404's - Do they impact search ranking/how do we get rid of them?
-
Hi,
We recently ran the Moz website crawl report and saw a number of 404 pages from our site come back. These were returned as "high priority" issues to fix. My question is, how do 404's impact search ranking? From what Google support tells me, 404's are "normal" and not a big deal to fix, but if they are "high priority" shouldn't we be doing something to remove them?
Also, if I do want to remove the pages, how would I go about doing so? Is it enough to go into Webmaster tools and list it as a link no to crawl anymore or do we need to do work from the website development side as well?
Here are a couple of examples that came back..these are articles that were previously posted but we decided to close out:
http://loyalty360.org/resources/article/mark-johnson-speaks-at-motivation-show
Thanks!
-
Hi
As far as I know there is no way to do this in webmaster tools. You can test your robots.txt file with the Robots.txt Tester - but you need to actually update the real file to block URLs from being crawled.
At any rate, normally you would not block 404s from being crawled - Google with either stop crawling them on their own, or this way if they are indexed they can drop out of the index.
-
By submit to webmaster tools, I meant submit the link so Google will not crawl it again.
-
What do you mean by "submit links to Google Webmaster Tools"? As far as I know there isn't a way to submit 404 URLs in there.
The way to solve 404s are;
- make the URL a real page again (if it broke by accident)
- remove links pointing at the bad page
- 301 redirect the 404 page to one that works
- you can opt to leave it alone if there was nothing important on that page and there is no good page to redirect it to
404s might hurt rankings, but only in extreme cases where it was a popular page and now you're losing the back link value or referral traffic etc. I'd say in 90/100 cases 404s will not hurt your rankings.
-
Interesting - good to know! So even when we submit these links to Google Webmaster tools, that doesn't solve the problem, correct? Even if Google isn't crawling these links (eventually) will it still hurt SEO rankings overall?
-
Got it. So I guess we need to decide what makes sense work-load wise and what is best for the site. If we do 301 redirects, is that seen as more beneficial than an "engaging" 404 page that allows people to go to another page?
It seems like the 404 page would be one project where constantly adding in 301 redirects would be a lot of work.
-
Theoretically a 404 error is a deleted page. To get rid of the 404 error you have to redirect the broken link, or deleted page.
-
Is there no way to just completely remove or delete a page/404 or it will always exist on some level?
-
Hey There
Google's webmaster documentation says;
"Generally, 404 errors don’t impact your site’s ranking in Google, and you can safely ignore them."
When Google says "generally" this tends to mean "in most cases" or "not directly" or "there may be secondary effects"... you get the idea.
But I think they are assuming you need to be smart enough to know if the 404 was intentional, and if not why it happened. For example - if you had a really popular piece of content with back links directly to that URL, and then the URL 404s - you supposed may lose the "link juice" pointing into that article. So in that regard 404s can hurt rankings secondarily.
But as other have said, you can redirect your 404s to a similar page (Google recommends not the homepage).
I am not sure why the Moz report puts them in "high priority" - perhaps they mean "high priority" from a general web best practice point of view, and not strictly SEO.
-
With that many I would suggest redirecting them to a relevant page rather than just stopping the indexing of them by submitting the links to Google Webmaster Tools. From what I've experienced, keeping the link juice flowing through your site by redirecting them is better for your overall SEO efforts.
Of course it's faster to submit the links to GWT…but that doesn't necessarily mean it's better. Regardless of what you do or how you do it, eliminating your crawl errors is very important.
-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9tz7Eexwp_A
This is video by Matt Cutts that gives some great advice. My goal is always to redirect them, even if it is back to the main article category page or even the home page. I hate the thought of losing a potential customer to a 404 error. This has to be your decision though.
Errors are not good, no matter what kind of error they are. Best practice is to remove any error you can. When your bounce rate increases you lose ranking power. When you have broken links, you lose searchers. That is the simplest way to put it.
-
Fix them, redirect them back to a relevant page and then mark them as fixed in GWT.
-
When we ran the MOZ report it said we had more than a couple...probably around 50 or so. Our website has been around 5-6 years and I don't think we have ever done anything with any of them. With this many errors, what is your suggestion? Would it be faster to submit the link to Google Webmaster tools than waiting for them to be crawled again?
-
404's can reduce your ability to rank highly for keywords when they effect your bounce rate and lower your impressions. Consider it giving your website a bad reputation. Again, it takes a lot of them to do this.
-
We are using Expression Engine. A lot of the links are within our own site - they are articles we once posted, but then we decided to close for one reason or another, and now they are throwing a 404 error. We don't necessarily have anything to redirect them to since they are mostly just random article pieces, which is why we were looking into deleting them completely.
-
There's tons of documentation stating that 404's negatively affect SEO. It's definitely debatable and there are obviously other factors involved. My main point is that it's important to deal with any and all crawl errors.
-
adamxj2 re: "... having too many at once can negatively affect your rankings...."
???
on what testing do you quote that? As my own SEO world includes no such assumptions or proof of same!
WHAT a 404 will affect is conversions...no one who shows up on a site after taking a link into same and finding a 404 will ever get a feeling other than if a site can't fix it's 404's then why would I belive they can sell me something etc.
404's do NOT affect rankings....they disappear on their own it's true...but I always fix same asap!
-
Hello!
Although 404's will eventually stop being crawled by Google, having too many at once can negatively affect your rankings. The most important thing is that you do not want to be linking to these 404s anywhere from within your site. If so, you want to definitely remove those links.
If I have one or two 404s in my crawl errors, I typically will just leave them be and wait for them to be dropped out of being indexed. Some other solutions I've utilized are:
1. Make an engaging 404 page so that when users find the page they will be encouraged to stay on the website. Having a search box or some of the most popular links on the page is a good place to start
2. 301 redirect the pages to relevant pages that do exist. This will help your link juice flow and will make for a good user experience since they are reaching a relevant page.
