Deleting out of stock items

[Rifat Rahman]

I want to delete out of stock products from my ecommerce website. I mean these items which are discontinued. It will cause any issue in google search engine rank? if I delete and redirect them to home page or use 410 Content Deleted Redirections.

[lucy24]

Redirecting a missing page to the home page is, as far as I know, NEVER a good idea.

410 is the correct response for a page that has been intentionally removed. But do take the time to create a 410 page that will be useful for humans.

[not2easy]

Hi Rifat Rahman and welcome to WebmasterWorld [webmasterworld.com]

Redirecting to your home page would concern me more, Google would see that as a soft 404.

If a page is no longer available you can redirect to a 'Permanently Out of Stock' page with links to similar products that are in stock. Yes, it could mean having a different Out of Stock page for each product category, but it is better than redirecting to an unrelated home page. Google expects people (and bots) to find the page they clicked on or a related page.

You could use a noindex tag on the discontinued products rather than delete the page, and maybe add an expiration tag so they will stop looking for that URL. The page of the discontinued product should let people know that the product is gone and will not be back in stock. Either way it would not surprise visitors and bots the way it would sending them to a page that does not explain why they can't find what they expected to find.

[tangor]

G would be far happier to see a 410 than a poor redirection to a soft 404.

[lucy24]

Yes, it could mean having a different Out of Stock page for each product category

With some rudimentary php, you could have your 410 page do this. (Keeping in mind that that your php will have access to the originally requested URL.) G### gets the response they want; humans get the information they need.