What can I put on a 404 page?
-
When it comes to SEO what can I put on a 404 page? I want to add content that actually makes the page useful so visitors will more likely stay on the website. Most pages just have a big image of 404 and a couple sentences saying what happened. I am wondering if Google would like if there was blog suggestions or navigational functions?
-
However, once you have a good 404 page, it is really worthwhile to use the Moz tools to find and correct any 404 errors you have. Every redirected URL has the chance to enhance your domain authority.
-
Nope. You're in no way required or expected to tell someone why they've hit a 404. As long as you have a page with content, you're doing OK. Any effort beyond that will only benefit you.
-
Could there be any negative impact from Google? Are they looking for that 404 error information?
-
Your 404 page is a great way to serve visitors links to the pages that would be most relevant in general to them. It's also a great opportunity to show your brand and personality - and yes, as you mention - blog articles are a great next step for these pages. However, make sure that it makes sense for them to be there. If a visitor is within your blog domain / subdomain, then go for it. If they're not, consider a combination of things.
And yes, you can have more than one 404 page. Whether having multiple versions makes sense is up to you.
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
-
How many links can you have on sitemap.html
we have a lot of pages that we want to create crawlable paths to. How many links are able to be crawled on 1 page for sitemap.html
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | imjonny0 -
Unlisted (hidden) pages
I just had a client say they were advised by a friend to use 'a bunch of unlisted (hidden) pages'. Isn't this seriously black hat?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | muzzmoz0 -
Redirecting 86'd Brand Product Category Page
What would be the approach if my website is no longer selling products for a brand that is driving top organic traffic? Where should I redirect the traffic on the page? I'm trying to decide between the homepage or another similar brand product page.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | JMSCC0 -
How can I 100% safe get some of my keywords ranking on second & third page?
Hi, I want to know how can I rank some of my keywords which are in the second and third page on google on page one 100% save, so it will pass all penguin, pandas etc as quick as possible? Kind Regards
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | rodica70 -
I'm Getting Attacked, What Can I Do?
I recently noticed a jump in my Crawl Errors in Google Webmaster Tools. Upon further investigation I found hundreds of the most spammy web pages I've ever seen pointing to my domain (although all going to 404 errors): http://blurchelsanog1980.blog.com/ http://lenitsky.wordpress.com/ These are all created within the last week. A. What the hell is going on? B. Should I be very concerned? (because they are 404 errors) C. What should my next steps be? Any help would be greatly appreciated.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | CleanEdisonInc0 -
Pages linked with Spam been 301 redirected to 404\. Is it ok
Pl suggest, some pages having some spam links pointed to those pages are been redirected to 404 error page (through 301 redirect) - as removing them manually was not possible due to part of core component of cms and many other coding issue, the only way as advised by developer was making 301 redirect to 404 page. Does by redirecting these pages to 404 page using 301 redirect, will nullify all negative or spam links pointing to them and eventually will remove the resulting spam impact on the site too. Many Thanks
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | Modi0 -
Page 1 Ranking - Disappeared!
Hi All We launched our client's website http://rollerbannerscheap.co.uk in January this year. We have been building links making sure we are not over optmising anchor text and only following ethical SEO tactics. Our client's site eventually hit page 1 for it's main key word 'Roller Banner' 1 week ago, the site received impressions/clicks from the SERPS and has started to gain traffic from that particular keyword. I have checked today, and I cannot our client's website URL within the first 10 pages of Google, nevermind on page 1. Our client is currently undercutting competitiors on price, which we stated (the price) in the meta tag. Is it possible other SEOs could de-rank our website? If not, what would be a likely explaination for this occurance? Would just like to add, I recently build a link with anchor text 'Roller Banner Website, but one of my older links uses anchor text 'Roller Banners Cheap Website' - They're not exact match, but could this affect our ranking? Awaiting help Lewis
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | SO_UK0 -
Would the same template landing page (placed on 50+ targeted domains) help or hurt my ranking?
Scenario: Company ABC has 50 related domains that are being forwarding to the main company URL. Q1: Would there be SEO value by creating a template landing page for each domain that includes product info, photos and keyword links to the main URL? Q2: If all 50+ landing pages were the same, would that penalize the main site due to duplicate content?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | brianmeert0