Blogger has launched an Array of Search Engine related features and one of them is the ability to create Custom Redirects. Technically Blogger allows you to create 302 Redirects which are used to specify that the Web Page has temporarily moved to a new location.
What is a redirect ? - A visitor coming to a particular web address is redirected to another web address. This process is called Redirect. Blogger allows you to create Internal Redirects which means that you will be able to redirect the user coming to a particular URL on your blog to another URL on your Blog.
When are Blogger Redirects Useful?
Consider a situation where a page on your Blog was really popular and later you decided to delete it for some reason. Since that page is popular, references to that URL might be there at multiple Blogs/Websites which linked to you. The users coming to that popular URL will now be greeted with a 404 Page not Found Error. You might be loosing some potential readers/subscribers here. One way of resolving this would be to redirect the guy to some other relevant page. This is exactly what Blogger’s Custom Redirects do.
You can also use the Blogger Redirection Tool to create short links. For example you might want to redirect yourblog.blogspot.com/yourname to your contact page. You can do that easily using the Blogger’s Redirect Tool.
How to add Redirects?
I will describe this using an Example. I had a post about Meta Tags on my Blog. This entry was made some 4 years back and when Blogger launched the new Search Options, it became irrelevant. So I just deleted that post and made a new entry in my Blog with the new details. Now the visitors coming to that 4 year old URL from various sources would be greeted with a 404 error. I don’t want that to happen but I need that user to be sent to my new Blog Post.
- To do a Redirect you should have 2 URLs. The first one is the URL which should be redirected to the target. The target is the second URL where the user should be redirected to.
- The second thing that you have to do is to get the relative paths of these URLs.e.g.: The relative path to http://www.bloggerplugins.org/2008/06/meta-tags-for-blogger-blogspot.html is /2008/06/meta-tags-for-blogger-blogspot.html . You might have already figured out that you should remove your Blog’s home page URL from the URL to get the relative path. You should also make sure that the Relative path starts with a slash (/)
- Similarly you have to figure out the relative path to the Target URL. I opted for /2012/03/add-meta-description-tags-to-blogger.html
- Once you have got these 2 Relative paths, you can do the Redirect at Settings > Search Preferences > Errors & Redirects > Custom Redirects Add the From and To Fields there and click on the Save link and then on the Save Settings Button
- You can add more Redirects in a similar way.
Demo
Check out the following URLs and see how these get redirected
- A Post which is no longer there http://www.bloggerplugins.org/2008/06/meta-tags-for-blogger-blogspot.html
- A Custom Short URL that I made http://www.bloggerplugins.org/contact
Both of these URLs will get redirected to a different page instead of showing a 404 Page.
So great
ReplyDeleteI guess, there will be some limitation on the number of total redirections..
ReplyDeleteI too think so but haven't checked it out yet :)
DeleteI heard that maximum number of links are only 10. So we need to use this feature for important links.
DeleteYeah! Aneesh There are only 10 redirect.I tried it.So in last line we should use it wisely.
DeleteI thinks if's better to use at broken link that we encounter at WebMaster tools.
Thanks
Bye
Green Bajgain
Whoa, this is useful to me. Thank you!
ReplyDeleteVery important information, it is a useful way to save your deleted links.
ReplyDeleteThank you.
After this SEO update,
ReplyDeletei would have to say Blogger will be Kickin WordPress's A** :D
This is very useful master..
ReplyDeleteBut maybe this have limit redirect..
your demo links not re directing !!!!!!!
ReplyDeletethey actually are :-)
DeleteAgreed with Wallpapersmyth that
ReplyDeleteAfter this SEO update,
i would have to say Blogger will be Kickin WordPress's A** :D
In your example you use /contact, but when I put a similar url, like /melhores for redirect to /p/melhores.html, does not work, I can't salve the configuration. I can only put valid URLs in both fields.
ReplyDeleteCan you explain how you make work with a non-valid url?
Now I could. Thanks for the great post.
ReplyDeletewhat happen in serp (google search) if this trick add in 2 link?
ReplyDeleteI like your Popular Posts widget, did you share it?
ReplyDeletei want to Move my OLD blog to another blog, how can i do that with loosing Traffic?
ReplyDeletethe next big thing. .I am sure this one will make a big difference :)
ReplyDeleteThis is really awesome.. i also saw this.Thanks for sharing valuable information
ReplyDeleteThanx.. Has Been Waiting... For such a plugin for blogger...
ReplyDeletebut.. Limit is only 10.. :(.
but working 100%....
Redirect a link to their blog to another blog?
ReplyDeletethanks
How does this work? I don't understand. I need the Facebook widget on my blog. How can i go about it?
ReplyDeleteStill can't understand. Where i can found Redirect at Settings > Search Preferences > Errors & Redirects > Custom Redirects?
ReplyDeleteThanks in advance.
Thanks for this! Awesome. Very helpful indeed.
ReplyDeletePR 6 congrats bro ;D
ReplyDeleteI did this and I thought it was really great. That is until I checked for my search preferences for each post and found they were gone. This is a great thing to be able to do, but unfortunately, for some reason, you can't do it and still have a search description.
ReplyDeleteMy blog description disappeared. My individual posts descriptions disappeared, AND my 404 set redirect that I took a long time writing, disappeared as well.
It really worked for me
ReplyDeletethanks
wowww
ReplyDeletenice
Kindly explain me the difference between 301 redirect and canonical
ReplyDeleteGreat Information :) ! Thanks a ton
ReplyDeleteits awesome man i was searching for this already :)
ReplyDeleteand now i can redirect to my wanted page instead of home page of my blog :)