small number of pages, editing the robots.txt file is not a very meaningful move.

benefits of noindex pages

How to Block Search Engine Bots?

Sometimes, some search engines may receive spam traffic, and your site’s traffic may increase due to irrelevant entries. One of the few solutions to be done when it reaches unacceptable levels will be to remove your website from the search engine that sends spam traffic. You can withdraw your site from the search engine of your choice. To do so, make a small change in the meta tag.

Example Code: Thanks to this code, we can remove our site from the Google search engine. You should use it carefully. As a result of this tag, the search engine will not index your site.

If I use the index Tag, My Site Will Not Appear on the Search Engines?

Using noindex is not the definitive solution. When we use these tags, the option to consider these tags is something up to the bots. Major search engines like Google, Yandex, and Bing often take these tags into account. And completely remove your site from its index. Small-scale search engines, however, do not often see these tags and continue to add your website to their indexes.

When did I add Noindex Meta Tag To My Site When It Is Deleted From Directory?

If the tag you added to your site is seen, your website will start to be deleted from the directory. The important thing here is that search engine bots see this tag. There is a chance that the Googlebot that comes to your site once a week will see the tag you added maybe a week later. While this label reacts quickly to current sites, it responds more slowly to outdated sites.

Noindex and Disallow

In addition to the Noindex tag, there is also a command called Disallow. It can be placed in the robots.txt of a website. Even if the two commands are similar, they are not identical. Anyone who uses the noindex tag only prevents a site from being indexed. But not from crawling by the search engine.

Disallow, on the other hand, stops crawling, but not indexing. You can use this for many things. For example, to ensure that the search engine does not come into contact with sensitive content on a website. But the page may still be indexed. Neither does it make sense to use both commands. Because if there is a disallow command, no crawling takes place. So the crawler does not perceive a noindex tag either.

However, if you want a website not to be indexed and the crawler should still follow the links within the page, you must use a combination of the Noindex and Follow tags. These are listed in the source code separated by a comma.

The relevance of the Noindex tag for search engine optimization

Noindex is primarily used to avoid duplicate content, and the tag is perfect for this purpose. Identical content to be indexed twice is not practical. Also, it is also harmful to the website when it comes to search engine ratings.

Conlusion

In this article, we mentioned what Noindex is. We hope that it helps you grow your SEO knowledge. Thanks for reading. If you want to check other SEO-related blog posts of InstaFollowers. If you want to learn more about Noindex, then check this video out by Catalyst Design:

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