Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Redirected Old Pages Still Indexed
-
Hello, we migrated a domain onto a new Wordpress site over a year ago. We redirected (with plugin: simple 301 redirects) all the old urls (.asp) to the corresponding new wordpress urls (non-.asp). The old pages are still indexed by Google, even though when you click on them you are redirected to the new page.
Can someone tell me reasons they would still be indexed?
Do you think it is hurting my rankings?
-
Hi,
I would like to know have you updated your sitemap? If not Kindly update it on the website as well as add the sitemap in Google Webmaster tool.
You can block old urls which you do not want to get indexed.
Yes it will affect the traffic as there are two different pages of same services which will distributes the customers.
-
Thanks Eric, we did this all on the same domain, migrated from something that uses ".asp" to Wordpress. It has been about 18 months, hopefully you are right and this is not affecting rankings.
-
Patrick, thanks for the response, there is only one redirect, from the old page to the new one (this was all done on the same domain) I will check the sitemap.
-
Whenever you migrate a domain name to another domain name (I think this is what you're saying you did), Google will keep the URLs of the old domain name in their index for at least a year. That's if you migrate to a new domain name.
If the pages have 301 redirects to other pages on the site or new pages on the site, then those old URLs could still remain in the index for a period of time--you'll be able to see them if you search for the URL.
Typically even if those URLs are still indexed, it shouldn't be hurting rankings at all.
-
Hi there
If there is more than 1 redirect, I would look into cutting that down as much as possible to 1. Google and other search engines will only follow redirects to a certain point, and if it follows more than 2 or 3, you could be in trouble. So make sure redirects are 1 to 1.
Beyond that, I focus on the following:
- Review Google's resource on properly moving a site
- Update your internal links to reflect new URL structure
- Update your sitemap and submit to Google / Bing
Let me know if this helps answer your question or if you've completed this already! Good luck!
Patrick
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
-
My product category pages are not being indexed on google can someone help?
My website has been indexed on google and all of its pages can be found on google except for the product category pages - which are where we want our traffic heading to, so this is a big problem for us. Our website is www.skirtinguk.com And an example of a page that isn't being indexed is https://www.skirtinguk.com/product-category/mdf-skirting-board/
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | chelseaskirtinguk0 -
What's the best way to noindex pages but still keep backlinks equity?
Hello everyone, Maybe it is a stupid question, but I ask to the experts... What's the best way to noindex pages but still keep backlinks equity from those noindexed pages? For example, let's say I have many pages that look similar to a "main" page which I solely want to appear on Google, so I want to noindex all pages with the exception of that "main" page... but, what if I also want to transfer any possible link equity present on the noindexed pages to the main page? The only solution I have thought is to add a canonical tag pointing to the main page on those noindexed pages... but will that work or cause wreak havoc in some way?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | fablau3 -
Google indexed wrong pages of my website.
When I google site:www.ayurjeewan.com, after 8 pages, google shows Slider and shop pages. Which I don't want to be indexed. How can I get rid of these pages?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | bondhoward0 -
Do I need to re-index the page after editing URL?
Hi, I had to edit some of the URLs. But, google is still showing my old URL in search results for certain keywords, which ofc get 404. By crawling with ScremingFrog it gets me 301 'page not found' and still giving old URLs. Why is that? And do I need to re-index pages with new URLs? Is 'fetch as Google' enough to do that or any other advice? Thanks a lot, hope the topic will help to someone else too. Dusan
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Chemometec0 -
How can I prevent duplicate pages being indexed because of load balancer (hosting)?
The site that I am optimising has a problem with duplicate pages being indexed as a result of the load balancer (which is required and set up by the hosting company). The load balancer passes the site through to 2 different URLs: www.domain.com www2.domain.com Some how, Google have indexed 2 of the same URLs (which I was obviously hoping they wouldn't) - the first on www and the second on www2. The hosting is a mirror image of each other (www and www2), meaning I can't upload a robots.txt to the root of www2.domain.com disallowing all. Also, I can't add a canonical script into the website header of www2.domain.com pointing the individual URLs through to www.domain.com etc. Any suggestions as to how I can resolve this issue would be greatly appreciated!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | iam-sold0 -
Dev Subdomain Pages Indexed - How to Remove
I own a website (domain.com) and used the subdomain "dev.domain.com" while adding a new section to the site (as a development link). I forgot to block the dev.domain.com in my robots file, and google indexed all of the dev pages (around 100 of them). I blocked the site (dev.domain.com) in robots, and then proceeded to just delete the entire subdomain altogether. It's been about a week now and I still see the subdomain pages indexed on Google. How do I get these pages removed from Google? Are they causing duplicate content/title issues, or does Google know that it's a development subdomain and it's just taking time for them to recognize that I deleted it already?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | WebServiceConsulting.com0 -
Our login pages are being indexed by Google - How do you remove them?
Each of our login pages show up under different subdomains of our website. Currently these are accessible by Google which is a huge competitive advantage for our competitors looking for our client list. We've done a few things to try to rectify the problem: - No index/archive to each login page Robot.txt to all subdomains to block search engines gone into webmaster tools and added the subdomain of one of our bigger clients then requested to remove it from Google (This would be great to do for every subdomain but we have a LOT of clients and it would require tons of backend work to make this happen.) Other than the last option, is there something we can do that will remove subdomains from being viewed from search engines? We know the robots.txt are working since the message on search results say: "A description for this result is not available because of this site's robots.txt – learn more." But we'd like the whole link to disappear.. Any suggestions?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | desmond.liang1 -
Should you stop indexing of short lived pages?
In my site there will be a lot of pages that have a short life span of about a week as they are items on sale, should I nofollow the links meaning the site has a fwe hundred pages or allow indexing and have thousands but then have lots of links to pages that do not exist. I would of course if allowing indexing make sure the page links does not error and sends them to a similarly relevant page but which is best for me with the SEarch Engines? I would like to have the option of loads of links with pages of loads of content but not if it is detrimental Thanks
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | barney30120