Forum Moderators: Robert Charlton & goodroi
How to do a proper redirect of it to the domain main index page?
I used to have a page long ago, that doesn't exist anymore: www.domain.com/blue-widgets/
It's still has a lot of backlinks poininting to it.
But it's now #1 in google instead of my www.domain.com page (which had always been #1)
How do I fix it?
Redirect 301 /oldpage.html http://www.example.com/newpage.htmlObviously replaces 'oldpage.html' with the page you are getting #1 in Google for.
Yes, but right now that old page is #1 for the keywords my index page should be.
So i cant just add content to it, i have to redirect traffic to main index.
You need to channel the traffic somewhere on your site, otherwise it is lost. You could set up a custom 404 error page to tell people that the page has moved, or you could set up a 301 to take vistors to the correct URL.
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>> Problem is, you have already deleted the page so you can not setup a redirect. <<
>> I would recommend doing a 404 redirect instead. <<
A 301 redirect is done in the server configuration. The server sends the redirect code to the browser without even looking in the filespace for anything else to serve. If a file is there it is not served. If there is no file there, it doesn't matter. The server has already sent the redirect code to the browser.
I am not sure what you mean by "404 redirect". A 404 page is an error page. It is NOT a redirect. You might have text on that page to tell a user to go elsewhere, but as far as the browser (or bot) is concered, as soon as the "404 Not Found" status is seen in the HTTP header, that is all it needs to know. Nothing here to be indexed.
[edited by: g1smd at 6:00 pm (utc) on Sep. 9, 2007]
That is frought with very many dangers.
To what are you referring, recommendations or the issue Jessica has?
House of cards, waiting to fall.
House of cards, waiting to fall.
Without wishing to go off topic please would you enlighten all of us just why you make such a statement?
My 404's have been like this for 13+ years and are so on some 180+ sites now and I have never, ever once experienced a single problem.
In fact I have seen many webmaster type of sites that actually encourage this practice therefore what do you feel is wrong with this implementation?
Over time, that can create a growing pile of urls that duplicate the "error page" content in Google's index. The duplicate content can collapse your rankings, but usually over time, only after quite a few such url errors build up in Google.
There is nothing inherently wrong, and potentially much that is useful, in serving a custom 404 error page. Just be sure that the status code returned in the server header is actually 404.
Over time, that can create a growing pile of urls that duplicate the "error page" content in Google's index.
Personally I have never seen this but I suppose it may be possible.
The duplicate content can collapse your rankings,
I did specify:
I have my index page as a custom 404 page, works a treat.
I do not need to explain any further!
I'll not bother trying to assist since it is plainly obvious I know nothing!
It only takes a minute to verify the http server headers, either with an online tool or with the Friefox http headers extension - and that can be a minute well spent. So for anyone reading who isn't 100% certain - I urge you to know for sure\ by a quick test of requesting a bad url from your site and seeing what server header is returned.
The problems I described have definitely hit several websites who then came to me for help. The problem can grow slowly and invisibly - but then, one day, it goes off like a time bomb. It can also be set off by intentional sabotage from a malicious competitor who spots the liability. Unfortunately, some do play the game this way.
For visitors, I think the index page makes most sense as the default page for a 404. Or a page that's basically the index page + a big red error message that the requested resource is no longer available.
On the other hand though, seriously...
If you want to keep your homepage in Google, the index as the 404 is a bit like playing Russian roulette just for the fun of it. If you did it right, that's great, as a user I've always liked that.
...have been like this for 13+ years...
With Google changing its stance on everything and anything every half a year, yeah.
That's the way to do SEO.
...
Whoa. Deja vu.
...
OK, back on topic.
How / why on Earth would someone delete a page on a site that's ranking #1 for a competitive term? No, I'm not kidding, I'm curious of the circumstances, as to why a page that's so valuable, a page that outranks the homepage, disappears in a flash -- and quite recently for it's still in the primary index I suppose -- and needs to have a redirect for it *can't* be replaced?
Just sounds funny.
why on Earth would someone delete a page on a site that's ranking #1 for a competitive term?
The most common reason I've seen with client sites has been a corporate redesign, coupled with in-house ignorance. Sometimes the marketing types are much more "image" focused than "direct response" types who measure everything. I've seen this happen often enough that now when I get a new client site, I routinely look for url assets with good backlinks that were discarded ouf of such ignorance.
Those of who work with SEO every day, and especially for more entrepreneurial businesses, can forget how completely alien our understanding seems to thpse outside our discipline. They may think of their website as just an ordering utility, rather than a marketing channel as well as a sales channel. This is a praticular liability when their offline presence is strong.
SEO Horror Story:
Not long ago I located such a discarded URL for a manufacturer and retailer, whose product you've probably heard of. The internal url for the product had many thousands of backlinks and was the second most trafficked url on their 400,000 url site. Mind you, this product was probably one of just two that the general public considers top-of-mind in their market. It had been a total home-run in their market.
When the company moved on to the next version of that product they just let the old url go 404 - because that's what their marketing department wanted to do. In fact, this has been standard operating procedure for them with all their discontinued product lines. As soon as the new product goes live, they 404 all website references to the old product and trash all that PR.
You might even say they have the luxury of PR to burn, except that they done it out of ignorance. This was an especially poor decision for this product because 1) they still offer support for the old version (in fact,there's still some inventory!) 2) they gave all the search traffic to their reseller partners, who were more than willing to inform the visitor about the change and offer an upsell.
When companies grow large, stuff happens.
In a corporate environment, no-one is likely to take ownership of such stuff, unless they have a good SEO that is very aware of the implications.
