301 Redirect and Webmaster Central
-
I've been working on removing canonical issues. My host is Apache.
Is this the correct code for my htaccess?
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^luckygemstones.com$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.luckygemstones.com/$1 [R=301,L]SECOND!!! I have two websites under Google's Webmaster Central;
http://luckygemstones.com which gets NO 404 soft errors...
AND
http://www.luckygemstones.com which has 247 soft 404 errors...
I think I should DELETE the http://luckygemstones.com site from Webmaster Central--the 301 redirect handles the"www" thing.
Is this correct? I hate to hose things (even worse?)
Help!
Kathleen
-
It seems like Google would want unused/unwanted pages removed--less "junk" on the web--less irrelevance to add to their already huge index...
A long time problem I think...I will sometimes put NOINDEX, NOFOLLOW in pages I wanted removed from the index--then after a few months, delete them.
Thanks for the feedback!
-
Hah, reading my daily dose of news and this came up.
"If we've seen a URL once, we're likely to retry it again and again, especially if we should run across new links to that URL. This isn't something that you really need to worry about, it's absolutely fine and even expected that a website returns 404 for URLs that don't exist. Assuming these are URLs that you don't want to have indexed, then these 404 errors will not negatively affect your site's performance in search. Having 404s is fine." - John Mueller
-
http://www.luckygemstones.com/anypage.htm" />
Yes, add the www. because that is what you want to be indexed.. you want the non-www version to be ignored and replaced with the www. version.
I wonder how people handle sold outs properly. - Keep the page and replace the "add to cart/buy now" button with a "Sold Out" graphic.
That way you get to keep all your pages (hopefully they are unique and get external links) and are able to target more keywords to cross sell your other items. And if you do get more of the item in stock, you can just add the payment buttons again.
-
So I still need the link rel tag on each page--including the 301 redirect?
So say or would the link tag require the www? I think not--but not totally clear!
We're a jewelry website--and things do sell out, so we remove the page (otherwise someone might try to order them) I have it in the sitemap to archive the pages yet still get 404 errors. I've been considering 410--but not sure how to implement...
We have literally thousands of items--so it'd be a bit of work to go over and manually remove sold out items at google every day. And what about yahoo/bing, etc?
I wonder how people handle sold outs properly.
Thx for your help!
Kathleen
-
Correct code for .htaccess.
I wouldn't remove the non-www version from GWT. Instead, set the preferred domain (configuration > settings > preferred domain > Display URLs as www.luckygemstones.com)
In addition, I would add rel canonical tags to the www. version of each page.
Can you list some sample soft 404s? By definition, they are pages that aren't found but return a 200 response code.
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
-
Multistore 302 Redirects
I noticed that every link on my site is being flagged up as a 302 temp redirect in Moz. The reason is because we have a multi store and use GeoIP to redirect anyone coming from their respective country. I'm guessing a 302 is the wrong way to do this - can anyone shed advice on the best practice for redirecting customers to geo-specific stores?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | moon-boots0 -
Relaunching website in two phases - 301 redirect approach
Hey Mozzers, Interested to know your thoughts on the following situation. I am relaunching a website with an updated URL structure in TWO phases. Phase one will be a much smaller version of the site, with 30% of the pages going live - the remaining 70% of page won't be available until Phase two. In Phase one, these 30% of pages will be 301 redirected from their like-for-like versions - old site to new site. The remaining 70%... because the like-for-like pages won't be available until Phase two, which is likely to be launched in 3 months time, should I do a temporary redirect on these pages (302) to the new homepage for the time being, until the new versions of the pages are live - and then implement the 301 from old url to new url. A bit of a messy situation, and not ideal for SEO, but my hands are tied as the organisation is pushing ahead with this phased approach. So, interested to hear your thoughts on an appropriate 301 migration plan.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | RWesley0 -
Setting up 301 Redirects after acquisition?
Hello! The company that I work for has recently acquired two other companies. I was wondering what the best strategy would be as it relates to redirects / authority. Please help! Thanks
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Colin.Accela0 -
301 redirections done too late - What do you suggest?
