{"id":14364,"date":"2010-07-30T21:24:42","date_gmt":"2010-07-30T15:54:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.quickonlinetips.com\/archives\/?p=14364"},"modified":"2020-04-13T12:22:11","modified_gmt":"2020-04-13T06:52:11","slug":"verify-301-redirects","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.quickonlinetips.com\/archives\/2010\/07\/verify-301-redirects\/","title":{"rendered":"Build Instant Link Equity by Verifying 301 Redirects"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ask any SEO and they will tell you that 301 redirects are essential to running a successful SEO campaign.\u00a0 For people that are unfamiliar, a 301 redirect is considered a \u2018permanent\u2019 change of location from one URL to another.<\/p>\n

An alternative to a 301 redirect is a 302 redirect.\u00a0 A 302 redirect is also known as a \u2018temporary\u2019 redirect between two URLs.\u00a0 One of these redirects will transfer link authority between pages and the other does not, both however will be friendly from a user standpoint.<\/p>\n

Why 301 Redirects?<\/h2>\n

A 301 redirect is the only redirect in which the search engines will take as a signal to transfer the link authority from one URL to another.\u00a0 Ideally this redirect will allow your new page to replace your old page at the same position within the search engines.\u00a0 I say \u2018ideally\u2019 only because it has been debated that 301 redirects only transfer a percentage of ranking value<\/a>.<\/p>\n

What should you take from this? Only place redirects when you absolutely need them.\u00a0 Make sure to create the best URL structure up front so you can avoid multiple 301 redirects in the future. Remember that transferring a percentage of your link value is always better then not placing a 301 redirect and losing ALL the value.<\/p>\n

How To Check 301 Redirects?<\/h2>\n

It\u2019s not that uncommon that SEO\u2019s themselves are not the ones that implement the 301 redirects.\u00a0 If this is the situation it\u2019s a good idea to verify that all the redirects are indeed 301 redirects.<\/p>\n

My tool of choice is Fiddler Web Debugging Proxy\u00a0(fiddler2.com)\u00a0–\u00a0it\u2019s a fantastic tool that will run while you surf the internet.\u00a0 Try typing in your old URL that is now redirecting to the new page, what do you see in Fiddler?\u00a0 Look at my example below.<\/p>\n

The DKS site has a 301 redirect from the non \u2018www\u2019 version to the \u2018www\u2019 version.\u00a0 I can validate the 301 redirect by typing the non \u2018www\u2019 version into the browser and looking at the results in Fiddler.\u00a0 You will see that in the left that it displays \u2018301\u2019 which is the goal we wanted to achieve.<\/p>\n

\"301<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t Miss Out On Free Link Equity<\/h2>\n

301 redirects are not only important for website redesigns or simple URL changes but it\u2019s also a valuable tool to maximize your link building opportunities.\u00a0 Is an authoritative website linking to a page on your domain that displays a 404 error page?\u00a0 Place a 301 redirect from this non existing URL to receive value from the linking source.<\/p>\n

While link building is arguably the hardest aspect of SEO it doesn\u2019t always have to be.\u00a0 Start with your existing link portfolio and see what value you can squeeze from it.\u00a0 Increasing your link value might just start with making sure that your redirects are actually 301 redirects!<\/p>\n

Guest author Nick LeRoy\u00a0(nickleroy.com) is the Search Marketing Specialist at Minnesota Web Design firm DKS Systems,\u00a0an award winning web design and development firm that services clients nationwide. You can also guest post here<\/a> and share your SEO tips.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ask any SEO and they will tell you that 301 redirects are essential to running a successful SEO campaign.\u00a0 For…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"_kad_post_classname":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3,41],"tags":[44,49],"class_list":["post-14364","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-google","category-search-engine-optimization","tag-guest-posts","tag-tutorials"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.quickonlinetips.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14364","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.quickonlinetips.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.quickonlinetips.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.quickonlinetips.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.quickonlinetips.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14364"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.quickonlinetips.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14364\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.quickonlinetips.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14364"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.quickonlinetips.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14364"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.quickonlinetips.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14364"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}