What is a 301 redirect?
Introduction
When a lot of business owners are thinking about investing in SEO, quite often they can quickly become confused by the amount of technical language that is often used.
That’s to say, a lot of business owners just want straightforward marketing advice, and not to be bombarded by marketing jargon.
And this is where our digital marketing agency can help you, that’s because we explain things in a crystal-clear way.
Within this article we are going to explain what 301 redirects are, and why some seo agencies use them.
What is a 301 redirect?
Sometimes a page will change its url. This basically means that when you enter a web address, sometimes this will have changed.
So for example, a subpage of our website may have the extension /link-building yet, we may change that page’s url to /white-hat-link-building instead.
This means the url will have changed, and what may happen is people may click on a link, and because the link has changed, they may be presented with what’s called a “404 page”.
A 404 page is essentially a broken link. So, in order for this not to happen, the marketing agency or website designer may implement what’s called a 301 redirect.
So a 301-redirect is just a way of saying that a page has moved to this url instead. It’s really as simple as that.
Who would implement a 301 redirect?
Well, we most certainly wouldn’t recommend just implementing 301 redirects for the sake of it.
Often 301-redirects are only used when say a new product range is launched for example. So, for example, you may retail luxury watches, and the new season means that a new product range has been released.
You know that people will be looking for a certain brand of watch, and also the name of that watch that the manufacturer has chosen.
So, you may want to place the manufacturers name, and the watches’ name in the url. The old model watch, which has now been replaced by the new model, you may place a 301-redirect on the old page.
This way when someone is looking for that brand of watch, they will no longer land on 404 page on your website. Instead they will be presented with the new watch.
404 pages
404 pages should not accumulate, your website design agency, or your seo company should implement 301 redirects.
What can happen is people may click a backlink that leads to your website, then because the page has been removed, they will be greeted by a 404 page instead. This may mean they leave your website, and then they may go straight to a competitor’s website.
Therefore, businesses normally implement 301 redirects, this may direct the visitor to a similar product.
Permanent redirects
Most seo companies agree that if redirects have to be used, that a 301-redirect should be used. The reason being is 301-redirects can be considered a permanent redirect.
This is important, as if you have backlinks pointing to that page, you do not want to lose the link juice through a broken link.
Backlinks
If you talk to any digital marketing agency, they will tell you that backlinks are an important part of implementing SEO. However, your business will only want good quality backlinks linking to your website.
Google Search Console
You can use Google Search Console to request which URL’s turn up with 404 errors.
This means that many agencies use Google Search Console to obtain a link report, this will help a website designer or seo business to fix any broken links.
How we can help
Whether your business requires help with its local seo or help with just one part of the seo process, such as building backlinks, we can help.
We have a team of expert marketing consultants, so we will be able to implement quality white hat seo for your company.
If you would like to find out more why not give us a ring?