Hi, When pushing our new site live, most of the 301 redirections got done too late for several reasons. Understandably, our site rankings in google have taken a hit now. So far we have just tried to perfectly optimize the pages that used to rank well (They weren't even optimized before and were still ranking) , to get our positions back. But does anyone have an idea about what else we could do? Is there a recommended "action plan" when someone is late with their 301 redirections?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | JohanMattisson0 -
301 redirect or Link back from old to new pages
Hi all, We run a ticket agent, and have multiple events that occur year after year, for example a festival. The festival has a main page with each event having a different page for each year like the below: Main page
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | gigantictickets
http://www.gigantic.com/leefest-tickets (main page) Event pages:
http://www.gigantic.com/leefest-2010-tickets/hawksbrook-lane-beckenham/2009-08-15-13-00-gce/11246a
http://www.gigantic.com/leefest-2010-tickets/highhams-hill-farm-warlingham/2010-08-14-13-00-gce/19044a
http://www.gigantic.com/leefest-2011-tickets/highhams-hill-farm-warlingham/2011-08-13-13-00-gce/26204a
http://www.gigantic.com/leefest-2012-tickets/highhams-hill-farm-warlingham/2012-06-29-12-00-gce/32168a
http://www.gigantic.com/leefest-2013/highhams-hill-farm/2013-07-12-12-00 my question is: Is it better to leave the old event pages active and link them back to the main page, or 301 redirect these pages once they're out of date? (leave them there until there is a new event page to replace it for this year) If the best answer is to leave the page there, should i use a canonical tag back to the main page? and what would be the best way to link back? there is a breadcrumb there now, but it doesn't seem to obvious for users to click this. Keywords we're aming for on this example are 'Leefest Tickets', which has good ranking now, the main page and 2012 page is listed. Thanks in advance for your help.0 -
Confusing 301 / Canonical Redirect Issue - Wizard Needed
I had two pages on my site with identical content. What I did was 301 redirect one page to the other. I also added canonical redirect code to the page that held the 301 code. Here is what I have: www.careersinmusic.com/music-colleges.aspx - this page was a duplicate and I needed it to resolve to:
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | 4Buck
www.careersinmusic.com/music-schools.aspx Here is the code I used: XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX music-colleges.aspx
<%@ Page Language="VB" AutoEventWireup="false" CodeFile="music-colleges.aspx.vb" Inherits="music_colleges" %>
http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> http://www.careersinmusic.com/music-schools.aspx"/> XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
music-colleges.aspx.vb
Partial Class music_colleges
Inherits System.Web.UI.Page
Protected Sub Page_Load(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles Me.Load
Response.Status = "301 Moved Permanently"
Response.AddHeader("Location", "http://www.careersinmusic.com/music-schools.aspx")
End Sub
End Class XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX The problem:
For some reason, when the search “music colleges” is done in Google, I am #7. When the term “music schools” is done, I am around 119. I MUST be getting a penalty for some reason, I just cannot figure the reason. When perform well for one term and terrible for the next? All I can come up with is a duplicate content penalty or something along those lines. Also, music-colleges.aspx seems to still be in Googles index, even though the above 301 happened months ago. Thoughts? site:www.careersinmusic.com/music-colleges.aspx Any insight into this would be GREATLY appreciated. Many Thanks!0 -
Is it ok to use both 301 redirect and rel="canonical' at the same time?
Hi everyone, I'm sorry if this has been asked before. I just wasn't able to find a response in previous questions. To fix the problems in our website regarding duplication I have the possibility to set up 301's and, at the same time, modify our CMS so that it automatically sets a rel="canonical" tag for every page that is generated. Would it be a problem to have both methods set up? Is it a problem to have a on a page that is redirecting to another one? Is it advisable to have a rel="canonical" tag on every single page? Thanks for reading!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | SDLOnlineChannel0 -
301 - do i change old links once 301 is in place?
Hey all, I'm about to setup a 301 on a website that has pretty good SEO rankings and I have the ability to change all the old inbound links that point to the old site, to the new site - should I leave them pointing to the old site that has the 301 on it or change all the old inbound links to the new domain name? Which has better SEO value? Thanks for helping, Anthony
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Grenadi0