When businesses start working on SEO, there's a common assumption:
More pages = more opportunities to rank on Google.
So they create page after page targeting similar phrases.
For example:
🌐 Website Design Leicester
🌐 Web Designers Leicester
🌐 Website Designer Leicester
🌐 Leicester Website Design Services
At first glance, that might sound like a clever SEO strategy.
But if all four pages are essentially trying to satisfy the same search intent and contain very similar information, you may have created unnecessary competition within your own website.
This is often discussed in SEO as keyword cannibalisation.
And sometimes, instead of creating another page, the better move is to make one existing page much stronger.
🤔 What Does It Mean When Your Pages Compete?
Imagine you have two pages.
Page A: SEO Services for Small Businesses
Page B: Small Business SEO Services
Both pages discuss essentially the same service, target the same type of customer and answer the same questions.
Which one should Google treat as the most relevant result?
There isn't automatically a problem simply because two pages mention the same keyword. Websites naturally discuss related subjects across multiple pages.
The issue is when pages have substantially overlapping purposes and search intent.
That's what you need to investigate.
🚨 More Pages Doesn't Automatically Mean Better SEO
Years ago, businesses sometimes created huge numbers of very similar pages in an attempt to target every possible keyword variation.
That's not a useful content strategy.
Your goal shouldn't be:
“How many SEO pages can we create?”
It should be:
“What does the person searching actually need?”
If one comprehensive, useful page can properly satisfy that search, creating another five near-duplicates may add little value.
Quality and purpose matter.
🎯 Every Important Page Should Have a Job
Think of your website like a team.
You don't want five people doing exactly the same job while another important job is completely ignored. 😅
Your pages should have clear purposes.
For example, a digital marketing agency might have:
🌐 Website Design
Explains its website design service.
🔎 SEO
Explains how it helps businesses improve organic search visibility.
📱 Social Media Management
Explains its social media service.
💷 Google Ads
Explains its paid search advertising service.
📣 Meta Advertising
Explains Facebook and Instagram advertising.
These pages may naturally mention one another, but they each serve a distinct purpose.
That's very different from creating six near-identical SEO pages simply because the keyword wording changes slightly.
🔍 How Do You Spot Overlapping Pages?
Start by reviewing your website.
Look for pages with:
⚠️ Very similar titles
⚠️ Almost identical headings
⚠️ Similar service descriptions
⚠️ The same target customer
⚠️ The same search intent
⚠️ Very similar content
⚠️ No obvious reason for both pages to exist
Then ask:
“If I were searching for this service, would these two pages essentially answer the same question?”
If the answer is yes, they're worth investigating.
📊 Google Search Console Can Help
Don't rely purely on guesswork.
Google Search Console can help you understand which pages from your website are appearing for particular searches.
You may discover that several URLs receive impressions for similar queries.
That alone doesn't automatically mean something is wrong.
But it gives you somewhere to investigate.
Look at:
🔎 Which queries trigger each page
📄 Which pages are appearing
👀 Impressions
🖱️ Clicks
📈 Changes over time
The objective isn't to panic whenever two pages appear for similar searches.
It's to understand whether each page has a useful and distinct role.
🧠 Keywords Aren't the Whole Story — Think About Intent
This is important.
Two pages can contain similar keywords while serving very different purposes.
Imagine these searches:
“What is SEO?”
and:
“SEO agency Leicester”
Both involve SEO.
But the person searching may want completely different things.
The first search is likely informational.
The second may have stronger commercial intent.
So you could reasonably have:
📚 An educational article explaining SEO
and:
💼 A service page offering SEO services.
Both discuss SEO, but they have different jobs.
That's why you shouldn't merge pages simply because they contain similar words.
📍 What About Location Pages?
This is particularly relevant for local businesses.
Suppose you genuinely serve:
📍 Leicester
📍 Nottingham
📍 Coventry
📍 Birmingham
Should you create individual location pages?
Potentially — if those pages genuinely help customers and accurately represent the areas you serve.
The problem comes when businesses create dozens or hundreds of pages where the only thing that changes is the town name.
A useful local page should ideally offer something meaningful for someone searching for that service in that location.
Don't create pages purely to swap:
“Plumber Leicester”
for:
“Plumber Coventry.”
Think about whether the page actually deserves to exist.
🛠️ What Should You Do With Overlapping Pages?
There's no universal answer.
Depending on the situation, you might:
1️⃣ Improve the strongest page
If one page is clearly the primary resource, concentrate on making it genuinely useful.
2️⃣ Differentiate the pages
Perhaps the pages can target different services, audiences or search intents.
3️⃣ Consolidate content
If two pages genuinely do the same job, combining useful information into one stronger resource may make sense.
4️⃣ Redirect an old page
If you remove a page, an appropriate redirect may sometimes be needed so visitors and search engines reach the relevant replacement.
⚠️ Don't start deleting and redirecting pages randomly. Existing pages may have traffic, links or rankings worth preserving. Review the situation properly first.
✍️ Don't Create Content Just to Hit a Keyword
This is where SEO can go wrong.
A business finds 50 keywords and decides:
“Great. Let's create 50 pages.”
But keywords aren't automatically a content plan.
Ask:
🤔 What is the searcher trying to achieve?
📄 Do we already have a page that answers this?
💡 Would a new page add something genuinely useful?
🎯 Does it serve a different purpose?
🔗 How will it fit into the rest of the website?
Sometimes a new page is absolutely justified.
Sometimes improving an existing page is the better decision.
🔗 Your Internal Links Matter Too
Once you've decided which pages are important, help users navigate between them logically.
For example, a blog post about improving website visibility might naturally link to your main SEO service page.
A Google Ads article might link to your Google Ads service.
This creates a clearer website structure for visitors and helps search engines understand relationships between pages.
But again, keep it natural.
Don't turn every paragraph into a collection of keyword-stuffed links. 😵💫
🚫 Don't Panic About Every Similar Page
Keyword cannibalisation is sometimes oversimplified online.
If two pages appear for similar queries, that doesn't automatically mean you've discovered an SEO disaster.
Related pages naturally overlap.
What matters is whether the pages:
✅ Serve different purposes
✅ Answer different questions
✅ Target different stages of the customer journey
✅ Provide genuinely useful information
The problem is unnecessary duplication and unclear purpose, not simply mentioning the same subject twice.
📋 Try This SEO Check Today
Go through your website and create a simple list of your important pages.
Next to each page, write:
Page:
Main topic:
Customer/search intent:
Purpose:
Primary next step:
Then compare them.
If two or three pages have almost identical answers, investigate further.
You might discover that you've been creating new content when you already had the page you needed.
🚀 Sometimes Better SEO Means Fewer, Stronger Pages
SEO isn't a competition to see who can create the biggest website.
Your website needs the pages necessary to answer your customers' questions, explain your products or services and support relevant searches.
Sometimes that means creating new content.
Sometimes it means improving what already exists.
And sometimes it means consolidating pages that no longer need to be separate.
At Page Crowd, we help UK businesses improve their websites and develop practical SEO strategies designed around useful content, clear website structure and relevant search opportunities.
📲 Want help improving your website's visibility on Google? Contact Page Crowd today.
🔥 Remember:
More SEO pages don't automatically mean better SEO.
