Changing page urls

[totsntoys]

I just wanted to check if I change page urls the old page url will forward to the new url.

It seems to be doing this but just wanted to check this will remain or do I still need to do 301 redirects.

[john]

Hi Tracy,
there isn't a simple answer,it depends how you change it and what part of it you change.
It can get very complicated if you have a product in more than one category, it's better to be safe and 301 it to the Url you want indexed.
I am experimenting at the moment with having a top category of 'product' that is disabled and will have all products in, any product then in a lower active category with have the canonical url yoursite/product/widget.html which won't change however many categories you may move it to and from and that will be the one indexed by Google.
The way it works at the moment is that if you move a product from a lower category to a higher one the canonical url changes and although it will still go through to the product, you lose any index value.

Hope this is clear, as I said it can get very complicated, perhaps Rich can express it better but when in doubt 301 it.

I suppose you could do this by putting the default 'all products' category at the top of the category tree disabled but you have no control over products in this and I would rather be able to choose how the canonical url is formed, to this end I have also made 'all products' noe index - no follow, as we have in the past had duplicate urls indexed from 'all products' when this should have been impossible.

[Stix]

This is food for thought - I'm always changing the category orders! Dumb question I'm sure but how do you do 301 redirects? and I don't seem to have an 'all products' category, is it something I need to create?

[Neil]

It depends how well your products are ranked in the first place.

If on page 1 then def. do a redirect, in any lower then i don't usually bother as i find google lists the new url faster if i don't do a redirect.

[totsntoys]

Thanks for your advice John,

Basically it is the product part itself I am changing. I set up with Bluepark in March this year and imported all my products by csv and just realised that doing it this way it has set up all the urls with the product code rather than the product name which is obviously better for seo.

As they are all relatively new urls and I have 301 redirects set up from my old site I think I will just change them. The point I was making is that for those I have changed if I type the old url in a browser web address it forwards to the new url anyway. Are there automatic redirects in place for any changes you make like this?

Good point about changing categories, I might look at doing something like that as well as it means you always have a static url whatever other changes you make.

Stix - here is a thread on 301 redirects if you feel the need:

http://www.bluepark.co.uk/forums/sho...light=htaccess


Stix - I went to follow you on Twitter - but the link in your signature is wrong.

[Red Devil]

For this product, can you confirm whether or not you have set up a manual 301 redirect from your old site?

www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-crafts/11282.html

http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-craf...uxe-easel.html

<link rel="canonical" href="http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-craf...uxe-easel.html">

I'm guessing you have.

So www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-crafts/11282.html points to http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-craf...uxe-easel.html in the htaccess file

If you were to change the Product Title so that it no longer said "melisaa doug deluxe easel" but it said "ABCXYZ" both your new URL would change to http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-crafts/ABCXYZ.html and if the product only appeared in one category the canonical ref would change to <link rel="canonical" href="http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-crafts/ABCXYZ.htmll">

However, your 301 would no longer work as it is pointing to the old (new site) URL name http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-craf...uxe-easel.html

Like Neil says, changing all your 301s may not be worth it as Google will re-index the new ones fairly quickly.

So, in conclusion, continue what you're doing by changing the Product Titles to have more meaningful names rather than a product number which in turn will change the format of your URLs, leave your existing 301s alone as these will become redundant, and let Google re-index your new URLs.

Submit your xml Sitemap to Google to speed things up at their end but if Google is visiting every day then it will take about a week for your Google searches to re-index.

[totsntoys]

I don't have any 301 redirect in place for this url.
http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-crafts/11282.html

It is not my old site url - it is the url I had on Bluepark from March until last night.

When I changed it to
http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-craf...uxe-easel.html

I think I'm getting confused. But getting the point - forget 301 redirects and just change the product names.

Many thanks

[Red Devil]

I don't have any 301 redirect in place for this url.
http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-crafts/11282.html

It is not my old site url - it is the url I had on Bluepark from March until last night.

When I changed it to
http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-craf...uxe-easel.html

I think I'm getting confused. But getting the point - forget 301 redirects and just change the product names.

Many thanks

I'm confused. Perhaps I'm missing something???

OK change this URL http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-crafts/A520W.html so that it uses the Product Title and becomes http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-craf...lage-farm.html

Currently http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-craf...lage-farm.html gives a 404 Page Not Found as it doesn't exist.

The canonical ref currently says:-

<link rel="canonical" href="http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-crafts/A520W.html">

The question is, after the change will http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-crafts/A520W.html give a 404 or will it automatically redirect to http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-craf...lage-farm.html ?

