Should I delete old page after a renamed version is live?

[michaelediting]

I recently revamped a site, and I changed the name of one page (same content but rearranged some), which means all the old pages are simply redesigned but one is there now with a new name: from www.example.com/old page.html to www.example.com/new page.html The new page was recently added to the Google directory but the old one still comes up for lots of searches and is in the site:example.com search results.

I can't put a forward on the old page because of provider limitations, and so I deleted all content from the old page and added a "click here for new page" message (with the url).

Will my site be penalized for any reason because of this move (no dup content now, except in cached pages)? Also, should I go ahead and remove the old page from the site:mysite.com search page (would rather not because the new page is not yet coming up for the same search terms, but then, maybe it isn't coming up because the old page is still there)?

[edited by: tedster at 9:42 pm (utc) on Aug. 12, 2009]
[edit reason] switch to example.com - it can never be owned [/edit]

[johnnie]

This is not smart, from both the user perspective and from the SE's perspective. They will both be presented with a pointless 404, and from an SEO standpoint you will lose all inbound linkjuice to that page.

If you can't do a server-side forward (have you tried using the php header directive instead of 'hardwiring' into .htaccess?), at least do a client-side forward (meta refresh, javascript) for your users.

As for the SEO, are you sure you can't work out a PHP redirect or something?

[johnnie]

Come to think of it, has anybody tried using the canonical tag for this? i.e. leaving both pages up, but using a canonical tag to point the linkjuice to the other version?

[michaelediting]

The link juice should not be an issue because this page (and the new page) are part of the larger site, all out links on a single associated page and all incoming to the main page (not one of these). What I will be missing if I turn down the old page are natural listing hits (7 year old site, and thus so was the old page). The htaccess or any server side move is out of the question (tried and tried before finding out it was impossible, the tech support truly awful and so they only discovered it as I asked the question). I have always thought the meta-refresh worse in G's eyes than most anything and so did not use it, but the canonical tag might be just the ticket. Not exactly a forward, which hopefully the manual forward will take care of, but maybe keep the G folks (via the appropriate bot) satisfied. Will have to investigate.

[CainIV]

If you cannot use a 301 redirect on the old page, I would definitely try the canonical link tag, but would change up all links (external and internal) to point to the new page where possible.

[youfoundjake]

What about using a meta refresh to the new page with a time of 0? Google will treat that like a 301.

[tedster]

Google will sometimes treat a zero meta-refresh as a 301 - but there's no guarantee on that one. It was an old trick used in certain markets, and there's no guarantee it won't throw a spam flag. JohnMu has discussed the zero meta-refresh a good bit on the Google Webmaster Help forum, and he always recommends a true redirect whenever possible.