Using a 302 instead of a 301
-
I am trying to figure out the best way to garner the most amount of link value.
We have an app that lives on a sub-domain ... For the purposes of this question, let's call it app.mydomain.com. We provide a service with this app that requires clients (with very high ranking websites) to link into app located on the sub-domain.
Would I garner more authority if had the high ranking client website link into a url that wasn't a sub-domain and redirect it using a 302?
For example: What if I created a 302 that was www.mydomain.com/app and have it redirected to the sub-domain version of app.mydomain.com?
Additionally am I correct to assume that a 301 would merely pass that value to the sub domain and NOT provide much value to the root?
-
Just to clarify, I want to direct the link juice to: www.mydomain.com from app.mydomain.com. As these high profile websites will be linking to the app.
My idea was to have them link to a page on the www.mydomain.com/app that I would effectively redirect back to app.mydomain.com.
But if I use a 301, the 301 will direct link juice back toward the sub domain (app.mydomain.com).
So my question is ... will the 302 keep the juice at the www version (not pass the juice)
Hopefully this makes sense. The other option is to simply let them link to the app. and add a canonical tag that points the juice back to the www version.
-
It seems your on the righ track as a 302 Redirect is a temporary redirect
and passes 0% of link juice according to SEOMOZ: http://www.seomoz.org/learn-seo/redirectionAlso The "root domain" redirected page will still retain its PageRank, MozRank,
Page Authority and Traffic Value – and the detour page will not accumulate any.You are also correct about the 301:
A 301 Redirect is a permanent redirect which passes between 90-99% of link juice
according to SEOMOZ: http://www.seomoz.org/learn-seo/redirectionKeep in mind that on this same page SEOMOZ goes on to say "and in most cases (302 redirect) should not be used.
Also if kept to long a 302 will eventually slide in rankingsI think yes you will garner more link value using a subfolder then a subdomain
As you will see posted also on SEOMOZ:"5. Subdomains or Sub-folders
Since search engines keep different metrics for domains than they do subdomains,
it is recommended that webmasters place link worthy content like blogs in subfolders
rather than subdomains. (i.e. www.example.com/blog/ rather than blog.example.com)
The notable exception to this is language specific websites. (i.e. en.example.com for english)"http://www.seomoz.org/learn-seo/domain
But the main point here is will you gain anything to your root domain while it
has a 302 and redrecting to another pagePersonally, I would avoid the 302 and move the page "app.mydomain.com" to the subfolder "www.mydomain.com/app"
Having the old page url "app.mydomain.com" 301 redirect to the subfolder "www.mydomain.com/app"
passing 90-99% of the juice -
What subdomain are you trying to get link juice for? app.mydomain.com or www.mydomain.com?
Never use a 302. You lose 100% of link juice.
With a 301, you will still lose a little, maybe 10% or so, but you will pass the link juice on to the app.mydomain.com
But if you are trying to get the most Link Juice to the root domain mydomain.com, then I would just suggest linking directly to the app.mydomain.com
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Pages that did NOT 301 redirect to the new site
Hi, Is there a tool out there that can tell me what pages did NOT 301 redirect to the new sites? I need something rather than going into google.com and typing in site:oldsite.com to see if it's still indexed and if it's not 301 redirecting.. I'm not sure if screaming frog can do that. Thanks.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | ggpaul5620 -
Changing 301s or using 302s after a relaunch?
We are doing a relaunch and changing nearly every URL. Since the list of redirects is > 5.000 we might have some mistakes we want to change later (i.e. having a 301 to a directory but finding a single page later that fits its purpose better). Can I change the 301 later and will seachengines get that? Can I use 302s for a week or two until I'm sure about my redirects and only than do propper 301s?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | nabujona0 -
Is there anything wrong with this 301 redirect?
I'll keep this one short and sweet 🙂 Many moons ago we used to have several different methods of sorting our products and this change in sort order was achieved by having ?dispmode=list or ?dispmode=grid after the product URL. Best part of a year ago we decided to scrap this feature and 301'd all the ?dispmode URL's back to the base URL. The funny thing is that Google don't seem to have dropped a single one of the old URL's from their index and a search for site:www.refreshcartridges.co.uk dispmode returns almost 8,000 results. This isn't a massive problem but I'd have expected in the past year they'd have picked up on a couple of the 301's and would have started removing the old results. I'd hate to think we were getting any kind of penalisation for duplicate pages. I know the answer to this question is going to be 'just be patient, the old results will disappear' but just to ensure we're not missing anything stupid. I'd really appreciate it if someone could check out www.refreshcartridges.co.uk/brother-c-223.html?dispmode=list to confirm there's nothing more we could be doing to get these old results removed from the index. Many thanks
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | ChrisHolgate0 -
How can using guest bloggers HURT me?
Hi Mozzers, I want to start accepting guest bloggers on my site to create content.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Travis-W
What potential pitfalls should I watch out for? Should they only link a certain amount of times to their site? Per article? Per everything?
Ratio of followed vs nofollowed links?
Should I not link to "hazardous" sites I don't want to associate myself with? How can I identify a site that will hurt my link profile?
What's the best way to make sure the guest bloggers aren't plagiarizing? Thanks!0 -
Is this a Correct Time to Use 302 Redirects?
Hi Mozzers! We are going through a rebranding process, and as of this morning we have 3 domains, all with identical content. For example (not real domain names): www.fantastic.com
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Travis-W
www.fantasticfireworks.com
www.fireworks.com We are using 3 domains to ease the rebranding transition. We currently only want people to visit 'www.fantastic.com,' and if they visit the other 2 domains we want them redirected. Since we will be using these other domains eventually, should we use 302 redirects instead of 301s? The other domains are new and do not have any domain authority or sites linking in, so we do not need to worry about link juice. Does it really matter what type of redirect we use? Thanks!0 -
Login redirect 302
Ok - anyone knows what to do with the temporary redirect to the login page? In our e-commerce system we have a checkout page, which requires user to be logged in - if they are not, we redirect them to the login page using simple php header("Locaiton: url"). This however has been found as a Warning as it's a temporary redirect. I can't really put there permanent redirect for obvious reasons so if someone could give me some clue on this situation that would be much appreciated.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | coremediadesign0 -
Quoestion about 301 redirect
Hey, I have interesting questions regardin 301 redirect (At least I think it's Interesting:) ) So i have this websites that compares different lenders, url below 🙂 If you go to the homepage then the first thing you see is different loan amounts in 50-99 euro range. Also you can check out different loan amounts like 100-149€, 150-199€, 200-249€ and so on. For now i have used 301 redirect and Noindex and Nofollow for all the different "loan amounts" urls. Examples below etc Is it a good idea to use 301 on all such pages to point to the homepage?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | TauriU0 -
301 Redirect shenanigans.
So our website (www.FrontlineMobility.com) Has a canonical link redirect to the non www. version. However when I put in website.com it comes up with a small list of links and says this site links to www.website.com. So I'm curious if I used to wrong canonical linking method( that is the method I tried and I placed it in the Head Tags.) I greatly appreciate any assistance in this matter ^.^
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | FrontlineMobility0