301 Clean-Up - Best Practices & Procedure?
-
Hello Again,
I have taken over managing a website for about 2 months and have fixed a whole heap of problems. Im now turning my attention to the URL rewrites as there are ALOT of them. I have fixed the most problematic offenders that were blocking products and all sorts of mischief but I now want to clean them up.
The website is on Magento, and there are 240 custom URL rewrites.
Question 1: Am i correct that I should edit the links on my website so that they link directly to the new page instead of utilising the re-direct for best SEO results.
Question 2: If my website doesn't utilise the URL rewrite (fixed in question 1) its only purpose is to transfer link juice from any external link the page had before. If this page didnt have any external inbound links then I can delete the URL rewrite as it serves no purpose.
Question 3: If Q1 and Q2 are correct, what is the quickest way to check the inbound links to a page quickly so I can make a quick decision on if i should remove the re-write.
Many Thanks in advance!
-
Thank you ATP for your answer +1 thumbs up
-
Answer 1 - Yes, you are correct. Update internal links. This is best practice.
Answer 2 - No, this is not correct. If users have a URL stored in a bookmark or someone is linking to it with javascript, in an email, or some way that would not show up in a backlink report the redirect would get them to the right page. Redirects are for more than just passing page-rank.
Answer 3 - Use the Moz toolbar for this on a page-by-page basis, or use OSE for the site as a whole. You should also check Google Webmaster Tools, as they have a fresher database than OSE and may know of new links, or ones that OSE didn't catch.
-
From my understanding it is a disadvantage Adam,
Although a 301 passes link juice it only passes a percentage of it, a little is lost along the way. Also redirects increase the amount of time needed for a page to load after the click as it has to walk down a longer path to reach its destination. Im sure I read somewhere (cant find the source sorry) that too many redirects and redirect "chains" can negatively impact your ranking but it likes redirects that genuinely offer replacement relevant content.
If it were me I would at the very least
Redirect: /this-is-it/ -> /how-nice/ removing a step in that path
Keep: /yep-yep/ -> /how-nice/Then change all links on your website point to /this-is-it/ and /yep-yep/ to /how-nice/
If possible get any backlinks changed to the new url also. -
I would like to add a question to the previous ones I hope that ATP won't mind, Is it a disadvantage in a SEO perspective to have 301-s that for example set for 3 pages and the previous 1 has been deleted already?
Example: /this-is-it/ (deleted old original page) --301--> /yep-yep/ --301--> /how-nice/ (current page)
Cheers,
Adam -
Hi There,
If I understand the first question correctly, Yes you should point all of your links to your new URL/page. 301 the old page and if there are any backlinks ask the webmaster of that page to point to the new URL. There are a few websites that allow you to check backlinks. I like MOZ Open Site Explorer but i've also used Ahrefs.
I hope this helps! Let me know if you have anymore questions.
Be well,
Alex Brown
Del Mar Fans and Lighting
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
-
Amp version of website
Hello & thanks for reading its maybe the monday morning blues but i have two versions of a website - www.gardeners.scot and www.gardeners.scot/AMP/ the pages on the amp version have canonicals pointing to the "normal" website Should the links on "www.example.com/AMP/" point to the amp website or the normal website? what are your thougths?
Technical SEO | | livingphilosophy0 -
301 Redirects
Hi, We have migrated to a new domain name and I wrote my redirects as follows: Redirect 301 / http://www.healthpointe.net Redirect 301 /urgent_care_locations.shtml http://www.healthpointe.net/healthpointe-locations/ Redirect 301 /locations.shtml http://www.healthpointe.net/healthpointe-locations/ Redirect 301 /career_client_relations_rep.shtml http://www.healthpointe.net/careers/ My issue is that when I include the first redirect, which is to the main page of the website that the other redirects stop working. Any idea what the problem could be?
Technical SEO | | healthpointeseo0 -
What is the best way to deal with https?
Currently, the site I am working on is using HTTPS throughout the website. The non-HTTPS pages are redirected through a 301 redirect to the HTTPS- this happens for all pages. Is this the best strategy going forward? if not, what changes would you suggest?
Technical SEO | | adarsh880 -
Should I use canonicals? Best practice?
Hi there, I've been working on a pretty dated site. The product pages have tabs that separate the product information, e.g., a tab for specifications, a tab for system essentials, an overview tab that is actually just a copy of the product page. Each tab is actually a link to a completely separate page, so product/main-page is split into product/main-page/specs, product/main-page/resources, etc. Wondering if canonicals would be appropriate in this situation? The information isn't necessarily duplicate (except for the overview tabs) but with each tab as a separate page, I would imagine that's diluting the value of the main page? The information all belongs to the main page, shouldn't it be saying "I'm a version of the main page"?
Technical SEO | | anneoaks0 -
CNAME vs 301 redirect
Hi all, Recently I created a website for a new client and my next job is trying to get them higher in Google. I added them in OSE and noticed some strange backlinks. To my surprise the client has about 20 domain names. All automatically poiting to (showing) the same new mainsite now. www.maindomain.nl www.maindomain.be
Technical SEO | | Houdoe
www.maindomain.eu
www.maindomain.com
www.otherdomain.nl
www.otherdomain.com
... Some of these domains have backlinks too (but not so much). I suggested to 301 redirect them all to the main site. Just to avoid duplicate content. But now the webhoster comes into play: "It's a problem, client has only 1 hosting account, blablabla...". They told me they could CNAME the 20 domains to the main domain. Or A-record them to an IP address. This is too technical stuff for me. So my concrete questions are: Is it smart to do anything at all or am I just harming my client? The main site is ranking pretty well now. And some backlinks are from their copy sites (probably because everywhere the logo links to the full mainsite url). Does the CNAME or A-record solution has the same effect as a 301 redirect, from SEO perspective? Many thanks,
Hans0 -
Non WWW. versus WWW. versions, current best practice ?
Hi Im increasingly seeing sites not using the www., but understand from various sources including seomoz that best practice is to be on the www. with the non www version 301'd to the www version. Since alot of sites are clearly doing this the other way round now is that better practice or the former still best ? I appreciate that non www version gives you 3 more characters for url's but apart from that is there any benefit over the www. version ? Cheers Dan
Technical SEO | | Dan-Lawrence0 -
Multiple Sites Duplicate Content Best Practice
Hi there, I have one client (atlantawidgets.com) who has a main site. But also has duplicate sites with different urls targeting specific geo areas. I.e. (widgetmakersinmarietta.com) Would it be best to go ahead and create a static home page at these add'l sites and make the rest of the site be nonindexed? Or should I go in and allow more pages to be indexed and change the content? If so how many, 3, 5, 8? I don't have tons of time at this point. 3)If I change content within the duplicate sites, what % do I need to change. Does switching the order of the sentences of the content count? Or does it need to be 100%fresh? Thanks everyone.
Technical SEO | | greenhornet770 -
Wordpress 301 redirects
I use wordpress as CMS on a few sites and I noticed that word press automattically places 301s if I change a url etc. I believe it does it by having the following in the .htaccess file: BEGIN WordPress<ifmodule mod_rewrite.c="">RewriteEngine OnRewriteBase /RewriteRule ^index.php$ - [L]RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-fRewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-dRewriteRule . /index.php [L]</ifmodule> END WordPress Should I use this? I feel like it limits my control over the 301s.
Technical SEO | | mmaes0