www and non www canonicalization question

[jpf566]

Hey guys, the whole “www and non www” issue is somewhat confusing to me… Actually, I don’t get it at all. It seems all websites are accessible by typing in www or non www so how do I know if I’m having canonicalization issues with my site? Also, I just noticed today that when I login to Google webmaster tools it now has TWO sites listed for my site (a www and a non www version) I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or not, but I feel like its bad.
 
Here is our site sheffieldfurniture.com
 
Thanks to anyone that can help shed some light on this subject!

[coniefox]

Many people have the same problem, but you can use 301 orientation to let a url point to the more traffic url.

[C.Rebecca]

Well both your URLs (www and non www) are opening the same page and you might get penalized for duplicate content. Yes, it is a bad practice to keep two versions of the same thing.
Choose the URL you prefer to keep and use a 301 redirect to the preferred page which makes it easier for Google to know which URL is canonical.
Refer to this link for canonicalization queries
http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/seo-advice-url-canonicalization/

[RichardSmith]

 Hi everyone,

Well both your URLs (www and non www) are opening the same page and you might get penalized for duplicate content. Yes, it is a bad practice to keep two versions of the same thing.

Choose the URL you prefer to keep and use a 301 redirect to the preferred page which makes it easier for Google to know which URL is canonical.

Thanks a lot
Richard Smith

Online Reputation Management

[motorbikestore]

Redirect 301 is the best option otherwise your site penalized by Google.Many webmaster doesn't give any importance towards that issue and result is 0....