SEO optimization

Hi. nicepage creates duplicate page always, and I don't believe it will change that.

To optimize the website for SEO what to do? Google always complaining about duplicate content.

index.html
main_page.html

canonical:
Should I put https://mydomain.com/main_page.html
or
Should I put https://mydomain.com/index.html

sitemap:
should I remove index.html if I put main_page.html as canonical?
Should I remove main_page.html if I put index.html as canonical?

.htaccess:
do I need to put if I put main_page.html as canonical?
DirectoryIndex main_page.html

I've made a custom 404.html page:
ErrorDocument 404 /404page.html

I think I should remove it from sitemap.xml? Correct? I already made it not index in nicepage, but it's always inserted in sitemap don't know why.

I'm sharing some info also about what I've in my .htaccess that I think everyone should have:

Redirect www to non-www
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^www.mywebsite.pt
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ https://mywebsite.pt/$1

Ensure HTTPS for all requests
RewriteCond %{HTTPS} off
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ https://%{HTTP_HOST}%{REQUEST_URI}

<IfModule mod_headers.c>

# Enable Caching for Static Files
<FilesMatch ".(ico|css|js|jpg|jpeg|png|gif|svg|woff|woff2|eot|ttf|otf)$">

Header set Cache-Control "public, max-age=31536000"  # One Year

# Don't Cache HTML Files (For SEO)
<FilesMatch ".(html|htm|php)$">

Header set Cache-Control "no-cache"

# ETag and Expires Headers for Static Files
<FilesMatch ".(ico|css|js|jpg|jpeg|png|gif|svg|woff|woff2|eot|ttf|otf)$">

Header set ETag MTIME
Header set Expires "Wed, 21 Apr 2025 15:48:00 GMT"  # One Year from Now

Last edited 06 June 2024 by joaopeixoto