What do you do with old web pages?
-
I have a wordpress blog that I've made a ton of changes to. I have about a dozen pages on it that have old information or I no longer have a use for. In retrospect, I probably should have used the old pages for new content instead of building new pages. Should I just leave them on the site with no links to them, should I mark them as noindex, or should I delete them? I think some of the old pages could be completing with my new pages for ranking due to similar content.
Website is: http://continuumweddings.com if you'd like to check out my site.
Thanks,
Melissa
-
Not sure what you meant by " wont be wasting any content,"
A 301 redirect will only redirect incomming links to the new page, the content value of the old page or any inherent authority it had will not be passed.
It will no lnger exist, only the incomming links will exist and can be redirected
-
Thanks! I actually have a Pinterest buttom in the menu and link to it at the end of all my blog entries. I'm obsessed with Pinterest but I'm still trying to figure out the best way to use it for my business.
-
Casey is correct.
If you already have written new pages, there's no need to update the old ones. Redirect them 301 to the most consistent new page you have.
Anyway, in the future, try to consider to use one of tips I suggested in one my last comment in the SEOmoz blog: you can read them here > http://www.seomoz.org/blog/new-links-old-pages-whiteboard-friday#jtc165757
Psst... I've seen the site and, sincerely, it is one of the best sites about wedding photography I've seen so far. Just a suggestion: being the photos so important both in the site and the blog, I warmly suggest you to add the Pinterest button to your site and to partecipate in Pinterest as I truly believe that it is the social network perfect for a business like yours.
-
I second that! It would have been best to update the old pages.
-
The best thing to do would be to update those pages with new & fresh content. But if you have already made new pages which are out ranking and competing with your old pages you can do a 301 redirect from the old pages to the new pages. This way you wont be wasting any content, and any authority the old pages had will be passed along to the new pages.
Since your using WordPress you can use Simple 301 Redirects Plugin to make it easier.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Should I change our main category pages to product listing pages?
With the thought of improving user experience, as well as rankings in Google, I'm considering changing our main category pages to product listing pages (with sub-categories remaining, still). These main category pages are very standard and don't link to any informational content, such as buyers guides, etc. What's driven this is the latest Google core update. I've noticed our main competitor (who we were out-ranking before... but not now) now uses this approach. I can see the benefit from a user perspective, i.e. less clicks to reach products. What's the pros/cons from an SEO point of view, please? Could the potential duplication of content be an issue? For context, we have about 2,000 products and website is on Magento 2.
On-Page Optimization | | alifeofjoy1 -
How to improve page authority?
Hello guys, I am in need of some helpful tips to improve my page authority for this site www.servicii-funerare-iuliana.ro . I have page authority 0, and I don't know why... Thanks.
On-Page Optimization | | iulianafun0 -
Why are my pages de-indexed?
<form id="form-t3_37nfib9dz" class="usertext" action="http://www.reddit.com/r/SEO/comments/37nfib/why_were_my_pages_deindexed/#"> Hello all, I am very new to SEO. For some reason many of the pages on my site were de-indexed. Specifically the ones linked from this page: However other pages, like the ones linked from this page and this page were not de-indexed. http://www.lawyerconnection.ca/practice-areas/car-accident-injury-lawyers/[1] However the pages linked from this page were not de-indexed: http://www.lawyerconnection.ca/practice-areas/slip-and-fall-lawyers/[2] http://www.lawyerconnection.ca/podcastresources/[3] That first page itself was not de-indexed, just the site that it links to. It just happened today, so maybe I am jumping the gun but I doubt it. When I enter the page into google webmaster tools again and press fetch, one of the child pages, it re-indexes. What could be the problem here? I had someone re-write the content for every city but I have a feeling that there is less differences in the car accidents pages? Is this considered duplicated content do you think? Am I making some other mistake I can't think of? Is it just a one day blip (I doubt it) Let me know, thanks. </form>
On-Page Optimization | | RafeTLouis0 -
Area pages
As area pages are seen as trying to game google (see link below) is their a 'better way' to target multipe areas (100 odd)? https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/2721311?hl=en Cheers
On-Page Optimization | | webguru20140 -
Page rank question
Hi all, pretty standard SEO question that I'm sure you are all getting asked day in, day out... the following page: http://www.3wisemonkeys.co.uk/dvd/portable-dvd-player-car/ It's targetting keywords "portable dvd", "portable DVD player", "portable DVD players" & "portable dvd player for car". The page gets a grade A via Moz analytics On-page grader for the keywords. We have incoming links and I believe the page is structured correctly with all meta tags, H1 etc and tried not too overload the tags with keywords. We have the keywords in the URL etc. We are still stuck on page 2 for all phrases. Any thoughts or suggestions as to what we are doing wrong please? Any help would be great.
On-Page Optimization | | jasef0 -
On Page reports is empty
Hello, Yesterday I created my PRO account, I have several urls in top 50 instead of a have no report in On Page Reports, how low take the system for generating this? Thank you, Carlos
On-Page Optimization | | cahams0 -
I am optimizing my webpages according to suggestions from the On Page Report Card. Should I have more than one keyword for a page?
I am optimizing my webpages according to suggestions from the On Page Report Card. Should I have more than one keyword for a page or should I make separate pages for each keyword even when they are similar? Will Google penalize me for making similar pages? Imagine selling, bargain milk chocolate peanut clusters. Keywords examples could be: Bargain chocolate Bargain milk chocolate Bargain milk chocolate peanut clusters Bargain chocolate peanut clusters Chocolate peanut cluster bargains Milk chocolate peanut cluster bargains Etc. Will one page called http://mycompany/bargainmilkchocolatepeanutclusters.com be OK or should I have one called http://mycompany/bargainmilkchocolate.com and one called http://mycompany/bargainmilkchocolatepeanutclusters.com and one called http://mycompany/chocolatepeanutclusterbargains.com , etc.? Thanks for your advice.
On-Page Optimization | | KSHAYY0 -
Page speed tools
Working on reducing page load time, since that is one of the ranking factors that Google uses. I've been using Page Speed FireFox plugin (requires FireBug), which is free. Pretty happy with it but wondering if others have pointers to good tools for this task. Thanks...
On-Page Optimization | | scanlin0