Pages still appear in Google after unpublishing them

  • leadgenp

    (@leadgenp)


    2 years ago

    Hi,

    I am in a situation where I need to delete 2 published pages, and I have done the following:

    -Unpublished the pages from WordPress and Elementor (they are in “Draft” mode)
    -I have added a “noindex” tag from the RankMath SEO plugin
    -I requested removal in Google Search Console for these specific pages a few days ago!

    What can I do to get rid of these pages from Google? I don’t want them to appear in SERPS any longer!

    Can anyone help, please?

    Thank you!

    • This topic was modified 2 years ago by Jan Dembowski. Reason: Moved to Fixing WordPress, this is not an Everything else WordPress topic
Viewing 4 replies - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)
  • clayp

    (@clayp)

    As you have already added the noindex tag on those pages, they should be removed from Google. However, it can take a while for Google to update its index. So after submitting the request, it’s ultimately up to Google. And there’s nothing you can do from your end.

    Thread Starter leadgenp

    (@leadgenp)

    Hi Clay,

    Thanks for your reply. So, you are saying that Google can still keep the page even if I delete the content from it?

    clayp

    (@clayp)

    Because you deleted the page, it is currently unavailable and displays a 404 error, not the content. But It can take some time for Google to know that you’ve deleted a page. Over time, Google will realize that your page is gone and update its index accordingly, which means the page won’t appear in SERP for longer.

    However, If the content has been removed and still appears in the search engine’s results, it’s because the content (snapshot of the page) was saved as a cache.

    Thread Starter leadgenp

    (@leadgenp)

    Hi Clay,

    Thanks again for your comprehensive explanation.

    The thing is that I have unpublished the pages but haven’t deleted the content from it.

    However, when I open the site in Incognito Mode I still see these pages including the content!

    I do not see a 404 error for these pages in Incognito Mode!

Viewing 4 replies - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)
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