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301 Redirects on IIS Print E-mail
morphed thread this thread morphed from How Important is URL Naming? which is located in the SEO/M category

Written by Magnus Brättemark
March 17, 2006

"Google and Yahoo both support 301 redirects for links." - Ian Smith, LED Digest 2118

Hi Ian,

Thanks for the advice. I don't know if I'm wrong, but I have understood that to make a 301 redirect my site has to be hosted on an apache server. Unfortunately (in this case) my site is on an ISS server. Is there a solution also for that server, or do I have to move?

Best regards,
Magnus Brättemark
alfatravelguide.com



Written by John Barendrecht
March 20, 2006

"Unfortunately (in this case) my site is on an ISS server. Is there a solution also for that server, or do I have to move?" - Magnus Brättemark

Don't apologize for being on an IIS server, over 50% of the Fortune 500 companies use IIS, you’re in good company. A 301 redirect is easy on IIS:

Go to Computer Management | Web Sites | yourwebsite

Right click on file or folder | Properties

Choose file you want to redirect to and check "permanent redirect"

I also do 302 (temporary redirects) and URL spell checking. For page names if you leave off the extension or type html instead of htm, I’ll still serve the right page. Type index.php or any 1,2 or 3 letters for an extension and we’ll still show home page. Some of my page names use an underscore but if you substitute a space, dash, or equal sign, we’ll still serve the right page. Put an extra or wrong letter in a page name and we’ll fix it for you. Type in zero, one, two or 4 w’s for domain name instead of 3, no problem. You should always try to make your site user friendly. People guess at page names but are horrible spellers. Don’t give them a 404 error page, try to correct the error if at all possible.

If I’d known in 1996 what I know now, I would have had a different directory structure and page names. But redirects and spell checking helps to alleviate problems. As for the look and feel, that was cutting edge in 96 but I’m thinking of a redesign for its 10th birthday.

Best regards,

John Barendrecht
Centralhome.com Company Inc.



Written by Viggie Bala
March 20, 2006

301 redirect is not restricted to Apache server.  You can do it in Windows IIS Server (it's IIS, not ISS).  But admittedly 301 redirect is not as simple in IIS as in Apache. I've searched "301 redirect in IIS server" in Google (without quotes) and found many useful pages.  Here is one particularly useful page on IIS 301 redirects

To complete a 301 redirect in IIS you need admin access to the server. If you don't have admin access to the server, you can still do the 301 redirect, but your pages need to run in ASP.  Here are step by step details for redirecting URLs with ASP.
 
Regards,
Viggie Bala

Helping Websites to Work
viggie.com


Comments (1)add comment

SEO Sam said:

  @ John - RE: "if you substitute a space, dash, or equal sign, we’ll still serve the right page" - learning something new every day.

A well-known hosting company once told me link juice wouldn't carry with a 301 redirect, nuts.

Regards,
Sam
Affordable SEO Consultants
December 11, 2009

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