Change WordPress Permalinks without affecting Google Index

By . in WordPress. Updated on .

You want to remove a particular prefix (Dates, for example) in the URL on all your permalinks, but you can’t bear the cost as your entries are either indexed by Google, hyperlink-ed by bloggers or bookmarked by other websites.

  • (a) http://www.domain.com/blog/2007/01/11/name-of-your-entry/ (long URL)
  • (b) http://www.domain.com/blog/name-of-your-entry/ (short URL)

Solution

Deanlee provides a WordPress Plugin replace your (a) with (b) and will not have any side effects, no loss of visitors.

There is a way to tell the search engines (and browsers) that the page has permanently moved, and that the old address should be replaced by the new one. It’s called a "301 Redirect", also known as a Permanent Redirect. When you do this, Search engines will update their indexes quickly, and you won’t lose your pagerank.you will continue to receive traffic as though nothing had changed. This works for search engines, bookmarks, and links from other sites.

Implementation

  1. Download the Permalinks Migration plugin
  2. Upload to /wp-content/plugins/
  3. (Admin Panel) Activate the plugin
  4. (Admin Panel) Go Options > PermalinksMigration. Set your old permalinks structure
  5. (Admin Panel) Go Options > Permalinks. Set your new permalinks structure
  6. (Admin Panel) Go Options > Permalinks. Click Update Permalinks Structure
  7. Done!

Verifying

  1. Go Google.com, type site:yourdomain.com. This list of all your blog entries indexed by Google
  2. Find a result that used one of the old permalinks.
  3. Click it, and you should be brought to the new URL with the same content.
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