HTTP status code SEO

As an SEO professional, you know that crawling and indexing is critical to SEO success.

You should also know that your page status code returned to the engine can hurt or help your rankings, especially when things move as they tend to do on search sites.

What we have here is collected in the primary HTTP status code SEO everyday (and webmasters and website owners) need to know so you do not hurt your SEO.

200 - Ok

200 status code status codes that most Digital Marketing Agencies Sheffield  major web URL in return. This tells the browser that the request was received, broken, and accepted and that the page should be loaded.

Page returns a 200 status code does not mean that there are no errors on the page, only that the resources are found and can be loaded in the URL where it is requested.

See more about the 200 status code here.

301 - Moved Permanently

A 301 redirect means that resources have been "permanently moved" and tells the browser to, you guessed it, redirect users (and search bots) to a new resource which must then be returned 200 status code and loads in a new URL.

301 is important for SEO because they pass link equity (in the case of Google, "pagerank") to the new page. Search engines also drop the old URL from their search index and replace it with a new URL.

The most common problem with the 301 status code is when the page redirects to another page that is then directed to another page. This is called "redirect chain" and reduce equity link sent to the final location.

When the redirect chain occurs, it could take longer for the old URL to descend from the index and replaced by new ones. SEO redirect chain is a silent killer.

Learn more about the 301 redirects here.

302 - while Moved

A 302 redirect is also telling the browser "this source has moved", but there are additional qualifications. This status code actually said "This resource has moved temporarily and might come back."

302 redirect to care for SEO because they do not pass link equity / PageRank (although Googlers have said that if the 302 is left in place long enough it can be treated as a permanent redirect).

SEO in the world will debate if 302 redirect pass link equity, but countless tests have proved that when 302s 301s then turned into a positive ratings change occurred.

Learn more about the 302 redirects here.

307 - while Moved

Now here's the fun case for your periphery. A 307 redirect, such as a 302 redirect, meaning "this resource has temporarily moved". It is less commonly used than a 302 redirect, but basically doing the same thing.

So, why they exist?

Frankly, 302 came first but little signal "fuzzy". With the advent of HTML 1.1, 307 are created and a temporary redirect more appropriate. It has grown in popularity over the years, but not much use as a 302 redirect.

Learn more about the 307 redirects here.

404 - Gone / Not Found

When you try to access the URL and receive a message that the page does not exist, which probably means it returns a 404 status code that tells the browser "This resource can not be found here".

404 is a common part of the internet and something that occurs naturally. But, they can also be a killer SEO for reasons including:

resources to move but the old URL is not redirected, and because the search engines will have a hard time finding new ones;

Weather restore 404 may have a valid external links which now does not help rank sites.

When the restore page 404, the search engine will eventually be dropped from the index. They do not always do it on the first crawling because 404 does not mean that these resources "permanently lost", only that this "can not be found right now." So they took a more conservative Digital Marketing Company Sheffield approach (although some at SEO hope they will not).

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