301-redirect
-
Hi
My website is fairly new and i wasnt aware of the difference btw 'website.com' and 'www.website.com' when i started up. It doesnt matter which one i use as long as i am consistent right ?
Most of my ingoing links are to mainpage on 'website.com'. I have som ingoing links to 'www.website.com' but also some to 'www.website.com/brandname'. is it enough to 301-redir 'www.website.com' to 'website.com' or does it need to be done on several levels ?
I need to have someone do the redirect for me - how can i check its working when its done ?
Dan Lærum
-
Use relative paths, and you lose all link juice when someone scrapes your content and reposts it.
-
On Google WMT, there's an option for preferred domain setting. You can use this. But I do agree with Ryan that it'll solve the issue only for Google not for other search engines.
-
There are other SE's out there then google and you don't want to loose that traffic, so as Ryan stated you can't fix it in GWT.
-
To be clear, you would use Google IN ADDITION TO the other changes, not instead of.
Google WMT will alter how your URL appears on their search pages. If you don't address the issue on your site you will still have the same negative effects.
-
2 things you should keep in mind about with and without www:
- how many pages does google have indexed with and without
- how many links do you have that points towards www vs non-www.. this one is important since not all of your PR will get passed on after a 301. Most but bot all of it
hope it helped
-
Didnt know i could do through google webmaster, thanks.
-
Does it really matter which direction i redirect ? Is it most common to redir to -->www. ?
-
Yes...it should be redirected to www. through .hactess or it can be done through Google webmaster tools.
-
Right back at you Ryan, good point
-
excellent point Rene
This works well for links you create but not for any UGC
-
Ryan is clearly less lazy then me just a short remark to the internal linking:
use relative paths and you will never have to worry about it.
meaning use: /images/someImg.jpg instead of www.yourdomain.com/images/someImg.jpg
-
Your host can create one entry to redirect all non-www traffic to it's www equivalent.
It's easy to confirm the change was made properly. Simply go to any page on your site and you should see it in the "www" form. Then, go to your address bar and remove the "www." portion of the URL, hit enter, then the "www." portion should be re-added and you should be on the same page.
Also, use your SEOmoz toolbar Analyze Page > Page Attributes and check the Status Code section at the bottom. When you try to access a "www." page the status code should show as 200. When you try to access a non-www page the status code should show a 301 redirect to the www page.
Lastly, check every internal link of your site to ensure you are using the www version, along with any signatures and company pages you may have on facebook or other locations.
-
short answer: yes
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
-
Should I set 301 Redirects or keep old permalinks?
I just built a new site for a client and the new site has pretty links like domain.com/about-us. The old site has been around for a VERY long time and had links like domain.com/aboutus. I want to do 301 redirects because from my understanding, it minimizes the negative SEO impact. But the client wants to keep the permalinks without the hyphens to match the old links. What is the best route, considering SEO? BTW, the site is still on the same domain. Thanks in advance for your help! Neik
Technical SEO | | glassh0use0 -
Alternatives 301? Issues redirection of index.html page with Adobe Business Catalyst
Hi Moz community, As for now we have two different versions of a client's homepage that’s dividing our traffic. One of the urls is the index.html version of the other url. We are using Adobe Business Catalyst for one of our clients and they told us they can’t 301 redirect. Adobe Business Catalyst does 301 redirects, but not to itself like an .htaccess rewrite. Doing a 301 redirect using BC from index.html to / creates an infinite loop and break the page. Are there alternatives to a 301 or any suggestions how to solve this? Thanks for all your answers and thoughts in advance,
Technical SEO | | Anna_Hoesl
Anna0 -
URL structure change for pages without traffic: 301 redirect or not ?
