301's, Mixed-Case URLs, and Site Migration Disaster
-
Hello Moz Community,
After placing trust in a developer to build & migrate our site, the site launched 9 weeks ago and has been one disaster after another. Sadly, after 16 months of development, we are building again, this time we are leveled-up and doing it in-house with our people.
I have 1 topic I need advice on, and that is 301s. Here's the deal. The newbie developer used a mixed-case version for our URL structure. So what should have been /example-url became /Example-Url on all URLs. Awesome right? It was a duplicate content nightmare upon launch (among other things).
We are re-building now. My question is this, do we bite the bullet for all URLs and 301 them to a proper lower-case URL structure? We've already lost a lot of link equity from 301ing the site the first time around. We were a PR 4 for the last 5 years on our homepage, now we are a PR 3. That is a substantial loss. For our primary keywords, we were on the first page for the big ones, for the last decade. Now, we are just barely cleaving to the second page, and many are 3rd page. I am afraid if we 301 all the URLs again, a 15% reduction in link equity per page is really going to hurt us, again. However, keeping the mixed-case URL structure is also a whammy. Building a brand new site, again, it seems like we should do it correctly and right all the previous wrongs. But on the other hand, another PR demotion and we'll be in line at the soup kitchen.
What would you do?
-
This post is deleted! -
Going through an entire site update and switching all of your URLs is always tough, but to launch with mixed case hits you in the stomach, doesn't it! Instead of going through yet another site update, I'd start with medicating the new site and getting it back in working condition. There are 2 things you can do with your mixed case URLs at this point:
- 301 redirect the upper case to the lower case and add rel=canonical's to all of your pages for the URL you prefer.
- If it's easier to stick on the rel=canonical now, as you work through the 301s, then do that first. The rel=canonical will help protect you against multiple mixed case issues that you may of not found quite yet. It also helps protect your content.
I'd be wary of doing an all new site re-haul again, because you may be down for longer that you want to be.
Other things to do:
- Monitor Google Webmaster like your life depends on it - your sites life definitely needs it right now!
- Look for other opportunities where there are quick fixes in helping to improve the site - look at the site errors in Moz and in Google Webmaster. If you're seeing dupe issues (beyond what you already know about) or missing meta, fix those.
- Instead of focusing on PR, I'd look at your domain authority, homepage authority, MozRank, and MozTrust. You need to establish a base so that you can monitor the trend line - while you're at it, go ahead and keep record of your competitors too.
- Look at your top links in OSE and make sure that any that are pointing at older URLs are pointing at the new URLs - it's better that your top links go to the right place, rather than being 301'd.
-
Hi Kristin,
Sounds like a bit of a nightmare. Personally, I would go ahead and set the URLs to lowercase in the new design. I would also take a closer look at what's going on with your site's pages. I've moved lots of sites with changing URLs and I typically don't see that kind of dramatic rankings drop if the optimization is maintained and the pages are properly redirected. So, there may be something else going on.
As for the switch back, did you create redirects from the old lowercase URLs to the new capitalized URLs? If so, be sure to removed those 301's when you launch the new site. You can also setup new 301s from the capitalized URLs to the lowercase versions using the .htaccess file (if your using an apache server). The following link may help you in setting up the redirects:
Also, I wouldn't worry about the Pagerank. It's not reliable. Better to pay attention to your rankings, traffic, and links.
Kurt Steinbrueck
OurChurch.Com -
I would recommend trying to get things right and going to the lower case format. As you mention it will save you headaches further down the line by keeping to a simple convention.
You can reduce the impact of the redirects by amending your previous ones to point to the new directories, this will prevent a redirect chain and you will lose less. You should then additionally redirect the new URLs of course.
Dependant on the types of inbound links your site has (and volume) it may also be worth a little outreach to other sites asking them to amend to the new final destination format.
Good luck however i know what a pain it is, I've done many site migrations myself.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
A client rebranded a few years ago and doesn't want to be associated with it's old brand name. He wishes not to appear when the old brand is searched in Google, is there something we can do?
