Google redirects / 301 redirects

The "google redirects" tool helps automate the setup of redirects.  It is important that you set these up prior to going live with your website.

Before we get started, let's make sure we understand what redirects are and why they are used.
 

What are they?

Redirects are a technique for making a web page available under more than one URL (web) address. When a web browser attempts to open a URL that has been redirected, a page with a different URL is opened.

Similarly, domain redirection or domain forwarding is when all pages in a URL domain are redirected to a different domain.

URL redirection can be used for:

• URL shortening,
• to prevent broken links when web pages are moved,
• to allow multiple domain names belonging to the same owner to refer to a single web site

 

301 redirect vs 302 redirect

A 301 redirect means that the page has moved to a new location, permanently.  A 302 redirect means that the move is temporary.   In most cases we will be using 301 redirects.
 

Why are redirects important?

Redirects are especially important to prevent broken links when web pages are moved.
If you do not apply redirects to a page when you change the address:

When users click on a link to the original link they will be served a 404 page not found error message. This is not a good experience for the user.
 

These links might appear in

1. Google search results

2. Links from forums, blogs and other websites

3. Emails

4. Peoples bookmarks

5. Social media, Facebook, Pinterest

The "google redirects" tool helps automate the setup of redirects when your site first goes live.

If you had an old site before switching to your new Zeald site, then it is good practice to map all the URLs of the old site to the appropriate pages on your new site.  We recommend you do this before your Zeald site is live and that way when you do go live, the site will have all the old links redirecting already.

To assist with this, the google redirects page will search google for pages it knows of on your old site, and present them to you so you can choose which page on the new site corresponds.

1. You will first be asked to enter the primary url by which your old website was known so go to the website manager to the Content tab, then Redirects, then Google Redirects:
   
   
    
2. This will then show a list of all the pages that were known to google on this old site.  For each one you can choose the page on your new site that corresponds:
   
   
3. In the Map to, you select the page that you want to map the direct to.
   
   Click OK when finished.
   
   
4. Make as many redirects as you need to on the redirects page.
5. Click Save on the bottom of the page once you've set all the redirects.