Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Best way to change URL for already ranking pages
-
Hello.
I have a lot of pages that I'm optimising. The ones I'm focusing on right now is already ranking, but the URLs could be better (they don't include the keywords right now). However I'm worried that if I change the URLs they will drop in rankings or have to start over. I would of course set up 301 redirect, but is there more I need to do?
What is the best way to change URL for already ranking pages?
-
My case it not quite that an incorrect page is ranking. It is the right ones, but I want to change the URL for these pages to optimise that part also, since the keywords are not included in the URLs right now.
-
Hi
I don’t think this will affect your ranking, I am sure you are familiar with the process.No matter what, changing your domain name will affect your search engine rankings, largely because each search engine responds differently to such changes, but you can substantially limit the damage done. Google has taken the lead as usual in dealing with URLs that change and will quickly index the new file with virtually no interruption if you follow some fairly straightforward procedures. AllTheWeb quickly followed suit. Unfortunately, the procedures described below do not work in the same way on the other major search engines.
The critical element in successful url redirecting or domain forwarding is taking the time to make sure that ALL links to your old page from directories and other websites are updated. That step must be done. Unfortunately, it is the most difficult step, as many links may be on sites that are neglected or even abandoned.
Google has published guidelines on changing your URLs. See, Google Information for Webmasters : "Once your new site is live, you may wish to place a permanent redirect (using a '301' code in HTTP headers) on your old site to inform visitors and search engines that your site has moved."
hope this helps ..:) -
Hi GoMentor,
Rand did a whiteboard friday on this topic: https://moz.com/blog/wrong-page-ranks-for-keywords-whiteboard-friday
Hope it helps,
Tom
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 effective are 301 redirects in passing page rank?
I have a blog which is ranking well for certain terms, and would like to repurpose it to better explain these terms it is ranking for, including updating the url to the new term the blog will be about. The plan being to 301 redirect the old url to new. In the past, I've done this with other pages, and have actually lost much of the rankings that I had earned on the original URL. What is your take on this? Maybe repurpose blog, but maintain original URL just to be on the safe side? Thanks
Technical SEO | | CitimarineMoz0 -
What's the best way to handle product filter URLs?
I've been researching and can't find a clear cut answer. Imagine you have a product category page e.g. domain/jeans You've a lot of options as to how to filter the results domain/jeans?=ladies,skinny,pink,10 or domain/jeans/ladies-skinny-pink-10 or domain/jeans/ladies/skinny?=pink,10 And in this how do you handle titles, breadcrumbs etc. Is the a way you prefer to handle filters and why do you do it that way? I'm trying to make my mind up as some very big names handle this differently e.g. http://www.next.co.uk/shop/gender-women-category-jeans/colour-pink-fit-skinny-size-10r VS https://www.matalan.co.uk/womens/shop-by-category/jeans?utf8=✓&[facet_filter][meta.tertiary_category][Skinny]=on&[facet_filter][variants.meta.size][Size+10]=on&[facet_filter][meta.master_colour][Midwash]=on&[facet_filter][min_current_price][gte]=6.0&[facet_filter][min_current_price][lte]=18.0&per=36&sort=
Technical SEO | | RodneyRiley0 -
How to handle dynamic product url that changes regularly
Hey Moz, It's actually my first post - although I look at the Q&As on a daily basis! I was hoping to get your opinions on how to handle dynamic product url that can change regularly. Before we start, our product page urls get populated by the product titles. So the situation is this. Let’s say we have a product url: /product/12345-abcde-fghj/ Then the client decides to change the title a week later, so the url changes with it to): /listing/12345-klm-qjk Another week later, the agent changes to: /listing/12345-jkhfk-jhf-kjdhfkjdhf So to note, the product ID will always remain the same. Naturally, 301 redirecting every time would cause a bit of page authority to be lost every time 301ed. Also potentially creating new a few hundreds of 301 redirect daily sounds totally mental. (I have been informed by the dev we expect a few hundreds to change url daily) Although I understand there’s no limit on how many 301s you can have on a single domain, this would look completely unnatural - really not ideal. So the potential solution we thought was: we’ll keep the original url, and make sure that is the only url that will get indexed**/product/12345-abcde-fghj/**and put canonical tag on any of the new urls, directing to the original url. The problem we will have then is that the most current url may not exactly match the description of the product -wouldn’t be ideal for ux. Has anyone had dealing with issues like this in the past? Would love to get your input! Many Thanks
Technical SEO | | MH-UK0 -
Best & easiest way to 301 redirect on IIS
Hi all, What is the best and easiest way to 301 redirect URLs on IIS server? I got access to the FTP and WordPress back office, but no access to the server admin. Is there an easy way to create 301 redirect without having to always annoy the tech in charge of the server? Thanks!
Technical SEO | | 2MSens0 -
Best way to noindex long dynamic urls?
I just got a Mozcrawl back and see lots of errors for overly dynamic urls. The site is a villa rental site that gives users the ability to search by bedroom, amenities, price, etc, so I'm wondering what the best way to keep these types of dynamically generated pages with urls like /property-search-page/?location=any&status=any&type=any&bedrooms=9&bathrooms=any&min-price=any&max-price=any from indexing. Any assistance will be greatly appreciated : )
Technical SEO | | wcbuckner0 -
Blog Ranking NOT home page main website?!
Hi, Our Blog (http://blog.thailand-investigation.com) is ranking for some of our major keywords but not our home page (http://www.thailand-investigation.com)!? Our blog is WordPress and our main website is HTML. It seems like the search engines consider that they are 2 separate websites!? When I check the incoming links to our website, I get also the blog links!!!??? Is it normal? Do I have to build a relation of some kind or write some code saying that it is our Blog... I don't know! I'm not a SEO specialist or even a webmaster. I'm a small business owner and take care on my website. I created by myself but never learned! So, please help! Thanks
Technical SEO | | MichelMauquoi0 -
Landing Page URL Structure
We are finally setting up landing pages to support our PPC campaigns. There has been some debate internally about the URL structure. Originally we were planning on URL's like: domain.com /california /florida /ny I would prefer to have the URL's for each state inside a "state" folder like: domain.com /state /california /florida /ny I like having the folders and pages for each state under a parent folder to keep the root folder as clean as possible. Having a folder or file for each state in the root will be very messy. Before you scream URL rewriting :-). Our current site is still running under Classic ASP which doesn't support URL rewriting. We have tried to use HeliconTech's ISAPI rewrite module for IIS but had to remove it because of too many configuration issues. Next year when our coding to MVC is complete we will use URL rewriting. So the question for now: Is there any advantage or disadvantage to one URL structure over the other?
Technical SEO | | briankb0 -
What is the best URL designed for a product page?
Should a product page URL include the category name and subcategory name in it? Most ecommerce platforms it seems are designed to do have the category and sub-category names included in the URL followed by the product name. If that is the case and the same product is listed in more then 1 category and sub-category then will that product have 2 unique urls and as a result be treated as 2 different product pages by google? And then since it is the same product in two places on the site won't google treat those 2 pages as having duplicate content? SO is it best to not have the category and sub-category names in the URL of a product page? And lastly, is there a preferred character limit for a URL to be less than in size? Thanks!
Technical SEO | | gallreddy0