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I copied my article to a medium post, I lost all my ranking. Initially, I was ranking #1 for the article, but now it shows N/A. I don't have any authority for my site, ranking was all due to the content

I deleted my medium post, but still, my rankings aren't back. How do I deindex my medium article, which gives 404 now?

Stephen Ostermiller
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johnrao07
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2 Answers2

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Wait, wait and wait some more

Simple you wait... until Google drops it the page from it's index which can take several days or even weeks.

But...

It's unlikely that medium had any influence on your rankings drop since Medium’s publication and cross-posting pathways automatically add canonical links to protect your original content posted offsite. This means that Medium can only boost — not cannibalize — your SEO.

SOURCE

Search engines use canonical links to determine and prioritize the ultimate source of content, removing confusion when there are multiple copies of the same document in different locations. Sites that publish an over abundance of duplicate content without indicating a canonical link may be penalized in search engine rankings.

Medium’s publication and cross-posting pathways automatically add canonical links to protect your original content posted offsite. This means that Medium can only boost — not cannibalize — your SEO.

Canonicals work... most likely something else

If your rankings have dropped, I'm willing to bet that it has nothing to do with Medium and your pointing fingers in the wrong direction, but to answer your question, Google does take several weeks for them to full drop articles because unless using error 410 (GONE), they have to ensure that 404 is not temporarily.

Finally, in regards of N/A, just so you know:

SOURCE

N/A is a common abbreviation in tables and lists for the phrase not applicable, not available, or no answer. It is used to indicate when information in a certain table cell is not provided, either because it does not apply to a particular case in question or because the answer is not available.

My point is... N/A does not mean zero.

Simon Hayter
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  • How do you setup canonical tags in Medium? It appears that the poster might not have properly set those up. – Michael d Feb 16 '18 at 23:35
  • can we make 410 with medium? or anyother way to fasten the process to deindex. I need to rank for my keyword in a week now, so any tips would be appreciated – johnrao07 Feb 17 '18 at 01:08
  • I'm not sure that canonicals work that well anymore. I'm seeing in the new search console beta how many times Google is choosing to index a non-canonical URL. It says "Google chose different canonical than user". – Stephen Ostermiller Feb 17 '18 at 14:03
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Google is supposed to identify which articles were published to which websites first in order to prevent plagiarism on the web. Unfortunately, many webmasters have experienced similar situations in which their content was copied and published by a 3rd party, and the 3rd party went on to rank higher than them in the SERPs as a result.

As others have mentioned, you should be using a rel=canonical tag on your Medium posts.

View the post on Medium and right click->view page source. Control+F (search) for canonical. If you cannot find the canonical tag then Medium is not identifying your article as the original source and you need to correct this.

One method to help ensure rankings boost is to link to your own original article in the Medium post as a "source: example.com/article". This should help signal to Google where the article originally came from as well as boost traffic to your blog from Medium.

If rel=canonical has been established in the Medium post, then Google has either deranked your article for other reasons or it's simply bypassing the canonical tag and is still favoring Medium over your own blog.

Michael d
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