Hi Marc,

Could you please tell us if Caro of i have answered your question? If so, please mark the answer. It's nice to get some credits for the work we've both put into this

Thanks very much.
Bas

Hi Marc,

Changing a URL is like moving your house or office: it can definately be done but you need to think it through. If you just move and don't tell anyone it will be a matter of time before some trouble might start.

Do you have anything in place that will tell Google that you have changed the URL/URL's? Otherwise it will consider the new URL as a completely new page, with a lot less trust than the old URL probably had. The value of the old URL will be lost. Essentially, Google will think you now have two URL's: the old and the new. It won't all of a sudden realise those are the same.

If you have anything in place to tell Google that you have changed the name of the page, the process will go smoother and much better. As soon as Google will visit the old URL, it will be informed of two things:
1. The old URL has been replaced, does not exist anymore and needs to be replaced in the index
2. It knows the new URL right away and will start to replace the old with the new URL and transfer the value of the old URL to the new URL

Every time a page is being loaded, the server will send - amongst others - the source code. And a header code: 200 is everything is OK, 404 is the page cannot be found, 500 is something is wrong with the server, 301 is the URL has changed to something new, etc.

If you don't do anything, Google will read a 404-code and thus think there is an error in your site.

It's better to send a 301-code because that will tell Google that nothing is wrong; you've just changed the URL. It will also tell what the new URL is.

Check out this page for more information about 301 and 302 redirects:
https://moz.com/learn/seo/redirection

Does this help you?

Yours,
Bas

Hi Michael,

Is a .htaccess an option? Mention the URL's by hand or with wildcards and give an 410-header code to make sure search engines know these pages are really gone.

These links might get you started:
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/33247849/using-htaccess-to-410-any-wildcard-url-that-contains-a-question-mark
http://www.quickonlinetips.com/archives/2014/11/http-410-error-pages-htaccess/

Hope that helps.

Bas

Hi Ruben,

You've uploaded a new site map so Google will correct this over time.

Method #1: In the mean time you can manually delete the URL's from Webmaster Tools:
https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/url-removal

You can find this link in 'Google-index' and after that 'Remove URLs'. I have translated those terms from Dutch so give me some slack

Post the URL you can to delete and hit Enter. Will take some effort but i've noticed a couple of days ago that it works like a charm.

In the mean time Google will remove the old URL's permanently from the index.

Method #2: If you are familiar with .htaccess-files you can also mention the old URL's there and give a 410-status code. '410' stands for "The URL is gone and i have no new URL for you". Or - as someone wrote a couple of years ago - "It's gone, No really: it's gone."

Perhaps this link will help you on your way:
http://www.quickonlinetips.com/archives/2014/11/http-410-error-pages-htaccess/

Good luck!
Bas

Hi Ruben,

Have you tried deleting these old pages from the index at Google Webmaster Tools?

https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/url-removal

You can only delete them temporarily but it might overlap the process of actually deleting the pages that you have already set in motion by uploading a new site map.

I did that about a week ago and the effect was noticeable within a couple of days.

Bas