[totsntoys]

I'm confused. Perhaps I'm missing something???

OK change this URL http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-crafts/A520W.html so that it uses the Product Title and becomes http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-craf...lage-farm.html

Currently http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-craf...lage-farm.html gives a 404 Page Not Found as it doesn't exist.

The canonical ref currently says:-

<link rel="canonical" href="http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-crafts/A520W.html">

The question is, after the change will http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-crafts/A520W.html give a 404 or will it automatically redirect to http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-craf...lage-farm.html ?

Just changed that page to the product name as opposed to product code but both urls point to the correct page. Automatically! I haven't set up 301 redirect - just ticked the url text box and saved.

[Red Devil]

Just changed that page to the product name as opposed to product code but both urls point to the correct page. Automatically! I haven't set up 301 redirect - just ticked the url text box and saved.

The new canonical ref has changed as I would have expected, so no other product is involved to point it somewhere else.

<link rel="canonical" href="http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-craf...lage-farm.html">

At least it answers the question that you don't need to set up a 301 redirect everytime you change the product title that generates the new URL.

It didn't use to work like this. It used to give a 404 error.

Perhaps Richard can explain what's going on.

An interesting experiment. Thanks.

[Red Devil]

All I can think of is that somehow in the htaccess file, the actual internal URL (generated by the software/PHP code e.g. item 101) has been translated into a real displayable SEO Friendly URL e.g. my-item-101.html by a Rewrite command and this is stored in the database. So there are 2 URLs stored on the database.

When you change my-item-101.html to something else e.g. my-item-102.html it is updated on the database but the original URL item 101 (internal reference/pointer) stays the same and this is the one that the software uses as its reference, but displays the other SEO Friendly URL one. The Cache is automatically refreshed.

So, in conclusion, you don't need 301 redirects for your current website URL changes unless you delete a product.

[totsntoys]

I'm not sure how it works, which is why I doubted it at first.

All I know is it is good new and makes life so much easier.

Thanks Red Devil for helping make it clearer for me.

[john]

As far as I know, the system automatically puts a re-direct (301?) in when you move the product from category to category, with the canonical Url becoming that of the highest category in the tree, the only drawback I can see is if there is already a 301 somewhere in existence. The product will then have a 301 on a 301 and Google in particular is not very happy about multiple re-directs.
This is one reason why I believe that it is better to have all products to a canonical Url that doesn't change i.e. yoursite/product/widget regardless of category, (as per some other software that seems to get better PR than us) i don't yet know if it gives better results in Google as it's still just an experiment but results should start showing soon.

[Red Devil]

What I still don't understand is how does the old URL (which doesn't physically exist)

http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-crafts/A520W.html

now point to

http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-craf...lage-farm.html

without any manual 301s ???

Can you elaborate, Richard?

[john]

What I still don't understand is how does the old URL (which doesn't physically exist)

http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-crafts/A520W.html

now point to

http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-craf...lage-farm.html

without any manual 301s ???

Can you elaborate, Richard?

Presumably because all you did was rename it. it's still the same product as far as the db is concerned.

[Red Devil]

What I still don't understand is how does the old URL (which doesn't physically exist)

http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-crafts/A520W.html

now point to

http://www.totsntoys.co.uk/arts-craf...lage-farm.html

without any manual 301s ???

Can you elaborate, Richard?

The reason why the above works is a quirk of Bluepark.

If the "URL Text" is blank on the product page, the URL of the product is constructed from the SKU. I assume that the SKU for this product is "A520W". This URL "A520W.html" stays with the product forever (unless you change the SKU).

If you now enter something into the "URL Text" the URL is now constructed from that text.

If you tick the box next to the "URL Text", then the URL is formatted from the "Product Title" above the "URL Text" box and the "Product Title" supersedes what was originally in the "URL Text" box.

OK, if you were to change what is in the "URL Text" box from "my collage farm" to "my collage farm new version" the URL would change from "my-collage-farm.html" to "my-collage-farm-new-version.html".

If you tried accessing the page using the old URL "my-collage-farm.html" you will get a 404 Not Found for that page.

However, the page is still accessible using the URL "A520W.html". A quirk of Bluepark.

It is just a coincidence that the original URL was based on the SKU.

So, yet again, to conclude, if you change your URL and the previous URL was not made up of the SKU, then you DO need to create a manual 301 Redirect as the system will not do it for you. Or as Neil says, wait till Google catches up...

