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Become a legend and solve the 301 redirect nightmare!

by Christiena
9 replies
  • WEB DESIGN
    • |
Please solve this headache for 100's of us newbies.


- I purchased the re-branding rights to a pdf guide.

- The download page is up : domain is with godaddy but is hosted as an addon domain at hostgator. If I'm correct it is a html site? where I just put files up through cpanel or ftp.

I am trying to create a 301 permanent redirect for each of the affiliate links within that guide. The links only exist in the pdf - not on any of the pages of the website. So what I have up is:

the images folder
the files folder containing the pdf zip file
the webpages

What I've already tried over the past few days:

- Use the redirect feature at hostgator. This resulted in 404 pages. Help is written in alien language and threads are unresolved.
- create a 301 redirect php script. This results in 505 pages and framelll?
(whatever that is)
- plus various other ways to put the php code that didn't do anything except make for error pages. Out of hundreds of sites that contain the just create this "code" none of them are helpful for the many of us who weren't born with this stuff allready enscribed on our DNA.

I even bought a useless piece of software that didn't work.

What I did find out from all this research is that the best way to do a 301 redirect is through htaccess. For a clean site and better seo and keeping Google happy or something.

So...please be a legend and explain it like you're talking to a 2year old:

1. How does a newbie create an htaccess redirect file for all of their affiliate links? Or do you need to make a seperate one for each link?

2. Where do you put that file?

3. Do you need to create extra files or folders to make it work and if so, where do you put these?

4. Do the pdf affiliate links need to exist somewhere on cpanel or will it work if they don't exist on the website and only in the rebranded book?

5. The links in the pdf are ffs://thisisnotalinkallready.c*m/ whatIwantitnamed. Should they have a .html or .psp extension? Do I have to create an extra file or folder to point to these?

Please be a legend and help us out with this. I've visited so many forums with fustrated newbies who go to unresolved threads. Other information is probably spot on but how do you use it?

Hope that all made sense. So confused. Pacing patiently.

(the links look funny cause this thing won't post otherwise)

Shutting up now...
#301 #301 redirects #aff links in ebooks #cloak affiliate links #legend #make a 301 redirect #nightmare #pdf affiliate link #redirect #solve
  • Profile picture of the author Elion Makkink
    Wow, this sounds complicated. You could try to contact coders on this forum directly since I don't think you'll get a lot of feedback :-)

    Goodluck!
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    Cheers,
    Elion Makkink

    Become an SEO Hustler too at seohustlers.com

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    • Profile picture of the author Christiena
      Originally Posted by Elion Makkink View Post

      Wow, this sounds complicated. You could try to contact coders on this forum directly since I don't think you'll get a lot of feedback :-)

      Goodluck!

      Thank you Elion. I think it might sound more complicated than it is because of the way I put it. Basically put - I want to create 301 redirects for affiliate links that are in a pdf. I need it explained in a useable way - not just 'use this code'. See what happens.
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  • Profile picture of the author Nail Yener
    I can suggest creating one .html file for each affiliate link and redirect it via .htaccess. Here is a sample:

    - Let's say you have Affiliate Product 1.
    - Create a blank .html file, e.g. affiliate-product-1.html.
    - Upload this file to your website folder.
    - In your pdf file, change the links for affiliate product 1 to http://www.yoursite.com/affiliate-product-1.html
    - Now in your .htaccess file insert the following code:

    Code:
    Redirect /affiliate-product-1.html http://www.the-real-affiliate-link.com/
    If you need further help, you can contact me via pm.
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    • Profile picture of the author Christiena
      [QUOTE=Nail Yener;4996563]I can suggest creating one .html file for each affiliate link and redirect it via .htaccess. Here is a sample:...


      WOOT! that works and it was all so simple in the end. Just a slap yourself in the head moment right there.

      What most every other advice on the net is missing is the html page you need to make. Some even said to create a psp index. Errors galore. This code is also much cleaner than some suggestions. Happy days.

