I created a site to replace my clients old worpress site made by someone else.
I had to use their hosting company … usually I use Chillidog so Greg helps me!
My problem is that I did not make a 404 error page.
I deleted the old files from the server. I thought that Google would have forgotten them by now and replaced with my new site. But now when I Google the clients name a list of pages come up which includes old and new … so looks terrible. I need to sort this ASAP so client doesnt see old dead links to their business.
Is there an easy way to make a 404 page work? Or does it depend on the hosting co?
Is it something I can ask the hosting company to help with? Or is there a magic 404 plugin I can use!?
THANKS for any advice
You can create in RapidWeaver what’s known as a custom 404 page just like any other and make it look exactly as you want… ‘We’re sorry, it looks as though you’ve asked for a page which doesn’t exist’ etc.
You’ll then need to edit your .htaccess file on the server (and Yes, your host should be able to help with that) and have the server redirect anyone who tries to load a non-existent page to the new page (whose name might well be something like 404.html) automatically. Good luck!
You can create a perfectly std page in your project that you can design the shit out of if you wish and then enter a line in your .htaccess file to set as your 404 page.
It’ll work ok without Joe’s new SEO helper stacks but they have a nice feature that will properly identify the page as a 404.
In addition to the above, you can also request Google remove outdated or non-existent URLs from SERPS which is particularly useful if there is no logical re-direct.
So, where you have a page that still exists but now has a different URL, a 301 redirect in htaccess is the way to go.
Where the content of an older page no longer exists at all, you don’t have any logical place to redirect it; therefore it is best to get the URL removed completely so nobody finds it in search results.
If you have a list of the “old” URL’s you’d be much better off redirecting ( (301) each one to the equivalent valid “new” URL’s.
404 are error pages and don’t really help you with people who have bookmarked old pages, old back links from other sites and search engines credibility or ranking.