Have You Customized Your 404 Error Page?

Once in a while a visitor lands on the 404 error page if some content has been moved, or the link is bad.I recently added a search box to my 404 page so the visitor can search for the information he/she is looking for.The longer you can keep the visitor at your site the better.

Have you customized your 404 error page?

 

A little customization I did on mine.
Try going to www.proxywhereabouts.com/anything

 

I haven't done much to mine just put my sites header at the top, but a search bar is not a bad idea.

Because usually after 404 they just click exit!

 

You can customize your 404 pages but what you are supposed to do is do searches on your website to find any missing pages and redirect them to another page. If you are just customizing a general 404 page for typos then I actually found the search box to be a great thing too.

 

Yes, I have done that for my site.
Customized 404 Error Page is search engine friendly and user friendly .

 

The best option is to not have any routine 404 errors if you can keep from it.

 

Definitely customize the page. I show a friendly error "Whoops... stuff not found" or similar note and then tell "Perhaps you were after this, this or this resource..."

 

I have customized mine as well.

I show people an error message and a way for them to subscribe to my newsletter. Once in a while, I get a few extra signups from this

- jens -

 

If I have an error page in my site, I am not doing my job right.

So, no, I don't customize mistakes. I correct them.

 

I've always had a custom 404. Surprising how often a 404 comes up and there is nothing. Squeeze every hit.

 

The only reason I took time to customize them is because for a few websites I get a lot of direct traffic where people type in the url after seeing it in a newspaper, magazine, etc. This is the only reason the 404 should show up and not because of broken links.

 

If you do not configure your 404 page, I think you are leaving money on the table.

I recall seeing a pretty impressive 404 page ..

It said something like "The page you were looking has either moved or removed
But while you are on this page why not grab this special offer ..."

And then it had some preselling and special offer

I forgot the name of the site though.. It was pretty good...


Regards,
Anup

 

Thats' what I have, and a search too. I actually got an email from somebody who liked my 404 page

 

I'm not customizing my 404 page. I just have the standard "The page cannot be found" and then have a link to the home page.

My question is does it mess up your search engine ranking? I was under the impression that custom 404 pages can mess up your rank.

 

I wouldn't worry, I customise my 404 pages and it doesn't mess up m rankings at all. Atleast I haven't noticed any changes when doing so

Hope it helps

 

I still didn't customize mine, but planning to do that soon. I think everyone should customize their 404 pages, at least put a link for index page on it, search bar or something.