A redirect occurs when someone requests a specific page but is sent to a different page. Often the site owner has taken down the page and set up a redirect to send the visiteurs and search engines on a relevant page. A much better approach than serving them a boring and unengaging experience. Redirects play an important role in the lives of site owners, developers and SEOs. So let's answer some recurring questions about redirects for the SEO.

1. Are redirections bad for SEO?

Well, it depends, but in most cases, no. Redirects are not bad for the SEO, but (as with many things) only if you set them up correctly. Poor implementation can cause all kinds of problems, from loss of PageRank to loss of traffic. Redirecting pages is a must if you make changes to your URLs. After all, you don't want to see all the hard work you've put into building an audience and collecting links, go down the drain.

2. Why should I redirect a URL?

By redirecting a modified URL, you send both users and bots to a new URL, minimizing nuisance. Every time you do some kind of maintenance on your site, you are changing things. You could delete an article, change your URL structure, or move your site to a new domain. You need to replace it or visiteurs will land on those dreaded 404 errors. If you make small changes, like deleting an outdated article, you can redirect that old URL with a 301 to a relevant new article or give it a 410 to say you deleted it. Don't delete items without a plan. And don't redirect your URLs to random posts that have nothing to do with the post you're deleting.

Larger projects require a URL migration strategy. Switching from HTTP to HTTPS for example (we'll talk more about that later), by changing URL paths, or by moving your site to a new domain. In this case, you should examine all the URLs on your site and associate them with their future locations on the new domain. After determining what goes where, you can start redirecting URLs. Use the change of address tool in Google Search Console to notify Google of changes.

3. What is a 301 redirect? What about a 302 redirect?

Use a 301 redirect to permanently redirect a URL to a new destination. In this way, you indicate to visiteurs and to search engines that this URL has changed and a new destination is found. This is the most common redirect. Do not use a 301 if you wish to reuse this URL. If so, you need a 302 redirect.

A 302 redirect is a so-called temporary redirect. This means that you can use it to say that this content is temporarily unavailable at that address, but it will come back.

4. What is an easy way to manage redirects on WordPress?

We could be a bit biased, but we think the redirection manager in the Yoast SEO Premium WordPress plugin It's incredible. We know that a lot of people have a hard time understanding the concept of redirects and the kind of work that goes into adding and managing them. This is why one of the first things added to the WordPress SEO plugin was an easy to use redirect tool.

Here's what happens when you delete an article:
  • Move an item to the trash
  • A message appears stating that you have moved an item to the trash
  • Choose one of the two options offered by the redirect manager:
    • Redirect to another URL
    • Serving a deleted 410 header content
  • If you choose redirect, a modal window will open where you can enter the new URL for that particular post
  • Save and you're done!

So practical, no?

5. What is a redirect checker?

A redirect checker is a tool to determine if a given URL is redirected and analyze the path it is following. You can use this information to find bottlenecks, such as a redirect string in which a URL is redirected multiple times, which makes it much more difficult for Google to crawl that URL, and gives users a less user experience. historical. These channels often arrive without you knowing it: if you delete a page that has already been redirected, you add another part to the channel. So, you need to keep an eye on your redirects and one of the tools to do that is a redirect checker.

You can use any of the SEO suites like Sitebulb, Ahrefs, and Screaming Frog to test your redirects and links. If you just need a quick check, you can also use a simpler tool like httpstatus.io to give you insight into the life of a URL on your site. Another must-have tool is the Redirect Path extension for Chrome, made by Ayima.

6. Do I have to redirect HTTP to HTTPS?

Whenever you plan to move to HTTPS protocol for your site (the one with the green padlock in the address bar) you must redirect your HTTP traffic to HTTPS. You might have trouble with Google if you make your site available over HTTP and HTTPS, so be careful of that. Additionally, browsers will display a NOT SECURE message when the site is unsecured over an HTTPS connection. Additionally, Google prefers HTTPS sites because these tend to be faster and more secure. Your visitors also expect additional security.

You must therefore configure a 301 redirect from HTTP to HTTPS. There are two ways to do this and you need to plan for this to make sure everything goes as planned. First of all, the preferred way to do this is at the server level. Find out what type of server your site is running on (NGINX, Apache, or other) and find the code needed to add to your server configuration file or .htaccess file. Most often, your host has a guide to help you configure HTTP to HTTPS redirect at the server level. Check out our tutorial to learn more.

Il ya also des WordPress plugins who can handle the HTTPS/SSL stuff for your site, but for this specific issue I wouldn't rely on a plugin, but handle your redirect at the server level. Don't forget to let Google know about changes in Search Console.

Referrals for SEO

There are a lot of questions that arise about redirection and SEO. If you think about it, the concept of a redirect isn't too difficult to grasp. Getting started with redirects isn't that difficult either. The difficult part about dealing with redirects is managing them. Where are all these redirects leading? What if something breaks? Can you find redirect chains or redirect loops? Can you shorten the paths? You can gain a lot by optimizing your redirects, so you should go ahead and fix them. Do you have any burning questions about redirects? Let us know in the comments!