The problem is there was redirection between the old branded site and the new one, and now when you type in the name of the old brand, the new one comes up. I have desperately tried to convince this client there is nothing we can do about it, dozens of news articles crop up with the two brands together as this was a hot topic a few years ago, but just in case I missed something I thought I'd ask the community of experts here on Moz. An example for this would be Tyco Healthcare that became covidien in 2007. When you type tyco healthcare, covidien crops up here and there. Any ideas? Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Netsociety0 -
Existing 301s during site migration - what to do?
Hi - I'm looking at an old website and there are lots of 301s internal to that site - what do I do with these when I move to a new site? Should I list them and adjust them so they redirect to the new site now (instead of from one URL to another URL on the old site) - I'm thinking that if I don't the user will have to travel through one 301 then another to get to the new site, which doesn't seem like a great idea? Your thoughts would be welcome.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | McTaggart0 -
What happens to a domain in SERPs when it's set to redirect to another?
We have just acquired a competing website and are wondering whether to leave it running as is for now, or set the domain to redirect to our own site. If we set up this redirect, what would happen to the old site in Google SERPs? Would the site drop off from results? If so, would we capture this new search traffic or is it a free for all and all sites compete for the search traffic as normal? Thanks in advance. Paul
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | kevinliao0 -
Is it ok to 301 redirect this previously algorithmicly penalised site?
Hi All, Is it OK to 301 redirect site A to site B? Site A: http://goo.gl/P9Zp2y Site B: http://goo.gl/ySDCzb The story - in 2013 site a seemed to be penalised with some kind of anchor text algorithm penalty - SEO couldnt fix, so created site B and turned site A into a holding page with a no follow link to new site. SEO company worked on disavow file etc, implemented in late 2013 301 redirect site A to B in late 2013 - SEO advised to stop 301 about 8 weeks later... This was my fault i didnt realise the implications of a redirect... Stopped the redirect, but too late, as site B dropped in rankings in early 2014 - new disavow files uploaded to both sites, but damage seems done now. No longer have a SEO company, and i would ideally like to 301 redirect site A to B, as it looks messy having a holding page - but wanted to check if SEO would still strongly advise against that? please advise James
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | isntworkdull0 -
How should I handle URL's created by an internal search engine?
Hi, I'm aware that internal search result URL's (www.example.co.uk/catalogsearch/result/?q=searchterm) should ideally be blocked using the robots.txt file. Unfortunately the damage has already been done and a large number of internal search result URL's have already been created and indexed by Google. I have double checked and these pages only account for approximately 1.5% of traffic per month. Is there a way I can remove the internal search URL's that have already been indexed and then stop this from happening in the future, I presume the last part would be to disallow /catalogsearch/ in the robots.txt file. Thanks
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | GrappleAgency0 -
Large Site - Complete Site URL Change and How to Preserver Organic Rankings/Traffic
Hello Community, What is your experience with site redesign when it comes to preserving the traffic? If a large enterprise website has to go through a site-wide enhancement (resulting in change of all URLs and partial content), what do you expect from Organic rankings and traffic? I assume we will experience a period that Google needs to "re-orientate" itself with the new site, if so, do you have similar experience and tips on how to minimize the traffic loss? Thanks
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | b.digi0 -
What's new with SEO in last 6 months?
Hi, I've been away from the SEO scene for about 6 months now. I was wondering if anyone could summerise what the big changes are and how one needs to approach an SEO strategy now compared to last year before this Penguine (?) update.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | LoveChicken0 -
Questions regarding Google's "improved url handling parameters"
Google recently posted about improving url handling parameters http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2011/07/improved-handling-of-urls-with.html I have a couple questions: Is it better to canonicalize urls or use parameter handling? Will Google inform us if it finds a parameter issue? Or, should we have a prepare a list of parameters that should be addressed?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | nicole.healthline0