301 redirects and saving Link Juice?

[ChadCook]

Is it a good idea?


SEO question here.... when you buy a domain from an auction how and what do you do when trying to save the link juice from links pointing to the domain you buy.

I was thinking about adding a 301 redirect on the domains 404.php page to redirect links to the main page.... would this be a good idea to help save back links from pointing at dead pages?

How are YOU...saving link juice from pointing at dead pages after you buy a domain?




Chad

[Dan B Rusu]

Originally Posted by ChadCook

Is it a good idea?


SEO question here.... when you buy a domain from an auction how and what do you do when trying to save the link juice from links pointing to the domain you buy.

I was thinking about adding a 301 redirect on the domains 404.php page to redirect links to the main page.... would this be a good idea to help save back links from pointing at dead pages?

How are YOU...saving link juice from pointing at dead pages after you buy a domain?




Chad

I'm wondering the same thing, but with 302 redirects. Has anyone bought a matured domain and 302d it to a site they wanted to get ranking?

[ChadCook]

I thought I would get more replies to this question.

Is there not any SEO experts in here? I find that hard to believe.

Please add your thoughts and expertise.

[yukon]

I always 301 my 404 page back to my Index page no matter what site I'm building.

If the page can't be found I send them back Home.

[ExploringInfinity]

Sorry to be a noob, I've read about doing 301's for your 404's, but I don't know how to do it..

Sure I could google it, but you know someone else is going to ask it here anyway..

Actually, instead of asking, I'll find out and post it here:

Well, that was easy.. Here's a wordpress plugin that can help you set up your wordpress to 301 your 404s:

WordPress › Redirection « WordPress Plugins

[yukon]

Originally Posted by ExploringInfinity

Sorry to be a noob, I've read about doing 301's for your 404's, but I don't know how to do it..

Sure I could google it, but you know someone else is going to ask it here anyway..

Actually, instead of asking, I'll find out and post it here:

Well, that was easy.. Here's a wordpress plugin that can help you set up your wordpress to 301 your 404s:

WordPress › Redirection « WordPress Plugins

Don't use a plugin, this is all you need.

1) Wordpress Admin
2) Appearance (left sidebar)
3) Editor (left sidebar)
4) 404.php (right sidebar)
5) Copy & paste the contents of your 404.php into a new text file on your desktop & save as a backup.
6) Paste the code below into your 404.php page. The code below is the only code that should be in your 404.php

Note:
Don't forget to create a backup of the 404.php before you make any changes just in case you want to go back to the original 404 later on...

<?php
header("HTTP/1.1 301 Moved Permanently");
header("Location: ".get_bloginfo('url'));
exit();
?>

[yukon]

Or, you can do this, same steps as above to install.

This will let you pick any page on the net to redirect to.

Example, this will redirect to hxxp://www.yahoo.com (hxxp = http).

<?php
header("HTTP/1.1 301 Moved Permanently");
header('Location: http://www.yahoo.com');
exit();
?>

This way you can send all 404's to any page on your site, or another site If you wanted to.

[marbar33]

Following on with this discussion then, I have a question please.
On my website I have an index.html page ('Home' on the side menu) and then, following the 'Products" button on the side menu, I have my sales page.

Now I want to remove the present index.html page altogether and redirect the sales.html to act as the index.html as well as stay as the sales.html because of the menu link. (So my present sales page will be both index/Home and sales/Products according to the side menu bar.)

How do I do this?

If I do the 301 redirect through .htaccess will that suffice to disable the present index.html page or is there some other step I need to take, like create a blank index.html page first?

I also have the code for doing the redirect alternatively with php but again don't know where to insert it.

It's the step by step process of putting the code in the right place that has me baffled.

Looking forward to expert advice....

[raviv]

Hi Chad,
The way I have understood your question, these are my observations.
First, when you buy an expired domain or from an auction, make sure the domain has not been dropped a lot of times by many owners along the way. There is not much integrity in that domain name in the eyes of Google.
Second, assuming the domain you bought is xyz.com, if you still want to refurbish this site, then you have say page1.htm, page2.htm on this site which has backlinks to it. What you would do is create similar themed pages in the redesigned site as newpage1.htm, newpage2.htm and then do a 301 permanent redirect from page1.htm to its corresponding new avatar newpage1.htm. Same from page2.htm to newpage2.htm
Redirecting the 404 page is not a good SEO technique.
THe worst method you can use is 302 redirect as the search engines get very confused by temporary redirects. So stay away from it
Best
Raviv

[ChadCook]

OK found the solution to and way I can find to use 301 redirects and saving Link Juice on blogs.

There is a wordpress plugin called 404-to-start that will do the trick just fine.

[ChadCook]

Hope this helps others now.