Ever felt frustrated when visitors land on broken pages on your website? You know, those pesky 404 errors that pop up when someone tries to access a page that no longer exists. We’ve all been there. As annoying as they are, 404 errors don’t have to be a dead end. With a few simple tricks in Google Search Console, you can get to the bottom of those bad links and point your users in the right direction. In this article, I’ll walk you through how to track down 404 errors and fix them step-by-step. No advanced technical skills required—just a willingness to tidy up your site. By the end, you’ll have happy visitors and improved SEO. So plug in your laptop and get ready to show those 404s who’s boss!
Identifying 404 Errors in Google Search Console
Once you’ve connected your website to Google Search Console, head to the Coverage report. This tool will show you all the URLs on your site that Google has tried to access but received 404 errors for. Finding the Errors In the Coverage report, look for URLs listed under “Valid with warnings.” These are pages that returned 404 status codes when Googlebot last crawled them. Click into the report for any page to see details like when the error occurred and what URL Google was actually trying to access.
Analyzing the Issues
With the list of 404 URLs in hand, it’s time to do some detective work. Check your site analytics to see if these were once valid pages that were removed. If so, you’ll want to set up 301 redirects. Or the URLs could contain typos or link to pages that were moved. Compare the 404 URLs to your internal linking structure and sitemap to determine the problem.
Implementing Fixes
For removed pages, set up 301 redirects from the old URLs to the most relevant existing content. For incorrect links or URLs, update them to point to the right pages. If the pages still exist but Google couldn’t access them for some reason, double check that they’re still indexed and reachable.
Validating the Fixes
Once you’ve implemented redirects or fixed the issues causing the 404s, head back to the Coverage report in Search Console. Select the fixed URLs and request validation. Google will recrawl the pages to confirm the 404 errors are resolved. Check back in a week or so—the URLs should disappear from the report, indicating Google can now properly access them.
Regularly monitoring your site for 404 errors and addressing them promptly is important for user experience and search ranking. By validating fixes in Search Console, you can ensure Google recognizes your corrections and will stop reporting issues that you’ve already resolved. Staying on top of 404s and keeping your internal linking clean and accurate is well worth the effort.
Analyzing and Understanding 404 Errors
Once you’ve accessed the Coverage report in Search Console and identified the URLs returning 404 errors, it’s time to analyze why these issues are occurring. There are a few common reasons 404 errors show up:
Pages Moved or Removed
The most likely culprit is that pages on your site have been moved to a new URL or removed altogether. But you forgot to implement a 301 redirect from the old page to the new one. Oops! Not to worry, now that you’ve identified the broken URLs, set up redirects right away. This will ensure any links pointing to the old page are seamlessly redirected to the correct new page.
Incorrect Internal Links
Another possibility is that you have links on your site pointing to pages that don’t exist. Double check any menus, sidebars, or content links pointing to the 404 URLs and fix them to link to the proper pages. Be very meticulous, as even one bad internal link can cause problems.
External Links
Occasionally, 404 errors appear due to links from other websites pointing to deleted or moved pages on your site. Contact the sites in question and let them know the content has changed, providing the correct URL to link to now. You can also set up redirects for these old external links.
Technical Issues
In some cases, 404 errors occur due to a technical glitch with your website. It could be an issue with your server or CMS that is causing pages to 404 erroneously. Work with your webmaster or developer to troubleshoot and fix any technical problems.
The key is to thoroughly analyze why your 404 errors are happening and take appropriate action. Fix any redirects, update incorrect links, and address any technical issues. Then, request validation in Search Console to confirm the problems have been resolved before Google crawls the bad URLs again. Staying on top of 404 errors is an important part of keeping your site in good shape for both users and search engines.
Implementing Redirects and Fixing Broken Links
Now that you’ve identified the 404 errors on your site, it’s time to implement solutions to resolve them. The two main ways to fix 404 errors are:
Redirect Pages
If the page has been removed or relocated, set up a 301 redirect from the old URL to the current page. This will forward search engines and users to the right location so the 404 error is avoided. You can implement redirects at the server level or use a redirect plugin if using a CMS like WordPress.
Fix Broken Links
Check for any internal links pointing to pages that no longer exist. Update or remove those links to prevent 404 errors. This includes links in your content, menus, image captions, or anywhere else on your site. You may need to do a site-wide audit to catch all the broken links.
