When an original web page gets removed or moved, a 301 redirect sends the visitors to a new or relevant URL. The deleted content may be unnecessary, but it may have accumulated a lot of valuable backlinks. If the page is not redirected to a relevant webpage correctly, then it will simply lose its SEO value. A 301 redirect points to a similar or most relevant live page.
For example, you are reviewing your URLs and come across a www.diet.com/old456.html. You will probably desire to clean it up, so use WordPress redirect 301 to direct guests from that old page to an improved page www.diet.com/new.
WP 301 redirect plugin is user-friendly WordPress plugin. It stops your visitors from landing on dead pages, and gets them redirected to the new ones. The link juice from the old page also gets transferred to the new one.
What is the meaning of 301 redirects?
It is a HyperText Transfer Protocol or HTTP code that responds from the server to the browser, when a specific URL is requested. The 301 redirect means that the webpage has been moved permanently. Basically, a 301 response means the architecture of your website is well-maintained. It stops guests from hitting an old, irrelevant, or broken 404 page. It even informs the search engines to redirect the links associated with the old URL, to the provided new one.
When to use 301 redirects?
- Migrating to the new domain
- Cleaning dynamic URLs
- Prevent duplicate content issues
- The rebuilding of your website
- Now the page is not useful, relevant, or deleted
SEO benefits of the WP 301 redirects
WP 301 redirect plugin is very crucial for good SEO practice. It helps in several ways.
Keeps visitors engaged
When users click on a specific link and hit a 404 page they get frustrated and retreat instantly. However, 301 redirects mean visitors land easily on new and engaging content, which could finally convert them into followers or customers.
Link equity
SEO professionals prefer 301 status codes, because it capably transfers 90% of link equity from the original page to a new one. The 302 redirects on the other hand are temporary, so search engines don’t pass on the link equity to those redirected pages.
Replaces the old URL with a new one in the index
When the bots encounter with 301 redirects, when they crawl your website, they replace the old URL with a new one in the index. Indexing is necessary for page rankings, which is taken care of automatically by the WP 301 redirects.
In case, 301 redirects are not employed, a 404 response code gets flashed. It means the page is not found and the search engine will remove it from their index completely, very soon.
Get complete control over multiple TLDs with your domain name
You can also use 301 redirects, if you buy cheap domain name TLDS to get complete ownership of your domain name. That way you can prevent any loss of traffic if the visitors type any wrong TLD or extension with your domain name.
Drawbacks of 301 redirects
Improper and incorrect usage can give rise to 301 redirect drawbacks. Over a period of time, redirect chains and looping issues crop up. You will need to learn about redirect chains and tricks to handle them. WordPress 301 redirect plugin is a useful tool for all the webmasters who use the WordPress platform.
