Open Site Explorer is finding old html Files that havn't been on my site in two years... even after a 301 Redirect. HELP!
-
Hello!
My problem started when I became aware that when I checked my backlinks for the past two years, it states that no backlinks have been found. When I ran a site analysis on SEMrush - No backlinks are found on the URL, or Domain. There are 7 Backlinks on the Root Domain and those were configured in 2012. I made a second domain www.columbusweddingphotographersreviews.comwhere I linked to my domain at www.morganlindsayphotography.com so I could test that google had crawled both websites and after, still no backlink was found. I have also been published on a dozen or so wedding websites that has linked to my website where they are follow links and still nothing. (http://www.brendasweddingblog.com/blogs/2015/2/23/an-elegant-fall-wedding-in-ohio-with-morgan-lindsay-photography)**Website Background- **
In 2012 I had two separate websites - One for Seniors that was an HTML website I build in Dreamweaver at www.morganlindsayphotography/seniors and another for Wedding Clients found at www.morganlindsayphotography.com/Wedding - (wordpress) I had a Splash page wish was found atwww.morganlindsayphotography.com. Two years ago when I became aware splash pages were frowned upon in Google, I combined the two websites and stayed with the Wordpress which was www.morganlindsayphotography.com/Wedding
Because I did not want users to have to go to www.morganlindsayphotography.com/Wedding to view my url, Godaddy moved my wordpress site from thewww.morganlindsyphotography.com/Wedding directory towww.morganlindsayphotography.comWhen I ran the Open Site Explorer with Moz I found after runningwww.morganlindsayphotography.com the TOP pages on this domain according to Page Authority are old HTML files from my senior website, as well as old Posts from when my wordpress site was found atwww.moragnlindsayphotography.com/Weddings
No current pots or pages are showing up besideswww.morganlindsyphotography.com I do run a cache management system to speed up my system and recently cleaned out my .htcacess folder and still had no luck. This is difficulty something**Last night I made a 301 Redirect in my htaccess for all the old links pointing to the new links as best as I could. My htacess folder looks like this..
BEGIN WordPress
<ifmodule mod_rewrite.c="">RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^index.php$ - [L]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule . /index.php [L]</ifmodule>END WordPress
Permanent URL redirect - generated by www.rapidtables.com
Redirect 301 /Wedding http://www.morganlindsayphotography.com/
Permanent URL redirect - generated by www.rapidtables.com
Redirect 301 /Wedding/ http://www.morganlindsayphotography.com/
Permanent URL redirect - generated by www.rapidtables.com
Redirect 301 /about.html http://www.morganlindsayphotography.com/about-morgan-lindsay/
Permanent URL redirect - generated by www.rapidtables.com
Redirect 301 /app.html http://www.morganlindsayphotography.com/blog/
Permanent URL redirect - generated by www.rapidtables.com
Redirect 301 /experience.html http://www.morganlindsayphotography.com/senior-sessions/
Permanent URL redirect - generated by www.rapidtables.com
Redirect 301 /index.html http://www.morganlindsayphotography.com/
Permanent URL redirect - generated by www.rapidtables.com
Redirect 301 /senior.html http://www.morganlindsayphotography.com/ohio-senior-photographer/
Permanent URL redirect - generated by www.rapidtables.com
Redirect 301 /seniorsconstruction.html http://www.morganlindsayphotography.com/ohio-senior-photographer/
Permanent URL redirect - generated by www.rapidtables.com
Redirect 301 /Wedding/2012/06/22/brittany-reis-jason-mcclaflin-tiffin-ohio-wedding/ http://www.morganlindsayphotography.com/holy-family-church-columbus-wedding/
After I ran the open site moz explorer and the www.morganlindsayphotography/Wedding was still there..
-
I don't know if you're looking at the right thing...
- Your site is listing in Google if you check with a site:morganlindsayphotography.com search, so that's current.
- Plus DNS tools show that your site is pointing to the correct nameservers: https://www.whatsmydns.net/#NS/morganlindsayphotography.com.
- Further, there aren't any pages listed that are your old 'html' style: https://encrypted.google.com/search?q=site%3Amorganlindsayphotography.com+inurl%3Ahtml.
- And I'm seeing pages that have been crawled as recently as February: site search with "past month" selected from search tools.
- If you're in Google Webmaster Tools and go to Google Index >> Index Status, you'll see a running timeline of how many pages Google has in their index up to recent dates.
Starting a new domain and rebuilding your site would be a bad idea as it would only delay OSE further.
-
Hi Ryan, I undated my google sitmap to Google and bing two weeks ago and it still hasn't fixed anything. I re-uploaded today and still nothing. I understand it takes time but I feel like there may be another issue.