      If you visit here again could I ask:

      do I need to make a htaccess file for every single redirect or can they all go into one?
      Can I insert 301 into the code you supplied to make it permanent or does it make no difference?

      Your a legend Nail -thank you so very much
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      • Profile picture of the author Nail Yener
        Originally Posted by Christiena View Post

        do I need to make a htaccess file for every single redirect or can they all go into one?
        Can I insert 301 into the code you supplied to make it permanent or does it make no difference?

        Your a legend Nail -thank you so very much
        You are welcome Christiena, I am glad it helped. You need only one .htaccess file and you can insert as many redirection codes as you want into that (one per line).

        You shouldn't worry about 301 since these are affiliate links. But for example if you moved a page to another location and you want to create a permanent redirection (so that you won't lose SE rankings), you should use the following code:

        Code:
        Redirect 301 /old-page.html /new-page.html
# OR
Redirect 301 /old-page.html http://www.newwebsite.com/new-page.html
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  • Profile picture of the author Michael71
    Personally I can not recommend using .htaccess (or let's better say mod_rewrite, if you use Apache webserver) because this can end in a real mess.

    If you make one error your website can be down (501 Server Error)...

    If you just want cloaked links there are several scripts out there.

    ---

    5. The links in the pdf are ffs://thisisnotalinkallready.c*m/ whatIwantitnamed. Should they have a .html or .psp extension? Do I have to create an extra file or folder to point to these?

    To answer this question:

    Use for example "ffs://thisisnotalinkallready.c*m/ whatIwantitnamed" with NO extension at all!

    the links in that guide point to your domain, right? Can you still change them?

    I would do it like this:

    make a folder with the name like "whatIwantitnamed" in your root folder. Upload an index.html file in that folder with the following code:

    Code:
    <html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="refresh" content="0; url=ffs://the-real-affiliate-link.c*m"> 
</head>
<body>
Redirecting to <a href="ffs://the-real-affiliate-link.c*m">this site</a>.
</body>
</html>
    If someone now opens the link "ffs://thisisnotalinkallready.c*m/ whatIwantitnamed" he gets automatically redirect to the real affiliate "link".

    If he uses some old browser he will see the message "Redirecting to this site" and he can click.

    Other solution:

    Since I run an URL shortening service I can use that one with custom URL's ...
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  • Profile picture of the author Christiena
    Thank you Nail and Michael. I really appreciate your advice. Not to mention the fact you made sense of my question lol.

    Nail, I will give that a go. It's 4 in the morning here so I'm gonna catch some shuteye first.

    Michael, is that what you call a html redirect? I've only been learning this redirect stuff for a few days so I don't know. If it is I've read conflicting stories about the method especially in relation to google whacking you senseless over time. This is why all this is so confusing to a newbie.

    I am able to rebrand the pdf to whatever I need it to be at any time - phew. The aim is to have a permanent solution for the redirect as once this goes viral I can't change it. People would get mighty unhappy if the links don't take them to the information they want.

    I'm not worried about messing up the site. Got a full back-up and I've been keeping plenty of hostgator support staff in full-time employment during my learning curve. Their support is unreal.

    Thanks guys

    Sleep and then try it out...eeek
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  • Profile picture of the author Michael71
    I am not a fan of using frames.

    Another possibility is using an URL shortener... since I can install mine on any of my domains it won't hurt in terms of SEO
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    HTML/CSS/jQuery/ZURB Foundation/Twitter Bootstrap/Wordpress/Frontend Performance Optimizing
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    • Profile picture of the author Christiena
      Originally Posted by Michael71 View Post

      I am not a fan of using frames.

      Another possibility is using an URL shortener... since I can install mine on any of my domains it won't hurt in terms of SEO
      I hear you. It's starting to look to me like one of those ford/vs/holden things.

      May I ask why you're not a fan? You are absolutely right about the method being fussy. Miss even a . and it gets messy.

      I'm going to give your code a go on my next site. It will be interesting to see what all the fuss is about and whether or not it really does have any bearing on seo or cross browser viewing.

      Thank you Michael

      WF sure is a place for legends
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