Major URL changes in new site launch
-
Hey Guys - we recently launched a new website for a client. Prior, all of their URLs were dynamic via an old-school Cold Fusion CMS. We basically had to rewrite 90% of the sites URLs (site is like 300 pages). The new URLs are SEO friendly and the on-page SEO is strong; but the page rank/authority is starting from scratch from these pages and placement has decreased more most of the new pages with competitive keywords.
We set up all of the 301 redirects properly and are actively monitoring in Google Webmaster Tools. **Anything else I can do to lessen the pain and get these pages higher page rank/authority sooner rather than later?**Thanks for all of your help.
-
It's not uncommon to see some lower traffic as Google re-crawls the site. If your 301 redirects are all done correctly to the correct pages, there's not much else you can do. As James mentioned, you may want to reach out where appropriate and see if you can have the link directed to the new URL.
I don't know how much they've changed, but you will also want to check and make sure that any changes to the internal links or navigation are for the best. Deeper pages can sometimes suffer in site redesigns if the number of internal links or the click-depth has fallen.
-
A few things to think about.
1. I usually crawl the old site with screaming frog software, to build by URL list.
2. I map out the URLs to related new pages on the site, any thing non related just 301 too the home page or sub category section.
3. Track your top converting keywords from the old site before and after the move too note changes.
4. Another too look at is internal links to your site from external sites, if you have some highly authority links it could be worth changing them to new URLS.
5. Re crawl the site after the launch to look for any errors pages ect, I wouldn't personally USE GWT for something like this I would use Deep Crawl or Screaming Frog.
-
One more - did you update the on page content to reflect the new URL structure? Any content linking to old URLs?
-
When did you launch the new site? For all 300 old pages did you redirect to the 300 new pages or did you just redirect everything to the home page? On those redirects, did you redirect to the same/equivalent page on the new site or different pages? Are the new URLs cached in Google SERPs or do you see the old URLs? Are you still seeing old URLs in your GWT reports for impressions and clicks? Did you update your sitemap with new URLs? Are you sure you got all the old pages? Often CMSs will generate all kinds of versions of a URL using parameters and so you will need your 301s to account for that.
Not sure if that is an answer, but I am just curious.
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
-
Googlebot Reports All URLs as Unreachable
Webmaster Tools is reporting that all of our site's URLs - located www.zuken.com - are "unreachable." The URLs display correctly in all browsers. We recently switched hosting providers, but they assure us there is no security setting that would be causing this issue. Any ideas? Is this a glitch with Webmaster Tools?
Web Design | | Zuken0 -
Spanish website indexed in English, redirect to spanish or english version if i do a new website design?
Hi MOZ users, i have this problem. We have a website in Spanish Language but Google crawls it on English (it is not important the reasons). We re made the entire website and now we are planning the move. The new website will have different language versions, english, spanish and portuguese. Somebody tells me that we have to redirect the old urls (crawled on english) to the new english versions, not to the spanish (the real language of the firsts). Example: URL1 Language: Spanish - Crawled on English --> redirect to Language English version. the other option will be redirect to the spanish new version, which the visitor is waiting to find. URL1 Language: Spanish - Crawled on English --> redirect to Language Spanish version. What do you think? Which is the better option?
Web Design | | NachoRetta0 -
How does Google look at strings added to a URL
For example: http://localhost:3000/en-US/app/a-knsmtrhqrqs/personal where knsmtrhqrqs is a string Can Google tell this is a string and what's their policy? Will it hurt rankings? Thank you.
Web Design | | RoxBrock0 -
301 Redirect from Old Domain to New Domain
I am building a new website and I plan to 301 Redirect my Old Domain (olddomain.com) to a brand new Domain (newdomain.com) in the upcoming months. To do this I was planning to update the htaccess file on both the old and new domains. The htaccess file on the old domain would look to 301 redirect all pages on the old domain to the new domain. The htaccess file on the new domain would detail any specific URL redirects I want to implement (ie. olddomain.com/EXAMPLE/TEST will redirect to newdomain/TEST) - this will ensure link equity is retained and bounce rates are kept at a lower level. Does this sound like the right approach? Also, what do I need to do with the old domain going forward? Do I need to keep this forever in order for the 301 redirect to work or can I eventually just forward the domain to the new one permanently?
Web Design | | DHS_SH0 -
Build New Site Without Losing Rankings
Good morning SEOmoz community. I have a question which I am pretty sure I already know the answer to, however i thought I would reach out to my fellow experts to see if anyone had some great advice. I would really like to give my website a makeover. i have two thoughts on this, one is to scrap the site completely and start fresh, the other would be to only change it visually, but keep all the content and on-page optimization. I am terrified of losing my rankings. I am ranked position 1 and 2 for highly competitive terms and have another 15 - 20 keywords on page 1. Any advice would be tremendously appreciated!!!
Web Design | | WebbyNabler0 -
SEO Searchable? Starting a New Forum for Company Community
Hi Mozzers, I'm new here and am looking forward to learning from this awesome group of SEOs As my company's Web Optimization Manager, I'm in charge of just about anything SEO related. We are an education company and we are looking to build a new forum so students (both new and old) and continue interacting within our community. We also want to use this as a tool for new users and potential new customers through search (obviously). We are in an internal debate as to how we should make the forums and the implications on search it may have. Some managers want the content available only to members, others want the content read-only to the public, and the tech team building the forum says that "it'll be an issue making the content available to the public without a log-in." So my questions are: (1) Will we still be searchable if we make our content "read-only" for non-members? Members will have the ability to log-in and comment and post etc (similar to this forum). (2) Will be searchable if we make the content completely private and available only to members. What I mean by private is perhaps, we'll make the title of the forum thread public but not the actual responses. Along these lines, what would happen if we made everything private (including the tite). Will Google still pick up on our content in a search result and a potential user only not be able to see anything? (3) What would you all suggest to make this flow the right way? Hope to hear from you all soon. Thanks
Web Design | | Pedram_SEO1 -
URL parameters causing duplicate content errors
My ISP implemented product reviews. In doing so, each page has a possible parameter string of ?wr=1. I am not receiving duplicate page content and duplicate page title errors for all my product URLs. The report shows the base URL and the base URL?wr=1. My ISP says that the search engines won't have a problem with the parameters and a check of Google Webmaster Tools for my site says I don't have any errors and recommends against configuring URL parameters. How can I get SEOmoz to stop reporting these errors?
Web Design | | NiftySon1 -
Flat vs. Silo Site Architecture, What's Better
I'm in the midst of converting a fairly large website (500+ pages) into WordPress as a content management system. I know that there are two schools of thought regarding site architecture: Those who believe that everything should be categorized, I.E.- website.com/shoes/reebok/running People who believe that the less clicks it takes from the homepage the better. As it stands, our current site has a completely flat architecture, with landing pages being added randomly to the root, I.E.- website.com/affordable-shoes-in-louisville-ky I'm beginning to think that there is a gray area with this. I spoke to someone who says that you should never have a page more than 2 categories/subfolders deep. But if we plan on adding a lot of content doesn't it make sense to set the site up into many categories so we can set a good foundation for adding massive amounts of content. Also, will 301 redirecting to the new structure cause us to lose rankings for certain terms? Any help here is appreciated.
Web Design | | C-Style0