301 from old site showing as #1 in Google now

[specimen65]

I had an old site and for various reasons built a new site on a new domian this past summer. I put in 301 redirects in my htaccess file on my old site, to redirect all the single page URLs to URLs on my new site. I implemented these rediects in September.

Things were working good with this as my new site post URLS were getting the same positioning in Google for my old ones. This only took a few weeks.

But...today, when I look at my main keyword string for my top performing post (to check its positioning), Google is now showing me the old site in #1 place. The redirects work however, when I click the link for the old site's post in Google's serps, I am redirected to the corresponding post my new site.

My only concern is that it should be my new site in that spot in the serps and not the old one, especially after Google was showing the new one for months now.

Could this be the result of their data centers updating?

Note: I kept my htaccess as simple as possible for this. The htaccess file located at the root of my old site is:

Options +FollowSymLinks
RewriteEngine on

Redirect 301 /retiredpage.html http://www.newdomain.com/newpage.html

RedirectMatch 301 ^(.*)$ http://www.newdomain.com

[netmeg]

If the redirect works, then I wouldn't worry about it too much. Sounds like another anomaly. Give it a few days or a week. As long as the redirect works, it shouldn't be a problem.

[specimen65]

netmeg: This is something that's apparently started happening in the last yr or so when Google changed the way it handles 301s.

[unfounded conspiracy theory disclaimer] These "phantom 301 URLs" could have to do with G experimenting which version, new or old, converts better.

[aakk9999]

Welcome to WebmasterWorld, specimen65!

These "phantom 301 URLs" could have to do with G experimenting which version, new or old, converts better.

The only difference would be the green domain name/url. Everything else would be taken from the target site as 301 does not pass any information on title, meta description or page content.

Regarding what you are seeing in SERPs, you are not the only one.

I have observed the following which I posted on 5th of December in the Monthly SERP Changes - December 2014 [webmasterworld.com], but which I think is worth repeating in this thread:

What I am seeing is SERPs flooded with old URLs that are set up to redirect permanently (have been redirected for 2 years and are still redirecting).

They are now appearing in SERPs as its own entries, taking the title and meta from the target page. The examples I am seeing are not "shorter URLs", in fact the ones set up to redirect are longer ones, but are still shown in SERPs.

This is happening expecially for cross-domain redirects (for example if a domain has moved or if a section of URLs on one domain that was previously duplicated on another domain was redirected to that other domain).

[lucy24]

<tangent>

RedirectMatch 301 ^(.*)$ http://www.example.com

Why isn't it either

RedirectMatch 301 ^(.*)$ http://www.example.com/$1

or

RedirectMatch 301 .? http://www.example.com

? No point to capturing if you're not going to reuse.
</tangent>

Sure, blame it on data centers. It's a useful catch-all for Inexplicable Google Behavior.

[rish3]

It's irritating to me that Google does this. The concept of a 301 is very simple..."Moved Permanently". Why Google thinks they need to override a decision made by a site owner is a mystery to me.

[Planet13]

Just more anecdotal stuff...

When I do a site:old_site_with_lots_of_redirected_paged.com search in google, I still see lots of old, redirected pages in the results. (About HALF of the site's pages were redirected to a new site back in 2009!)

So I would not worry TOO MUCH about what you are experiencing, specimen65.

_{And I have no doubt that data centers ARE responsible for my recent weight gain. They seem to do that each year during the holiday season...}

[edited by: Robert_Charlton at 6:58 pm (utc) on Dec 13, 2014]
[edit reason] fixed unintended smiley display [/edit]

[TheMadScientist]

In a not-too-old hangout, JohnMu stated Google will at times show the origination URL rather than the destination URL a 301 is pointed at -- IDK why Google decided to throw out protocol and standards, but in some circumstances it does, so I would worry about more important things than which URL is showing if the redirect is in place and working correctly.

[specimen65]

Thanks for the replies everyone! I wonder that this sort of thing could create issues for some, eg, if one company bought someone out and their domain isn't showing in the results, but the old company which doesn't exist anymore. Could potentially hurt their equity?


Lucy, what would the difference be between

RedirectMatch 301 ^(.*)$ http://www.example.com

and

RedirectMatch 301 ^(.*)$ http://www.example.com/$1

[TheMadScientist]

I'm not Lucy24, but the first example sends people to the homepage of example.com while the second example sends people to the example.com page they were visiting on old-site.com.

Basically, if someone visits old-site.com/a-page.ext the first code will send them to example.com's home page where they will have to find a link to /a-page.ext to visit what they were wanting to find, but the second code will send them directly to example.com/a-page.ext

[specimen65]

Oh, I wonder if I did make the right choice in going with the first example?

When I built the new site (on new domain) I got rid of the old site's database, but but all the old URLs into my htaccess. So, there is nothing at my old site, just a blank html page and the htaccess with the redirects.

[aakk9999]

Oh, I wonder if I did make the right choice in going with the first example?

No.

If the path of the URL between the old and the new site is the same, then I suggest that you add $1 to that redirect. It is not good to redirect everything to the home page.

Regarding not having anything on the old site, you do not have to. You do not have to have neither the blank html page. If everything redirects, the blank html page (or any other page for that matter) will never be returned.

[TheMadScientist]

What AAKK9999 said, definitely.

[lucy24]

I'm not Lucy24, but

... but I've stolen a fair amount of code from you over the years, so why not cut out the middleman :)

[TheMadScientist]

Glad someone found something useful in some of what I post and I would guess most of us have gotten at least a line or two from around here somewhere over the years. I know I have ;)

[specimen65]

Funny thing - today its showing the new domain for all my top keywords.

Thanks everyone!