Feb 19, 2007
I have just completely revamped the NZ Coastguard boating education website tonight.When I say "revamped", I mean make substantial changes to the backend with virtually no changes to how it looks - if anyone notices anything new, I'll be surprised. Clients aren't going to notice the new nice URLs, the new CSS based layout, the fact that it's quite a bit lighter, it validates, it has client side validation on the contact form or any of those other good things.
I'll bet they notice the spam prevention mods in the forums though :)
301 redirects
Anyway, 301 redirects. As part of any major upgrade where you are renaming URLs, it's not a bad idea to run a spider through the site and make sure you haven't missed anything.I recommend Xenu for this.
I was surprised at what I found on the outbound links...
https://coastguard.e-member.cc/
redirected to: https://coastguard.e-member.cc/scripts/cgiip.exe/WService=coastguard/main.w
status code: 302 (object temporarily moved)
http://www.coastguard.org.nz/
redirected to: http://www.coastguard.org.nz/home/home_default.asp
status code: 302 (object temporarily moved)
http://www.metservice.com/
redirected to: http://www.metservice.com/default/index.php
status code: 302 (object temporarily moved)
http://www.arc.govt.nz/harbourmaster
redirected to: http://www.arc.govt.nz/harbourmaster/
status code: 302 (object temporarily moved)
http://www.yachtlifeline.com/
redirected to: http://www.yachtlifeline.com/index.php?section=1
status code: 302 (object temporarily moved)
http://www.arc.govt.nz/harbourmaster/
redirected to: http://www.arc.govt.nz/arc/auckland-region/harbourmaster/maritime-operations_home.cfm
status code: 302 (object temporarily moved)
http://www.nelpoly.ac.nz/
redirected to: http://www.nmit.ac.nz/
status code: 302 (object temporarily moved)
redirected to: https://coastguard.e-member.cc/scripts/cgiip.exe/WService=coastguard/main.w
status code: 302 (object temporarily moved)
http://www.coastguard.org.nz/
redirected to: http://www.coastguard.org.nz/home/home_default.asp
status code: 302 (object temporarily moved)
http://www.metservice.com/
redirected to: http://www.metservice.com/default/index.php
status code: 302 (object temporarily moved)
http://www.arc.govt.nz/harbourmaster
redirected to: http://www.arc.govt.nz/harbourmaster/
status code: 302 (object temporarily moved)
http://www.yachtlifeline.com/
redirected to: http://www.yachtlifeline.com/index.php?section=1
status code: 302 (object temporarily moved)
http://www.arc.govt.nz/harbourmaster/
redirected to: http://www.arc.govt.nz/arc/auckland-region/harbourmaster/maritime-operations_home.cfm
status code: 302 (object temporarily moved)
http://www.nelpoly.ac.nz/
redirected to: http://www.nmit.ac.nz/
status code: 302 (object temporarily moved)
Yes, they all use a 302 redirect.
This surprises me as many of these sites are large organisations in New Zealand.
I can almost understand using a 302 on a subpage of your site to catch any missed visitors - this is lazy, but it does the trick and no real harm done (using a 301 redirect would be better as the link juice would be transferred).
But what I don't get is sites where the domain root or homepage redirects to another page. There are several things wrong with this approach...
- Spammers use 302 redirects to trick search engines. Do you want to look like a spammer?
- It looks weird when your homepage url is not www.example.com - it just ain't right.
- Your www.example.com URL and the URL it redirects to will be competing for links. Neither address will rank as strongly
In simple terms, a 301 redirect is used when a URL changes permanently. If you use the 301 redirect, you are telling the search engines your intent to remove the old page from the index, and add the new page to the index. You also tell them to transfer any link juice from the old URL to the new.
Basically it's about keeping a tidy house. Your homepage should be your homepage - not index.php or home/home_default.asp
To all web developers out there - it's not that hard to do a 301 redirect when a page moves. Really.
Check out how your site is redirecting using my new redirect check tool.
4 Comments
- May 29, 2008
I wonder whether any link juice is lost through the use of a 301 redirect. Moreover, from an SEO perspective, it is widely believed subdomains are not treated as well as subfolders. However, what if you have to use a redirect to get set up a subfolder? In that case, what is better, the subfolder or the subdomain?
- Jun 20, 2008
Hello
Well Describe 302 and 302 stuff, Quite encouraging.
Could you describe this:
I found this status when I checked URL
":HTTP/1.1 302 Moved Permanently "
is that 302 or 302 redirection.
thank in advance.
Arun
- Jan 4, 2009
Some months ago i changed the domain of one of my website and used the 301 redirect but i loose all my rankings :( now i have another web of which i want to change the domain but i dont want to loose rankings this time.. can any one please guide me??
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I think 301 redirects are mostly used if you want to have a URL with a www, or vice versa. 302 is just used if your content is temporarily moved to another page.