Redirect old image that has backlinks

[BradChandler]

Hi Moz Community!

I'm doing an audit of a website and did a backlink analysis. In the backlink analysis, there is an image that has 66 backlinks but the image doesn't exist on the website anymore (it was on a website that was created in 2011 - 2 web launches ago).  I don't believe a 301 redirect will work for an image that doesn't exist anymore.

How would I redirect the image URL (it's WordPress so we have a specific URL that other websites are linking to but get 404 errors) without going to each individual website and requesting they change the URL link?

Any advice or recommendations would be great. Thanks!

[MikeTek]

Hi Brad,

As others have indicated, there's no reason a 301 redirect on a missing image shouldn't work - it's all based on the URL request (not the actual resource served, since the server intercepts the request and forwards it to another URL along with the 301 status code).

I'd second Yaroslav's recommendation on a good WP plug-in for this (Redirection). You should be able to just use the URL string here to set the redirect where you want to point it.

I would also suggest double-checking that these are actual links pointing to the image URL, not embeds of that image on these pages (some tools will pick that up as a link). 
Finally, you may want to create a new page that includes a suitable replacement image if one is available, rather than redirecting to the replacement image file URL (bc this way the reclaimed PageRank will flow through to the rest of your site via your navigation).

Best,
Mike

[Corbec888]

Hi there,

I believe there are a handful of Wordpress plugins which allow you to simply place in a direct URL path so in your instance http://www.site.com/gallery/image/picture.png could be redirected to http://www.site.com.

The main thing to keep in mind is you use a 301 redirect for this process to ensure all link equity is maintained during the process.

A good plugin for doing 301 redirects on wordpress is - https://en-gb.wordpress.org/plugins/redirection/

I hope this helps!

[TucsonAZWebDesign]

As jcnotfound2083 states the ideal is to use a 301 redirect. I am certain it very much will pass authority. Reason being I've seen many black/grey hats check for broken links on NY Times on older articles and should they see a DoFollow to a expired non owned domain, purchase the lease and 301 redirect it to a domain they want authority passed.

When it comes to the NYTimes scenario, I'd Personally make a website and put relevant content on it, giving me the most longevity as to not appear blatantly obvious that I'm manipulating the situation for ranking. In the case of this image, you don't want to just swap it with another one especially if it's annoying and had say for instance the date meshed in with the url extension, which is to much to deal with. This will redirect it to your homepage

Redirect 301 /foldersAnd/ToOldImage/image.jpg /

[jcnotfound2083]

Hi,

A 301 redirect is the most reasonable alternative. I would place an instruction within the .htaccess file like this:

Redirect 301 /[old_folder] new_url_image

[Seenlyst]

Hello Brad,

I'm assuming the image used to be on the same domain you're now on, and it leads them to your website 404 page, in that case, I would upload another relevant image with the same filename to my site and do a 301 redirect.

If those backlinks point to an image from the other site which is different from your current site, you might want to make sure these backlinks are quality and relevant to your content before making a domain level 301 redirect.

Hope this answered your question.

Regards,
Joseph Yap