I I have a Google +. local page and have updated it weekly for the past 6 months. you can find my profile here https://plus.google.com/+MorganLindsayPhotographyTiffin
after doing some reserch I remembered I used to have used MAMP application configured and pointed to my www.morganlindsayphotography.com site two years ago. This was used to test a php contact form when my website was html: I also found a robot.txt file but no site map in the root folder. I checked the mamp folder and found files that are still coming up in the moz open site explorer In this mamp root folder.
the www.morganlindsayphotography.com/app.html
the www.morganlindsayphotography.com/senior.html
the www.morganlindsayphotography.com/experience.html
....all of the files found on my MAMP root directory for Www.morganlindsayphotography.com were the url's that were named in the folder of the in the mamp application.. Could this be causing the issue? I'm ready to start a new domain and rebuild my site. I'm not sure what to do.
thanks again, Ryan!
-
Wow. Well the good news is that I see a sitemap at http://www.morganlindsayphotography.com/sitemap.xml which seems accurate to your current site. If you submit that within Google Webmaster Tools and Bing that will help refresh pages there.
The other aspect of all this stuff is getting more external links, so feel free to link up your social profiles: linkedin, twitter, facebook, etc. to point back to your site as your home page. You can announce new blog posts via twitter as well. You can also link up photography orientated sites like 500px, flickr, dphoto, and so on to point back to your main site as your home page within your profile. All this should help update the other services as they crawl those sites.
The other aspect is local sites, like Google + Local, Bing Local, Yelp, Facebook and others. Moz Local covers many of them. Each of those also offers a place for you to point to your main site.
Updating throughout there should get you up to speed in no time. Plus David gave you the inside info on your site's status in OSE, so you should be set. Cheers!
-
Anytime and you can use OSE to research those with high authority as well
Cheers!
-
I will definitely keep that in mind when choosing who to submit publications too. Thanks again!
-
Hi Morgan
The more sites that link to your blog posts and site, the higher chance there will be for our index to pick them up. Our index is based on freshness and importance so it's best to build your links on sites with high authority.
Hope this helps
-
I just ran the index status in Google Webmaster tools and found that there are currently no files and hasn't been since July 2014 indexed from my domain name at www.morganlindsayphotography.com -- This is nuts.
-
Hi Ryan! Thank you so much for your info. After running a few reports the SemRUSH, Ahref and Majectic... It is coming up that my domain http://www.morganlindsayphotography.com is not found. Although, http://morganlindsayphotography.com is. have uploaded my sitemap through google and bing and went into my Godaddy file manager to see if there was any issues there...
I found that there is no sitemap.xml folder found on my root directory in Godaddy and there are two videositemaps.xml one that says video-sitmap.xml and another that says video-sitemap.xml.gz.. Is it a problem that my regular sitemap.xml is not found in my root in my file manager with godaddy? and is it a problem that there are two video-sitemap's? You have been so much help, thank you!
-
I have updated my website and have new blog posts almost every week, so I'm nervous why there are no new links to crawl! I think there is something definitely wrong. Thank you for time and answering my question!!
Morgan
-
Hi Ryan! Thank you so much for your info. After running a few reports the SemRUSH, Ahref and Majectic... It is coming up that my domain http://www.morganlindsayphotography.com is not found. Although, http://morganlindsayphotography.com is. have uploaded my sitemap through google and bing and went into my Godaddy file manager to see if there was any issues there...
I found that there is no sitemap.xml folder found on my root directory in Godaddy and there are two videositemaps.xml one that says video-sitmap.xml and another that says video-sitemap.xml.gz.. Is it a problem that my regular sitemap.xml is not found in my root in my file manager with godaddy? and is it a problem that there are two video-sitemap's? You have been so much help, thank you!
-
Hey Morgan!
It appears we last crawled your site on November 14th 2014. If we do not re-crawl a site, data can be stored in our index for up to 160 days. In order for us to update you information we will need to discover new links to re-crawl. There are a couple in the queue for processing from Wedding Wire so you should see those top pages update in the next 1-2 index updates.
Hope this helps!
-
Hi Morgan. Your updates look good. One thing with OSE is that it doesn't update instantaneously and is actually refreshed on a monthly schedule or so which means any changes you make that work well in Google and on your site will take a while to get recorded in OSE. Did you try checking your site in the webmaster tools Google and Bing offer? Uploading the current sitemap should help clear things up further. The latest update is scheduled for March 11th at which time you might see this information updated, see: http://moz.com/products/api/updates for past information and this post discussing OSE: http://moz.com/community/q/have-questions-about-the-jan-27th-mozscape-index-update-get-answers-here in more detail.
There are also some other backlink checking tools out there such as Ahrefs and Majestic that are useful for finding even more links. Mostly OSE is suited for checking the link profile of several competitors and getting ideas one where else you can market your site. For example, if you know of some other photography sites that are ranking highly you can add them into OSE and begin to see what they've done and how you could improve. Your current work looks fine though so you should be good to go. Cheers!
