[thelist] another google question

[Tony Grimes]

On 2/6/03 6:33 PM, "Erik Mattheis" <gozz at gozz.com> wrote:

> So if a page with a good ranking changes to a doc with just a meta
> refresh and JS redirect to the new location, the ranking may change? Is
> this why you're saying "not a good idea"?
>


Hi Erik,

Most search engines (including Google) don't like redirects because spammers
sometimes use them to get more than one listing in their indexes. Anything
with a refresh rate of less than 30 seconds will probably get flagged and
maybe penalized.

Since link relevance and link popularity centre around the URL (not the
content), moving a page will almost always impact your ranking. Some people
use redirects at the server level, which has worked for me in the past, but
I don't do it anymore because it doesn't give people any incentive to change
their links.

If you just use a redirect, you'll be splitting your PageRank (in the case
of Google) between the old URL and the new one (once people start linking to
it). If it's an important page, you'll want everyone linking to one URL.

This is the way I would deal with the situation:

1. Set up a page at the old URL saying something like "This page has moved
to [new URL here]. Please update your links and bookmarks." Don't put a
refresh on the page; just let the user click through. Make sure the link is
natural (i.e. no JavaScript) and that it's the only one on the page. With
this method, a lot of your PageRank will be passed to the new URL. It will
also tell people to link to the new page. You can also serve the page at the
server level if you don't want an extra page hanging around your directory;
just make sure there's no refresh.

2. Contact the directories about changing the URL for your listing. Most
have a "change of listing" form or something similar. Yahoo is pretty good
about changing URLs. DMOZ might take awhile. I haven't tried this with
LookSmart since they went PPC.

3. If you're really serious about keeping your PageRank, compile a list of
sites that are linking to you (i.e. On Google, type
"link:http://oldurl.com/oldpage.html"). Email each of these webmasters and
ask them to change their link to the new page. If your content is high
quality, most will do it. This could be a lot of work, so you might want to
confirm that your ranking has decreased first; with non-competitive
keywords, you may not have to bother.

Hope this helps and good luck,

.tony