Totsntoys - your are fortunate that your previous URL was made up of the SKU. So no need for any 301s for you (this time).

I think that's enough on this subject ....

P.S. So the logic in Bluepark is if the "URL Text" box is blank, use the SKU URL otherwise use the "URL Text" box URL.

If you look at your site's xml sitemap www.mysite.co.uk/sitemap.xml you can see at a glance which Products haven't got their "URL Text" box filled in because the URL will be made up of "SKU.html" e.g. 123.html instead of a meaningful name. The same goes for Categories (made up of the Category number assigned to it by Bluepark).

[Red Devil]

Totsntoys

I see you have over 800 products. It will take you a lifetime to go through them one by one to create the SEO Friendly URLs.

Here's a better way. You can do it automatically using the Product Export/Import feature.

Before attempting this, we need to take a Complete Back Up of your Product Data in CSV format.

Back Up

1. Select Catalogue / Export Product Data.
2. You will see some examples there such as Complete Export, Googlebase Example etc.,.
3. Click on the Complete Export Template.
4. Leave everything as it is. All the columns are pre-selected.
5. Click on the Grey/Silver Down Arrow icon to generate the export CSV file. Confirmation at the top of the rows/products exported.
6. Click on the Green Excel icon in the top middle of the screen to download the CSV file and select "save" from the pop up window and save it somewhere on your computer where you will be able to find it. Give it a meaningful name e.g CompleteExport.csv (with or with the dot CSV on the end) but make sure you save it as a CSV file (Microsoft Excel Comma Separated Values - should default to this).

That's everything saved. Hopefully you won't need this backup.


OK now we can do the Export / Import to create the URL Text.

Export

1. Select Catalogue / Export Product Data.
2. You will see some examples there such as Complete Export, Googlebase Example etc.,.
3. We are going to create a new Export Template.
4. Click on the Green Cross Icon in the top right hand corner of the screen which will create a new template. Call this (Export Name) anything you like e.g. URL Creation Export
5. Next to the SKU field, select Column/A from the drop down. That's all you need, one column. The rest will say "Ignore" next to them. Then Save. This will create the Export Template. Confirmation shows at the top of the screen.
6. Click on the Grey/Silver Down Arrow icon to generate the export CSV file. Confirmation at the top of the rows/products exported. Remember we are only exporting the SKU numbers here (in Column A), nothing else.
7. Click on the Green Excel icon in the top middle of the screen to download the CSV file and select "save" from the pop up window and save it somewhere on your computer where you will be able to find it. Give it a meaningful name e.g URLExport.csv (with or with the dot CSV on the end) but make sure you save it as a CSV file (Microsoft Excel Comma Separated Values - should default to this).

That's the Export finished.

Now we are going to import that exported data back into the database from the CSV file. In effect we only have the SKUs.

Import

1. Select Catalogue / Import Product Data.
2. Again you will see some example templates.
3. We are going to create a new Import Template.
4. Click on the Green Cross Icon in the top right hand corner of the screen which will create a new template. Call this (Import Name) anything you like e.g. URL Creation Import
5. Next to the SKU field, select Column/A from the drop down. That's all you need. Make sure the DELETE option is set to ignore (the default). Then Save. This will create the Export Template. Confirmation shows at the top of the screen.
6. The important bit. Within the template, click on the "File Format" tab (you are currently in the Properties tab) and on the File Format tab TICK the box that says "Generate URL text". The "Ignore First Row" should also be TICKED (default). Save again.
6. Click on the Browse button to locate your saved CSV file on your computer using the pop up window e.g URLExport.csv
7. Once selected, click "Go". Confirmation will show at the top of the number of rows/products processed. That's it!

Remember the only data affected is the URL Text which has been generated from your Product Titles.

Any problems, questions - PM me or ask on here.

[totsntoys]

Red Devil

I can not thank you enough - you have indeed saved me hundreds of hours.

It's easy when you know how!!!! Thank you so much

[Red Devil]

Red Devil

I can not thank you enough - you have indeed saved me hundreds of hours.

It's easy when you know how!!!! Thank you so much

Glad to help

[Stix]

Thanks for your advice John,

Stix - here is a thread on 301 redirects if you feel the need:

http://www.bluepark.co.uk/forums/sho...light=htaccess


Stix - I went to follow you on Twitter - but the link in your signature is wrong.

Thanks Tracy
Have update my sig with the correct link too.