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Wordpress: deleting 6k posts, should I redirect?

Discussion in 'Search Engine Optimization' started by acquawater, Aug 17, 2018.

0
  1. #1
    Hi Community,
    SEMrush
    I am going to delete 6k posts from author xxxx.
    What is the best practice for SEO in this case?

    Redirect 404 to the homepage?
    Please advice
     
    acquawater, Aug 17, 2018 IP
  2. sarahk

    sarahk iTamer Staff

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    #2
    I'd unpublish them and send visitors to a 404 page that then gives "perhaps you might like this instead" recommendations based on the original content.
     
    sarahk, Aug 17, 2018 IP
  3. acquawater

    acquawater Peon

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    #3
    Good advice, how can I do the second part? I mean the customized 404 page that gives: perhaps you might like this instead
     
    acquawater, Aug 17, 2018 IP
  4. sarahk

    sarahk iTamer Staff

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    #4
    The 404 is easy
    Pull apart a plugin that does the recommendation and create your own version that looks at the unpublished post and finds the comparison. The main thing is that the 404 needs to know what the user requested so it can pull up the right unpublished content when it's doing it's compare. Most compare scripts are at the bottom of a published post but it shouldn't be much of a rewrite.
     
    sarahk, Aug 17, 2018 IP
  5. John Romaine

    John Romaine Greenhorn

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    #5
    6,000 posts?????????

    Why???
     
    John Romaine, Sep 6, 2018 IP
  6. mrb1129

    mrb1129 Well-Known Member

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    #6
    I presume they are low quality posts. So, why would you publish them in the first place?
     
    mrb1129, Sep 7, 2018 IP
  7. iwebsocial

    iwebsocial Well-Known Member

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    #7
    you can redirect all of your pages to your homepage using 301 redirect. If you are on WordPress consider using plugin.
     
    iwebsocial, Sep 7, 2018 IP
  8. kjh-08

    kjh-08 Well-Known Member

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    #8
    If you have existing posts with relevant content to those being removed it's better to 301. Especially if there are any inbound links to the ones being removed, this will save and pass some "link juice".

    Why would someone do this? Google gives your site a base "quality score" and having poor performing posts can/will lower this. Most do not realize removing posts with little to no traffic, high bounce rate, low "time on site" pages, which is poor quality in most cases will actually increase site rankings after they have been removed. Because this will raise their overall base "quality score". This is one of the quickest/easiest boosts you can get.

    Need to add, this will help wasting your "crawl budget" on poor pages as well.
     
    kjh-08, Sep 7, 2018 IP
  9. Brandon Sheley

    Brandon Sheley Illustrious Member

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    #9
    Yes, you should redirect everything, at least temporally.
     
    Brandon Sheley, Sep 7, 2018 IP
  10. mclelj

    mclelj Peon

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    #10
    6000 posts is alot.
    If it is a duplicate subject and the posts are cannibalising each other then I would do a cannibalization analysis and and redirect the ones that Google is seeing as the same content in the posts and so is splitting the rankings. Ahrefs has a great tool for this. Cannolize (not redirect) the lower ranking ones in the same subject to the higher ranking post.
    If the posts are low quality or no traffic redirect the urls to the home page and delete.
     
    mclelj, Sep 16, 2018 IP