codeman - 9:38 pm on Sep 24, 2007 (gmt 0)

I'm hearing some dramatically different experiences, ranging from "301 redirects are fine if done properly" to "don't change url's".

I am in the process of rebuilding a well-indexed ecommerce site from scratch. In the process, url structures will go from:

http://example.com/catid/120/subcatid/32/productid/230

to

http://example.com/product/widgets

There are about 200 products and categories that will change URL's. It will be quite impossible to only redirect a few at a time, as the site will be re-built on a completely different platform and database.

From reading all of the above posts, I have gathered the following strategies, maybe some of you can shed more light on this:

- put 301 redirects on a few key URL's, and allow the rest to go 404
- make sure that only one redirect occurs with each request

Is there anything else I can do to lessen the chances of prolonged indexing problems?

[edited by: tedster at 9:49 pm (utc) on Sep. 24, 2007]

[edited by: Robert_Charlton at 10:50 pm (utc) on Sep. 24, 2007]
[edit reason] switch to example.com - it can never be owned [/edit]