Hi, I am just starting with MOZ PRO and trying to handle the high priority issues, starting with pages with 4XX Client Error. I am wondering what we should do with pages with no traffic and no external links. For instance: So time ago we change the URL structure of our blog to a flatter one, and so eg we moved a page: from: domain-name/dla-rodzicow/poradniki/poradniki-po-markach/vilac/vilac-zabawki-z-dusza to: domain-name/dla-rodzicow/poradniki/marka-vilac/vilac-zabawki-z-dusza/ Still not very flat but this is not the point. MOZ PRO shows we are having internal links to the old url. According to MOZ PRO, we don't have external links. According to Analytics we have no traffic on the old page. So now we changed the internal link, and I am wondering whether we should 301 redirect the old page to the new one, or whether a sitemap update is enough for this kind of pages ? Thanks in advance for your help.
Technical SEO | | isabelledylag0 -
Why are my 301 redirects and duplicate pages (with canonicals) still showing up as duplicates in Webmaster Tools?
My guess is that in time Google will realize that my duplicate content is not actually duplicate content, but in the meantime I'd like to get your guys feedback. The reporting in Webmaster Tools looks something like this. Duplicates /url1.html /url2.html /url3.html /category/product/url.html /category2/product/url.html url3.html is the true canonical page in the list above._ url1.html,_ and url2.html are old URLs that 301 to url3.html. So, it seems my bases are covered there. _/category/product/url.html _and _/category2/product/url.html _ do not redirect. They are the same page as url3.html. Each of the category URLs has a canonical URL of url3.html in the header. So, it seems my bases are covered there as well. Can I expect Google to pick up on this? Why wouldn't it understand this already?
Technical SEO | | bearpaw0 -
Code for redirect
What is the code to redirect www.xyz.com/abc where abc is a folder to www.xyz.com/abc.html
Technical SEO | | seoug_20050 -
New project old domain should I 301 redirect while new sites built
I just took on a larger scale e-commerce project and came across a tricky road block that I need some advise on. Ok I'm building the site from scratch and due to it's complexity it may take 3-4 months before I have it designed and coded. The client has a domain name that has some decent page/domain authority and I would hate to loose that while the sites being built. Currently I have nothing to display as his previous site got hacked and it was deleted by the previous web admin. Being that a blog has already been approved as part of the project I already installed wordpress to keep the domain fresh however here's the issue, I installed wordpress in a folder called blog and debating if I should 301 redirect or 302 redirect his index here? The blog will always reside in the blog folder even after launch. Will performing a 301 redirect pull all the juice away from my index page? I'm assuming yes. IF so what would occur once the project is complete and I make the ecommerce site live in the index page? Thanks in Advance! Mike
Technical SEO | | MikeDelaCruz770 -
Minisites - 301 Redirect or Links to Main site
Not sure whether this is considered black hat or not but I know it is done and I would like to know which is the most effectrive method. If you were to acquire multiple sites in the same niche to your main site (either by buying existing sites or perhaps registering expired domains) which already had strong aged backlinks, is it better to either: a) 301 the new domain to the main site (or a subpage perhaps) b) create 'minisites' on the new domains (trying to mirror the URL structure of the previous incarnation if possible to scoop up and remaining inbound backlink juice, on seperate IPs to the main site as well) and then place several links to the main site & subpages. Would the decay of link juice through 301's mean you lose benefit that way or is it the same as a normal link? Would the 301 method mean any IBL's into URL's other than the homepage be lost? The homepage of the minisite will likely have 4 or 5 internal links so will this dilure the effect of the links to the main site? Thanks in advance!
Technical SEO | | OzDave0 -
301 Redirect NOT Working as Expected - HELP!
Hi! I just launched our newly coded site and just realized the installed 301 is NOT working. The URL string is the same EXCEPT for the removal of /shop/. Here is the code in .htaccess: ############################################ enable rewrites Options +FollowSymLinks RewriteEngine on #RedirectMatch 301 ^/shop?/$ http://hiphound.com/ RedirectMatch 301 ^/shop?/$ http://hiphound.com ########################################### When I go to Google and click on an old link I get a 404. No bueno!! Here is an example: http://hiphound.com/shop/rubit-dog-tag-clip I thought (and was told) that the installed 301 would send this page to: http://hiphound.com/rubit-dog-tag-clip It's not. Please HELP!! 🙂 What am I doing wrong??? Lynn
Technical SEO | | hiphound0