How to fix broken links in my website how to#
How to fix broken links in my website update#
How to fix broken links in my website manual#
How to fix broken links in my website software#

How to fix broken links in my website update#

Do I Really Need to Fix 404 Errors?Д®xhausted? We hear you! Some of our clients have 50+ links to update each month, depending on the size of their site and the frequency with which their products change. (And yes, we do recommend going through this process each month!) ThatвЂ™s A Lot of Work. In Google Search Console, check the вЂњMark as FixedвЂќ box for each URL that has been corrected so that you donвЂ™t continue to see the same URLs each month. The next time you run Xenu, none of those broken links should appear. Save, test, and repeat for the remaining links in your spreadsheet.

For redirect links, use a plugin like Redirection to map each old URL to the new URL.

Save, test, and repeat for all the links on your site.

For broken links, go to the page on your site with the broken link and update it with the correct link in your spreadsheet.

Now that youвЂ™ve filled out your spreadsheet, itвЂ™s time to make the updates. If they were expecting to find X, what is the closest match you can now direct them to? If you canвЂ™t find a close match, then you can redirect to the home page or remove the link.

If you canвЂ™t find any content that matches, you can redirect to the home page.

If no similar ones exist, redirect to the main product or service page.

In cases where you no longer offer a particular product or service, redirect to the most similar one.

Sometimes there wonвЂ™t be an exact match but here are some tips: If you were linking to a page that has moved elsewhere, note the URL of the new page in your spreadsheet.

If you canвЂ™t find a single thing on the internet that will work, make a note to simply remove the link from your site.

Once you find a good replacement, pop that link in your spreadsheet. For example, if you were linking to an article with statistics about identify theft, a quick Google search will probably turn up a similar reputable article you can replace yours with.

If youвЂ™re unable to find the content anywhere, try finding similar content on another site.

If you find the content elsewhere, pop the new link into your spreadsheet.

First try to see if that content has simply moved elsewhere.

If youвЂ™re linking to a page that no longer exists (either on your site or on another site): This greatly depends on your site and your business, but here are a few tips: Now that you have a spreadsheet of all the broken links on your site, itвЂ™s time to match them up or fix them. Grab any results from this tool and add them to your spreadsheet as well. This will often find additional 404 errors that the other two link-checking tools donвЂ™t catch, especially behind-the-scenes files that donвЂ™t usually get accessed by regular users. If you have a WordPress site, we recommend installing a plugin like WP Security Audit Log.

How to fix broken links in my website manual#

Xenu doesnвЂ™t offer download functionality so itвЂ™s somewhat of a manual process to get it into a spreadsheet. Xenu will output a webpage with info about your 404 errors. is the URL Google has indexed, while and simply redirect to that site, so we would use in Xenu). YouвЂ™ll enter the URL of the site you want to check.

How to fix broken links in my website software#

You can turn on your virus-checking software before downloading their desktop version (weвЂ™ve never had any problems, but better safe than sorry) and then run the tool. DonвЂ™t be put off by the scary-looking site! WeвЂ™ve used Xenu for years to check for broken links. You can download a spreadsheet of these URLs. There you will see a list of URLs for any pages Google has indexed that result in 404 errors. Log into your account (or set one up if you havenвЂ™t already and link it to your Google Analytics account) and click on your property, then click Crawl > Crawl Errors on the left-hand side.

Google Search Console (formerly Google Webmaster Tools). We recommend the following tools to find 404 errors: A client might have reported a broken link or you might have encountered an issue while you were clicking around your site, but the best way to find ALL the broken links on your website (especially if you have a large site that could have hundreds or even thousands of broken links) is to use tools to help you.

Step #1: Identify the ErrorsДЇirst, you need to identify the 404 errors on your site.

How to fix broken links in my website how to#

But what about on your own website? Do you handle these errors in the best way possible? Here we offer tips on how to fix 404 errors on your website. If youвЂ™re unlucky, you just get a 404 error and have to manually find a new way to get where you were trying to go. If youвЂ™re lucky, the 404 error page has been customized and at least points you where you might want to go. WeвЂ™ve all stumbled across a webpage that no longer works.