Why 301 redirect? Why it is important for SEO?
·
Redirection:
It is a process of
forwarding one URL to a different URL. There are three types.
- 301→ 301 refers to the HTTPS Status Code to redirect. URL
moved permanently and it is SEO recommended. It passes 90-99% link juice
will pass to the redirected page.
- 302→ it redirects the URL temporarily. It passes no
link juice. It is not an SEO recommended technique. It runs on http protocol
which dictates how the URL works. It has two major versions, HTTP 1.1 - “Moved
Temporarily” and HTTP 1.0 - to mean “Found”
- Meta
Refreshes→ It executes at page
level rather than the server level. Meta refreshes do pass some link juice. But,
slower and not SEO recommended due to poor usability and the loss of link juice
passed. They are most commonly associated with a 5 Sec countdown with
the text "If you are not redirected in 5 secs, click here".
To implement a 301
redirect for websites that are hosted on servers running Apache, you'll need
access to your server's. htaccess file.
Eg:
<?
Header (“HTTP/1.1 301 Moved Permanently”);
Header (“Location: http://www.new-url.com”);
?>
Importance:
It is common practice to redirect one URL to another. When doing
this, it is critical to observe best practices in order to maintain SEO value.