A website with too many 404 errors can be perceived as poorly maintained, which can harm your online reputation . Internet users and browsers prefer reliable and well-maintained sites. As a result, your SEO rankings can suffer if you don’t fix these errors quickly.
Google Search Console
: This free tool is essential for detecting 404 errors and monitoring the SEO health of your site in real time, providing you with detailed reports and automatic
notifications.
- Screaming Frog : Known for its ability to comprehensively crawl sites, this tool can quickly identify 404 errors and broken links, providing a comprehensive view of the issues that need to be resolved.
- Oncrawl : An advanced SEO audit tool, Oncrawl allows you to analyze 404 errors in depth, while optimizing the crawling and indexing of your site by search engines thanks to its detailed analyses.
Strategies to Fix 404 Errors
301 redirects play a key role in effectively handling 404 errors. They serve as a permanent redirect, signaling to Google that a page has been permanently moved to a new URL. Using 301 redirects, such as through an .htaccess file , helps preserve the authority of the original page and directs users to relevant content. This strategy is especially useful when you’re deleting or moving pages that you don’t plan to restore. For example, after deleting a page that still has external or internal links, a 301 redirect to a similar or relevant page can preserve your link capital and ensure a smooth user journey.
Fix broken internal links
404 errors caused by bad internal links can easily frustrate site visitors. It is essential to fix them quickly to prevent them from landing on non-existent pages. Use tools like Screaming Frog to detect these broken links on your site. Make sure they point to existing pages and, if necessary, update them with the correct URLs. This not only improves the user experience, but also strengthens the consistency of your site.
Create a custom 404
Even with all precautions taken, some customers may encounter a 404 error. To improve their experience, create a customized 404 page that is both informative and helpful. Include a clear message that the page is missing, a search form to make navigation 1000 mobile phone numbers easier, links to popular pages or major categories on optimize page components your site, and a link back to the home page. , but also encourage them to stay on your site, turning a potentially negative session into a visitor retention opportunity .
