Content Redirection

When operating a professional website you will eventually want to understand the basics of Content redirection and relocation. The purpose of a redirection is to “redirect” a request from one address to another as well as ensure the sight consistency while preventing broken links. Basically redirection is another word for sending you to another URL

Why would this be necessary? We will discuss a few situations when it becomes necessary for content redirection. One good reason might be for Misspelled words in the URL. You may wish to account for a user’s misspelling by redirecting them to your page (applet.com might redirect you to apple.com)

Another good reason would be if the domain name changed abruptly, it’s not possible to let all your potential visitors know that so redirecting them to your site would be a great alternative. Another reason being when a shorter URL is needed. URL’s can be long and tedious at times not to mention hard to remember redirection is a way of providing shortcuts through this problem.

A tool that helps in the world of SEO is content redirection. Content redirection is also called content relocation. There are two types of content redirection, server-side redirection and client side redirection. The following discussion will explain the advantages and disadvantages to each. Topics will also include the reasons for performing content redirection and how to avoid spamming techniques when performing content redirection.

Content redirection allows a web site owner/manager to move old content to a new location without losing the original web address. Redirecting content lets the user type in the original web address and still get to the typed domain name. Most often, the web site owner/manager would have the domain name registered with one service and host the site with another. Users don't know that the content is being redirected.

What reasons are there for using content redirection? The site owner/manager may want to provide an alias for a long URL. The owner/manager may want to keep the same domain name when changing to a new hosting service. The person running the site may also want the data in one room and the server in another. Web hosting services can help with content redirection.

There are some important points to ensure that content is redirected properly. Keep the web address the same in order to avoid confusing site users. Also be certain to check with the host to see if there are any bandwidth restrictions. Web crawlers should be able to find the site's data and use it to make a connection to the site's name, not to the redirected URL.

Before implementing content redirection it is necessary to know whether to use server side redirection or client side redirection. Using server side redirection means that the redirection is controlled by the server. Client side redirection requires some coding skills. Script must be entered to control the redirection.

A big disadvantage to client side redirection is that not all clients (in this case the Browsers) are executing Javascript. Also, more complicated scripts cannot be executed by search engines. In both cases, the client (whether it is the real person or the search engine) might not see the expected content and therefore leave the site..

Server side redirection tends to work more reliably than client side redirection. Also, since the server is controlling content redirection, users can't access the codes. They may not even know they are being redirected. The web site will still get several views, increasing its search engine ranking. Moreover, server side redirects can be permanent or temporary.

Consider a website URL ‘www.ContentRedirection.com’ this website is being hosted with vendor A. In normal scenario Vendor A will also host the data that a user access. Vendor A will charge you for firstly hosting the website on their server and second a domain name registered through them. In content redirection you could just pay for the domain name and request the vendor, or write a code to redirect the website to a different location which could be “www.freehosting.com/contentredirection.html’. The website user will remain transparent to all of this. Situations where you would be using such content redirection service:

• The domain name and web hosting services are provided by different vendors.
• Short aliases for along URL name for example “google.site.com/content redirection”.
• You want to keep the data on your server and the website will be directed to a server in your room. This is called virtual redirection; the hosting partner will look for your static or dynamic IP. You can consult your internet service provider on these details.
• You are relocating a website to a different content hosting company but domain name is still registered with previous provider.

Content redirection is simple either the service is already provided by your hosting service provider or a small piece of code is doing all work for you.

Following points should be considered for URL redirection:

• The web address should remain unchanged after redirection; this will prevent the confusion for the website user.
• Both the service provider’s downtime are matching otherwise the site will not be accessible and the user will get unknown or unscripted errors.
• Search engine crawlers can access your data and can associate it with the website name than the redirected URL.
• Look for bandwidth restriction with the content redirection web service.