URL Redirects

The URL Redirect feature lets you redirect specific URLs on your site to specific pages. Replacing your site with a new responsive site temporarily affects your search engine rankings while Google and other search engines adjust to the changes. Use the URL redirect feature to redirect your old page URLs to their new responsive site URLs and keep search engines happy.

To set up a URL redirect:

Delete the old page, then in the left panel, click Settings and then click URL Redirect. You have the following options: 

• To manually create a URL redirect, click Add new redirect.
  1. Type the original URL to be redirected in the Old page name field. For example, if your site originally had a page yoursite.com/my-page.html, type /my-page.html. Note this only redirects the specific URL and not nested pages.
  2. Select the redirect Destination page. You can choose to use a page from your new site or an external URL.
  3. To edit or delete your custom URL redirects, click Edit or Delete in the redirect menu.
• To import multiple redirects, click Import Multiple Redirects.
  1. To upload a CSV to import multiple URL redirects, click Upload CSV. To ensure you follow the correct structure, use the template and click Download CSV Template. The uploaded CSV should be in the same structure as our template, where the first column is the old URL and the new column is the new URL.
  2. Click Upload New File, and click Choose Files.
  3. Select your CSV, and click Open.
  4. Click Done.
  5. Note

     Each file can contain up to 200 redirect URLs. To see the option to upload a CSV to import multiple redirects, you must first add a single redirect.

• Redirect Type. Select the redirect type from the drop-down:
  • 301 Redirect (permanently moved)
  • 302 Redirect (temporarily moved)

URL Redirects are very useful if you have multiple sites that you want forwarded to your responsive site. Redirects are also important when you are switching domains or moving specific pages to a new domain. While URL redirects are very beneficial in these cases, they can also cause visitors confusion to which site they are visiting. When using redirects, make sure the visitor understands that they will be redirected so they do not mistake it for phishing attacks.

Redirect with URL Parameters

Specific URL redirects do not work on URL parameters. A URL parameter is anything that comes after the ? or # in the URL. Website Builder treats any URL with a URL parameter as the same URL.

That is, this URL: http://www.sitename.com/page1 is the same as this URL: http://www.sitename.com/page1?url_referrer=blank.

If you have a 301 redirect set up on page 1, it will also redirect any /page1 URL with a URL parameter. If you need a specific URL redirect for a URL parameter, please check with your DNS host to see if this is something they can set up for you.