What are the good and bad redirects?

[dougie]

I keep hearing that there are some redirects that Google doesn't mind and then there are some redirects that they would frown on.

Has anyone seen a definitive answer anywhere, on what redirects they like and don't like please?

[ThomasB]

It always depends on what you're aiming to do. For example when you switch to another domain, a header 301 is recommended by GoogleGuy.
[webmasterworld.com...]

Regarding other solutions I'd suggest you using the search fuction or google using site:webmasterworld.com redirect + specific need

[g1smd]

If a page is gone never to return then issue a 410 rather than a 404 error.

If a page has moved permanently then use a 301 redirect to alert Google to the new URL.

If you cannot alter the configuration of your server this way then use <meta> tags instead, like this:

If you use <meta name="robots" content="noindex,follow"> on every page of the old site, and then point all "internal" site navigation over to the equivalent page at the new site, then Google will drop the old site from the listings and reindex the new one in its place in about 4 to 8 weeks or so.

[dougie]

Many thanks for the helful responses on this. Just to clarify, I only have the one website, but it's had 2 url names in the past that have quite a few links, but it must be changed to the new url name.

I would prefer not to get involved with .htaccess.

Reading the referred post to Google guy, is there a way of doing this somehow in the meta tags for the whole url?

Dougie.

[Eljaybe]

Hmm. My redirect looks like it's a 302. This is what my page says:

<TITLE>302 Found</TITLE>

Is this bad if I want the old domain removed from Google? I don't know much about redirects, but should I have this changed to 301?

[Philosopher]

A 302 redirect is considered a temporary redirect, while a 301 is seen a a permanent redirect.

In your case, if you want to remove the old domain, then you would want a 301 redirect.

[Eljaybe]

Philosopher,
That shed some light on my Google problems. Thank you! I will make sure it's changed to a 301 redirect.