Hope that helps!
-
I would log in to GWT and look at your 404 errors under crawl errors. In there you will see where the links are still linked from. If they are pointing at external sites, I would redirect them. I don't know what platform you are using, but you should be able to do this in the admin section of your platform.
If they aren't linked externally, you should probably still redirect them. I know the Google says that 404 errors are harmless, but if you have dead links on your site and someone clicks on it, it most likely results in a lost searcher.
Hope that helps!
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
-
How to get back links with higher rank ?
Hi All , These days I am finding new ways of creating back links. Could any one tell me how to get backlinks with higher DA ?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | mozentution1 -
Why is Google ranking irrelevant / not preferred pages for keywords?
Over the past few months we have been chipping away at duplicate content issues. We know this is our biggest issue and is working against us. However, it is due to this client also owning the competitor site. Therefore, product merchandise and top level categories are highly similar, including a shared server. Our rank is suffering major for this, which we understand. However, as we make changes, and I track and perform test searches, the pages that Google ranks for keywords never seems to match or make sense, at all. For example, I search for "solid scrub tops" and it ranks the "print scrub tops" category. Or the "Men Clearance" page is ranking for keyword "Women Scrub Pants". Or, I will search for a specific brand, and it ranks a completely different brand. Has anyone else seen this behavior with duplicate content issues? Or is it an issue with some other penalty? At this point, our only option is to test something and see what impact it has, but it is difficult to do when keywords do not align with content.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | lunavista-comm0 -
My company wants to set up some blogs - what's best practice in getting started from scratch?
My company wants to set up two or three blogs (on previously unused domains) with the idea being to disseminate good content that gets picked up in SERPs and acts as a lead generator, shows us to be authorities in our market, creates brand (or individual employee who's doing the blogging) awareness etc... From scratch, what are all the boxes that should be ticked to make this work from the outset? What are the must haves?With all the ideals in place, how long could it realistically take to make this work? What are some pitfalls to look out for? Any advice in general will be appreciated. Thanks, M
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Martin_S0 -
Chinese Sites Linking With Bizarre Keywords Creating 404's
Just ran a link profile, and have noticed for the first time many spammy Chinese sites linking to my site with spammy keywords such as "Buy Nike" or "Get Viagra". Making matters worse, they're linking to pages that are creating 404's. Can anybody explain what's going on, and what I can do?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | alrockn0 -
How to prevent 404's from a job board ?
I have a new client with a job listing board on their site. I am getting a bunch of 404 errors as they delete the filled jobs. Question: Should we leave the the jobs pages up for extra content and entry points to the site and put a notice like this job has been filled, please search our other job listings ? Or should I no index - no follow these pages ? Or any other suggestions - it is an employment agency site. Overall what would be the best practice going forward - we are looking at probably 20 jobs / pages per month.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | jlane90 -
Can some brilliant mozzer out there teach a moron/newbie like me how to 301 redirect several URL's I have?
Okay - I am a supermodel. I look pretty. My legs are amazing. My cheekbones are high. But when it comes to 301 redirects I am the ugliest supermodel on the block. Crap, here is the truth: I am not even a supermodel. I am just a middle-aged, goofy looking dude who is a newbie to fixing websites. I have inherited several sites from a friend and I have been helping by creating solid contextual links internally and externally for a while. But, when Roger the wondrous SEOMoz robot talks to me, he says, "oops, it looks like your foolish freak self has a site that has both a www. and a non-www, which can create competition for yourself." What do I do when he says that? I just whisper a "thank-you" but gently press the skip this step button and go on with my life because I do not know how to make my non-www.'s redirect into the www. sites... Now, I have sort of asked this question on the site before, but I was answered by someone who does not understand my level of ignorance. any use of the word canonical or just put this lfwjkshj.htp/php inside the left ear of your mom, does not tell me anything so, is there any willing and kind soul who can walk me through redirecting several of my sites to their proper home - kind of like Carl Chubbs Weathers did for Happy Gilmore in that Academy Award winning classic? Thanks for the help in advance best, dumbhead
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | creativeguy0 -
List Your Top 3 SEO Strategies to Get Your Rankings Back
Hey guys, can you list your top 3 strategies (what you've been focused on - SEO) to get your rankings back, or rank well in general, in Panda. Don't be vague saying link building...we all know that, what type of link building specifically, for example. Thanks
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | PaulDylan0 -
SEO Correlation Between Code and Search Engine Rankings
I posted this on my blog and wanted to get everyones opinion on this (http://palatnikfactor.com/2011/06/07/seo-correlation-between-code-and-search-engine-rankings/) I’m always looking to see what top ranking websites may be doing to get the rankings they do. One of the tasks of any SEO I guess is to really analyze competitors, right? I want to really stress that what I am writing here is completely opinion based and have not (due to time) validated this correlation enough but would like to get the discussion started. Nevertheless, I did enough research to see that there may be a correlation between code validation and top ranking websites, at least for certain queries where the number of real big players/brands is limited or non-existent. So, what do I mean? http://validator.w3.org/ validates code on websites. This tool shows you errors and warnings that may be making it harder for search engines to crawl your website. Looking at top competitors for certain niches, I was surprised to find that top sites had very few errors compared to 2+ page rankings. That’s not to say that all the sites on the first page had fewer errors (cleaner code) than websites in the 2<sup>nd</sup> page plus. However, again, top ranking websites for keywords that I was looking at had cleaner code which may have a correlation in regards to organic rankings. What’s your take? Does this have any effect in regards to SEO?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | PaulDylan0