Redirect hurt SERPs?

I currently have a website with a forum hosted at the main domain. (www.website.com/forumindex.php).

However, anticipating future needs, I've moved the forum over to www.website.com/forum/forumindex.php

I was going to set up a temporary redirect in cPanel from website.com to website.com/forum as there's currently nothing at website.com - will this hurt my Google rankings? And if I do put something up at website.com in the future, will Google index the content there?

Sorry if its a bit of a newbie question but was just wondering.

Cheers!

 

i'm no seo expert but these are my two cents:

temporary redirects are big no-nos..

You need to set up a permanent redirect (also called 301 redirect) with cpanel and you should be fine..
serps might fall for a while and it will take a while for pr to transfer, but you should be fine at the end...

 

Hm, well last time I remember setting up a permanent redirect, I couldn't remove it!

I'm going to add a splash page in next week or so anyway but would you still recommend adding a permanent redirect? Can it be removed later?

 

...Anyone?
Would just like to get this clarified to be on the safe side.

 

301 redirects are the way to go. I'm not familiar with whatever control panel you are using to set them up, it's hard to image that you can't remove it after the fact.

But even if you can't remove a permanent redirect, do you foresee yourself moving the forum back into the root folder? If you plan on keeping the forum in its own /forum/ folder, then definitely use the 301.

 

I suggest you should do 301 redirect, which is the most SEO friendly redirect. By doing this, you have to create .htaccess file (dot in front of htaccess) or if you have it already then just add these lines.

redirect 301 /forumindex.php http://www.website.com/forum/forumindex.php

Code (markup):

I have to say this is the most safety for your redirect method, otherwise is use php header redirect but I'm not quite sure if it's good or not. I use this method to redirect old of my site to new domain completely and it's worked.

 

I think Google spider will not work with redirects, so feel they would hurt.

 

Google spider works well with 301 redirect.

 

Thanks, will give it a go! +rep

 

hello Veej

301 is one of the best ways to shift your pages permanently. Moreover, you should try to change existing back links ( only those pointing towards forum page).

You should try changing (back links to your forum page) from /page to /forum/page . This will help google to understand that page has indeed been moved to a new one.

This is just a seo friendly suggestion

 

Thanks mascot. I've put up a portal/CMS type website now and as there werent (m)any backlinks, there shouldn't be need for the redirect.

Thanks anyway though!

 

Hmm well i use temp redirects all the time and does not seam to hurt my sites but even helps the new site get in the search engine list
But normal a only do this for aweek or two then put back old site for aweek then same again.

 

I've believe Google doesn't like that 301 code I've used that code before and bad results.
I've found this code and used it and found Google responds better to it,
Unfortuntatly it won't work for redirecting a single file, it 301 redirects the entire folder.

Options +FollowSymLinks
RewriteEngine on
RewriteRule (.*) http://www.yoursite.com/forum/$1 [R=301,L]

HTML:

 

I've used that code myself and have no any problem with that. Your suggestion is another good option for 301 redirect also.