Published:
by Wayne Smith
TL;DR: A doorway is algorithmically an orphaned page that does not have internal links pointing towards it but otherwise is suitable for ranking or is SEOed. They end up as Crawled currently not indexed.
The longer version is that Google and many other search engines consider doorway pages low-value, or pages that don't add value to the search engine but consume search engine resources. It is a design choice made by search engines to save clicks to the answer, which is a better user experience.
Many Link-based search engine algorithms are designed to provide the page with the answer. Doorway and orphaned content becomes buried under the page with links from the site ... Making them redundant adding nothing to the search engine results page.
Marketing POV
There are those in marketing who see doorway pages as valuable content. The TL;DR content can help a visitor make a choice, and removing the content not related to the choice facilitates the user's choice.
Content for people but not for link-based search engines can use a "robots noindex" tag for those search engines. However, these pages can also have links internal to the website.
It is very helpful to see search engines as a customer for the content on the website and address the pain point. For link-based search engines, doorway pages are a pain point. Although, alternative engines may not see doorways as a pain point.
Search Engines with link-based algorithms
When pages are sorted based on links the pages with fewer links appear lower in the search results. A doorway page will be buried in the search results and like a self-fulfilling prophecy consume search engine resources by always being below pages with links towards them.
If external links are used to rank an orphaned page, link-based algorithms see these as artificially manipulating the search index. Link schemes to rank pages can result in algorithmic penalties and affect more than just the orphaned or doorway page.
User interaction may come into play to determine if the orphaned or doorway page has more value than the page it links to ... these algorithms are subject to change.
Orphaned Pages
Orphaned pages may exist, because as the site expanded, they had little content and value for the site; Or, they may have been orphaned by mistake.
These pages should be updated or pruned.
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