HTTP Errors in Webmaster Tools
-
We recently added a 301 redirect from our non-www domain to the www version. As a result, we now have tons of HTTP errors (403s to be exact) in Webmaster Tools. They're all from over a month ago, but they still show up. How can we fix this?
-
Hey Sha,
Sorry for the slow reply. Yes, I checked the URLs that were listed and I didn't actually receive a 403 error. I guess I figured there would be some room for lag time but these errors are over a month old so I thought that was strange.
-
Hi Kyle,
Have you manually checked the URL's reported in Webmaster Tools to check whether they are actually returning a 403 for users? I have often seen errors that were temporary or have already been fixed still being reported in WMT for sometime afterwards.
If you have checked and the pages are working fine then the problem is most likely due to a lag in updates in WMT so you can ignore it and wait for it to go away.
If you have checked manually and find that there is in fact a 403 problem on the site, then you will need to investigate further. Since you are relating the sudden flood of 403's to the addition of the 301 redirect, the first thing I would do is check that the code for your 301 is correct.
Hope that helps,
Sha
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
-
Will critical error in wordpress for memory limit affect seo rankings?
will critical error in wordpress to increase memory limit affect seo rankings?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | gamstopbet0 -
Would you redirect Website A to Website B, when Website B is in the middle of a HTTP=>HTTPS migration?
Hey guys, I'm curious on your thoughts around this scenario... Website A: 35,000 monthly pageviews 1,000 pages 375 root linking domains currently HTTPS focused on one topic weak rankings for competitive keywords Website B: 3M monthly pageviews 32,500 pages 3,500 root linking domains started HTTP to HTTPS migration 1 week ago. 1/3 of pages indexed as HTTPS. focused on many topics strong rankings for competitive keywords Requirement: I want to have a reliable read on how Website A's keyword rankings change after redirecting it's pages to Website A. This post-migration analysis will be used as a basis to assess the risk of redirecting another website we own that is similar to Website A into Website B. My question: Would you wait until most of the pages on Website B are indexed as HTTPS before doing a 301 of Website A to Website B? Please back up your answer with reasons why or why not 🙂
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | jeremycabral0 -
Question regarding geo-targeting in Google Webmaster Tools.
I understand that it's possible to target both domains/subdomains and subfolders to different geographical regions in GWT. However, I was wondering about the effect of targeting the domain to a single country, say the UK. Then targeting subfolders to other regions (say the US and France). e.g. www.domain.com -> UK
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | TranslateMediaLtd
www.domain.com/us -> US
www.domain.com/fr -> France etc Would it be better to leave the main domain without a geographical target but set geo-targeting for the subfolders? Or would it be best to set geo-targeting for both the domain and subfolders.0 -
SEO implications of serving a different site on HTTPS vs. HTTP
I have two sites: Site A, and Site B. Both sites are hosted on the same IP address, and server using IIS 7.5. Site B has an SSL cert, and Site A does not. It has recently been brought to my attention that when requesting the HTTPS version of Site A (the site w/o an SSL cert), IIS will serve Site B... Our server has been configured this way for roughly a year. We don't do any promotion of Site A using HTTPS URLs, though I suppose somebody could accidentally link to or type in HTTPS and get the wrong website. Until we can upgrade to IIS8 / Windows Server 2012 to support SNI, it seems I have two reasonable options: Move Site B over to its own dedicated IP, and let HTTPS requests for Site A 404. Get another certificate for Site A, and have it's HTTPS version 301 redirect to HTTP/non-ssl. #1 seems preferable, as we don't really need an SSL cert for Site A, and HTTPS doesn't really have any SEO benefits over HTTP/non-ssl. However, I'm concerned if we've done any SEO damage to Site A by letting our configuration sit this way for so long. I could see Googlebot trying https versions of websites to test if they exist, even if there aren't any ssl/https links for the given domain in the wild... In which case, option #2 would seem to mostly reverse any damage done (if any). Though Site A seems to be indexed fine. No concerns other than my gut. Does anybody have any recommendations? Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | dsbud0 -
301 Redirect and Webmaster Central
I've been working on removing canonical issues. My host is Apache. Is this the correct code for my htaccess? RewriteEngine On
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | spkcp111
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^luckygemstones.com$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.luckygemstones.com/$1 [R=301,L] SECOND!!! I have two websites under Google's Webmaster Central; http://luckygemstones.com which gets NO 404 soft errors... AND http://www.luckygemstones.com which has 247 soft 404 errors... I think I should DELETE the http://luckygemstones.com site from Webmaster Central--the 301 redirect handles the"www" thing. Is this correct? I hate to hose things (even worse?) Help! Kathleen0 -
Strange affiliate links in web master tools
Hi All I have been looking in the Google webmasters tools account for a client and from out of nowhere they suddenly have 42,000 links last time I checked it was just over 4,000. It looks to me like some of our affiliates have links showing, they are formatted so it goes via a php script that looks like accomtracking.php?estid=1234&ref=123 this link appears 3 times in the source code of the page that is linking to my client but Google webmaster tools thinks it is linking 12,000 times. I assume this is a problem with the database where the link points to, issuing a unique link for each visit or something similar but I am not sure how to explain it to my client and how to correct it / stop it happening again. There are around 37,000 links like this to the site from just 6 referring sites and the client have had an unnatural link warning so I am anxious to get this fixed. Any help gratefully received. Sean
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | SKE0 -
Usage of HTTP Status Code 303
Hello, is there anybody who has got some experience with 303 HTTP Status Code? Our software development would like to use 303 "See Others" instead of 301 for redirecting old product-links to the site-root, instead of showing 404 errors. What is the best practise for redirecting old product links which are gone in online-shop context? Best regards Steffen
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | steffen_0 -
Strange Linking Data in Webmaster Tools
I run a site that was a Wordpress blog with Edirectory software for a directory on the back end. I've scrapped the Edirectory and built the entire site on Wordpress. After the site change I'm seeing about 700 404 Not Found crawling errors, which appear to be old Edirectory pages that no longer exist. My understanding is that they'll cycle out eventually. What troubles me is the linking data I'm seeing. In the "Links to My Site" area of Webmaster tools, I'm seeing 4,430 links to the "About" page, another 2,900 to an obscure deleted directory listing page and only 2,050 to the home page. I show 1,700 links to a terms and conditions pdf and other strange data. To summarize, I'm showing huge numbers of links to obscure pages. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | JSOC0