Log-in page ranking instead of homepage due to high traffic on login page! How to avoid?

[vtmoz]

Hi all,

Our log-in page is ranking in SERP instead of homepage and some times both pages rank for the primary keyword we targeted. We have even dropped. I am looking for a solution for this. Three points here to consider is:

1. Our log-in page is the most visited page and landing page on the website.
2. Even there is the primary keyword in this page or not; same scenario continues
3. Log-in page is the first link bots touch when they crawling any page of our website as log-in page is linked on top navigation menu

If we move login page to sub-domain, will it works? I am worrying that we loose so much traffic to our website which will be taken away from log-in page sub domain

Please guide with your valuable suggestions.

Thanks

[GastonRiera]

Hello Vtmoz,

Im not following you. You have clearly stated below: Noindexing the login page will force visitors from google on doing an extra step to log in.

[vtmoz]

Hi Linda,

Yes, I agree with you that we may not lose the traffic but again, most of the website visitors are going to end up at log-in page which might be a strong indicator to Google that most visitors are just interested about our log-in and this may dilute our ranking efforts of ranking other pages of the website including homepage.

Thanks

[vtmoz]

Hi GR,

Most of our website visitors intention is to get into log-in page as most of them are our customers. There are large number of people who will get into log-in page from website rather than directly. So, even if we noindex the login page, the people who are searching directly for our log-in page or who are clicking on the log-in page from the Google sitelinks after searching from our brand will not able to find; they may end manually with one more extra step of visiting the website first. Again the indicator is that most of the website page visitors are going to log-in page. How that works?

Thanks

[Linda-Vassily]

I don't think you will lose traffic if you noindex the login page. People who are doing a search and then clicking on a login link are very likely to be specifically looking for you and if the login result is not there, they'll choose the next best page, like the homepage.

I second Gaston's comment about intent and usability. If searchers are going to be driven to a different page, you need to be sure that they can easily complete their task there.

[GastonRiera]

Yeap, adding the noindex tag will remove that page from google results.
And no, there is no guarantee that rankings will improve nor go down by adding the noindex. It is just the patch in order to do not appear in search with a page you dont want to show.

You should anlayze those incoming visitors to the log-in page and try to figure out wherer they were looking to log in into the web or anything else.
Also, consider the idea that removing from index that log in page, will make those visitor to do extra interactions with your website in order to log in. Is your UX prepared to that? Have you analyzed your audience for that?

As you can see, there no simple answer, because you must take into consideration the intent and usability for those visitors.

Hope it helps.
Best luck.
GR.

[vtmoz]

Hi Gaston,

Thanks for the reply. Yes, we need it in the Google as many of our users are landing on that page from SERP only. If we add the tag as you mentioned, it'll be out of SERP right?

We don't want the traffic of log-in page as it's hitting the actual traffic and ranking of website. Do you think our ranking will be improved with this or we will be more dropped by loosing the traffic of log-in page?

Thanks

[GastonRiera]

Hello vtmoz,

do you need that login page to be in google? this issue could be resolved just by adding a robots noindex tag in that page.

Here some more information about the Robots tag

Hope it helps.
GR.