-
yes! I love that the open site explorer allows you to check backlinks... When I found that none of my backlinks were showing up from other websites I know I have been published at, I dug further into the top pages tab linking to my domain and found the only pages it was pulling were old worspress pages and old html files from two years ago. there is no access to those files anywhere on my website And hey have been deleted two years ago.
Thank you for your reply!
-
The purpose of Open Site Explorer is to show backlinks. It is not intended to show how those links are redirected on your site. If your 301 redirects are set up properly, anyone who clicks on them will be redirected to the proper page on your site. However, you would have to ask the websites linking to you to change the URLs if you want those URLs to be updated (and reflected in OSE).
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
-
Unsolved Issue with former site redirect
Hello, After 2 months of starting a new service with a new domain name and a rather flat curve, I decided to invest in auditing tools. To my surprise, when analyzing links with 'Link Explorer', I got the following warning : "You entered the URL crapahute.com which redirects to www.krapahute.com. Click here to analyze www.krapahute.com instead."... So I understand I bought a domain name that was previously in use, 8 years ago. And logically, when they moved from crapahute.com to krapahute.com, the former site owners set a (probably 401) redirect between their former name and their new one. Probably that in the last 8 years they dropped crapahute.com since I was able to buy the domain name last year. I can't understand the warning I'm receiving. since I thought this redirect would become inactive when they dropped the domain name. On the contrary, if I analyze the backlinks to krapahute.com I can indeed see : crapahute.com [no anchor text] 3 2 0 --
Link Explorer | | x_all
redirect More Info
Date first seen - Date lost - Link target
2016-09-05 - N/A - www.krapahute.com So my question is : where is this warning coming from ? I performed some nslookup and dig on my domain and their's just to find out that every thing seems to look normal. Meanwhile, if I type "crapahute" in Google (and most other search engines), my site arrives in 12th page (!), and if I type "crapahute.com", the site "krapahute.com" appears first. Thank you for those reading up to that point ! Any hint on what could cause this ? Should I change of domain name ? Thank you !0 -
Unsolved Moz link explorer is how much reliable and accurate as compared to others link explorer tools like Ahref
Hi.. I need to check backlinks for one of my client website duplicatebills through Moz Pro link explorer tool then its show that linking domain to this website are 90 but when i cross check these links from other tools like Ahref free backlinking tool then its show a different figure (ahref show that linking domain to this website are 103).
Link Explorer | | dbills
I am confused that which one correct. And MOZ link explorer tools in reliable to which extent?0 -
How do I find http backlinks to my domain?
Hi, We spotted a number of sites linking to us from http sites, not https sites. How can I use backlink tools to find just those from http sites? Right now I'm looking at exporting a spreadsheet with 3.3 million entries and filtering - and there's not one person here who wants to do that! Thanks in advance. Screen Shot 2021-11-03 at 10.49.12.png
Link Explorer | | mark_seomoz10 -
Moz's new Link Explorer displaying the DA marginally less than Site Explorer
Moz's new Link Explorer displaying the DA marginally less than Site Explorer. Old one is showing it 46 while new link explorer is showing the DA as 40.
Link Explorer | | dhananjay.kumar11 -
Difference on full and partial URLs in Open Site Explorer?
Hi, I am pretty new to SEO and it might show. Here is my question, regarding the difference on "full and partial" urls in Open Site Explorer (OSP). That is, the difference on http://www.mywebsite.com and http://mywebsite.com. I get very similar results for the two variations, but not exactly the same. That suggest to me that OSP most of the time find the same links regardless of whether the url put into the search field is full or partial. But not all the time. Can anyone clarify? Thx in advance
Link Explorer | | plovski0 -
Why aren't my "page social metrics" increasing?
I post a lot to Facebook & twitter, & my "page social metrics" haven't budged in 4 weeks. I even stopped using bit.ly & stated the full URL as a test. Still no change. The fb account is /getgoodgifts & twitter is /giftsing. Thoughts on why social metrics aren't increasing?
Link Explorer | | giftsing0 -
When requesting a CSV for an internal 302 redirect report, the data isn't aligning with the UI. Does anyone have any suggestions?
When requesting a CSV for an internal 302 redirect report, the data isn't aligning with the UI. Does anyone have any suggestions?
Link Explorer | | Merkle-Impaqt0 -
Open Site Explorer Only showing 2 Internal Links
Hi, for some reason Open Site Explorer only shows 2 internal links linking to our homepage (and other pages). When looking at a competitors site, they have thousands of internal links to their homepage! Are there any reasons why OSE is only showing 2 for our site, when in fact there are hundreds and thousands? Thanks.
Link Explorer | | Jaybeamer0