301 Redirect
A permanent redirect that sends users and search engines from an old URL to a new one, transferring ranking authority to the new address.
Why It Matters for Your Business
When you redesign your website or change a page URL, the old address doesn't just disappear from the internet. Customers may have it bookmarked, other sites may link to it, and Google has it in its index. Without a 301 redirect, all of that traffic hits a dead end, a 404 error page.
For Space Coast businesses, this is especially critical during website redesigns. A Melbourne real estate agency that redesigns their site without redirecting old listing pages loses every backlink and ranking those pages earned over the years.
How It Works
A 301 redirect works at the server level, intercepting requests for the old URL and automatically forwarding them:
- 1.User or Bot Requests Old URLA customer clicks a bookmarked link, or Google's crawler visits a URL it has stored in its index from a previous crawl.
- 2.Server Returns 301 StatusYour server responds with a '301 Moved Permanently' code and provides the new URL. This happens in milliseconds, and the visitor barely notices.
- 3.Authority TransfersGoogle passes the old page's backlink authority, trust signals, and ranking power to the new URL over time.
- 4.Index UpdatesGoogle eventually replaces the old URL with the new one in its search index, and future crawls go directly to the new page.
A Brevard County law firm that moves from an old WordPress site to a new custom website should map every old URL to its new equivalent with 301 redirects. This preserves years of SEO work and ensures clients with bookmarked pages reach the right content.
Never use a 302 (temporary) redirect when you mean 301 (permanent). A 302 tells Google the move is temporary, so it may keep the old URL in its index and not transfer authority. If the change is permanent, always use 301.
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