Double Check Your Work
Once you’ve implemented redirects or fixed broken links, validate your fixes in Google Search Console. Submit a sitemap with the updated URLs or request validation for individual pages. This tells Google to recrawl those pages to confirm the 404 errors have been resolved.
Monitor for New Issues
Even after you’ve fixed existing 404 errors on your site, new ones can pop up over time. Continuously check the Coverage report in Search Console to monitor for fresh 404 errors. The sooner you detect them, the faster you can implement solutions and prevent potential drops in search ranking or user experience issues.
Staying on top of 404 errors and broken links is an important part of maintaining a solid SEO foundation and keeping your site running smoothly. With regular monitoring and quick fixes for any issues detected, you’ll avoid headaches from 404 errors and keep your site optimized for the best search and user experience.
Validating Fixes Through Google Search Console
Once you’ve fixed any 404 errors on your site by implementing redirects or updating incorrect links, it’s time to validate those fixes in Google Search Console. Requesting validation lets Google know that you’ve addressed issues they’ve found, so they can re-crawl your pages and confirm everything is working properly.
Requesting Validation for Individual URLs
The easiest way to validate fixes for 404 errors is to request validation for specific URLs. In the Coverage report, find the page you fixed, click the drop-down menu next to it, and select “Request validation”. Google will immediately re-crawl that page and check for any remaining issues. If none are found, the status for that page will change to “Validated”.
Submitting an Updated Sitemap
If you’ve fixed 404 errors for multiple pages, it may be easier to submit an updated sitemap with all of those URLs. Google will crawl the entire sitemap and re-check all the pages listed, validating any that no longer return errors. To submit a sitemap, go to the Sitemaps report in Search Console and click “Add/Update sitemap”.
Monitoring for New Issues
Regularly checking the Coverage report in Search Console is key to staying on top of 404 errors. Even after validating fixes, new issues can arise over time due to additional content changes, link rot, or other factors. When you spot new 404 errors, follow the same process of analyzing the cause, implementing redirects or fixing links, and requesting validation to resolve them.
By routinely monitoring for 404 errors and promptly validating fixes in Search Console, you can ensure users and search engines can access all of your pages with no issues. Double checking that redirects and links are working properly gives you peace of mind that people will be able to find all the great content on your website.
Ongoing 404 Error Monitoring and Maintenance
Once you’ve resolved any 404 errors on your site, the work isn’t done. You need to regularly monitor for new 404s and address them promptly.
Check the Coverage Report Weekly
Make checking the Coverage report in Search Console a weekly task. Look for any new URLs returning 404 status codes and analyze why they’re occurring. It’s best to fix 404s within a month of them appearing to minimize any negative impact.
Update Redirects and Fix Broken Links
If pages have been removed or relocated, set up 301 redirects to send users and search engines to the right location. Double check that all internal links on your site are pointing to valid pages. Outdated or incorrect links are a common cause of 404 errors.
Submit New Sitemaps
After fixing any issues, submit an updated sitemap to Search Console so Google can re-crawl your pages. This will remove the errors from their records and confirm the fixes. Be sure to ping other search engines like Bing as well so they also recrawl the updated URLs.
Conduct Regular Site Audits
In addition to monitoring Search Console, perform your own manual site audits. Check for pages with outdated content, broken images, non-functioning contact forms or other issues that could frustrate visitors or get flagged as errors. Staying on top of potential problems will help reduce 404s in the long run.
Keeping a close eye on 404 errors and maintaining your site is an ongoing effort. But by making it a regular part of your SEO workflow, you can provide the best possible experience for your users and uphold a good reputation with the search engines. Through frequent monitoring, updating and optimizing, you’ll have a site that runs smoothly and ranks well.
Conclusion
You’ve got this. By taking the time to analyze and fix 404 errors on your site, you’re looking out for your users and search engine bots. Don’t get discouraged if new errors pop up – just rinse and repeat the process. A little extra effort now prevents bigger headaches down the road. Who knows, you may even uncover some hidden gems to enhance your content. So put on some tunes, brew a fresh cup of coffee, and tackle those 404s. You can do it – one link at a time.
