Changing Category Names in Wordpress Blog & Inbound Links
-
I'm working on a wordpress blog, /www.athleticfoodie.com, and I'd like to change the names of the categories so that I include keywords.
If I change the current category name of "Healthy Recipes" to "Recipes for Athletes" will I lose the inbound links associated with the category and/or posts? Is there a way to prevent this?
-
You are very welcome!
-
Thanks, Tait. This is very helpful!
-
Thanks, EGOL. Great advice!
-
Short Answer: If you change your category slugs in WordPress, you will potentially lose links
Long Answer...
WordPress is pretty decent at taking a URL from a request that it doesn't have a match for and trying to match it to a post or category even when the category slug has changed slightly.
Google is also pretty decent at figuring out that your content hasn't changed but has a new home.
That said, I never rely on WordPress + Google to do the right thing in this case. I always end up writing rewrite rules in my .htaccess file that performs a 301 redirect. If people just link to the first page of each category then do
RewriteRule ^category/foo/?$ /category/bar/ [R=permanent, L]
You can see the mod_rewrite documentation for more info.
Of course check the number of inbound links you've received before doing any of this to make sure that it's worth the effort.
-
If you go into wordpress and click the "category" link on the left side, then select a category, you can see the controls.
You can edit the "name" but keep the same "slug". The slug controls the URL.
This will enable you to change the name but keep the slug and not need to request changes on your incoming links.
This will work great if you are happy with your current URLs.
(you can also create unique descriptions for each category here that Google will sometimes display in the SERPs.)
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Missing Inbound Linking Domains
For some reason, our websites seem to be missing a number of authoritative inbound linking domains which seems to be a primary driver in lowering our domain authority as compared to our competition. Does anyone have any feedback as to why this might not be populating or is there something additional we need to do to have these show up? If it doesn't show up in MOZ is it likely that Google might also not be seeing these as inbound link domains? Thanks as always MOZ Community!
Link Building | | Leithmarketing0 -
Poor Blog and Website DA and links
Hi There We have a mature website and a mature blog with over 500 genuine blogs written on it over 4 years. In terms of actual "people" value it has to be high. We used to get 1000 visitors per day, we now get 300. We still have 850 subscribers so its of a certain size. However we have been hit by the Penguin/Panda updates and our DA has dropped to what everyone is telling us is too low for a site like this and we still have a google backlink problem, unyet we only have 190 external links that we think are all OK now. The problem we have is that we seem to have too many links from the blog to the main website with the same anchor text. This has occurred with a blogroll style link to the home page which appears on every post/page of the blog, also I think we have too many anchor same anchor text links to product pages (Motorola ES400) and category pages (Tablet PC). We're going through changing these now so that we have the right mix but the specific questions I wanted to ask were: 1. Will loads of links with the same anchor text affect us if the blog is counted as internal links. Its on the same "blog" sub-domain as the main website. 2. Will this affect the DA of both sites? 3. Is Wordpress capable of damaging us with all the extra pages it creates automatically. We've done nothing but genuine content posting here and i'm sure we can get it back but it kind of really demotivates you when 2/3rds of your traffic goes overnight. Many thanks for any help.
Link Building | | Raptor-crew0 -
How much time does it take for the links to be forwarded to redirected link?
Hi there,
Link Building | | MoeezLodhi
Thank you for taking out some time for this question; I have changed the permalinks last week for a website.. I forgot to redirect old permalinks to the new one.. So I did 301 redirection, it has been 4-5 days since I did that but the links are not forwarded to the new Permalink so far.
How much time should I wait for the links to be forwarded to the new permalinks? Secondly, I am sure I have done the 301 redirect correctly, as when I go to the old url / permalink it directs me to the new permalink. So I am sure 301 is done correctly. Do I need to submit the sitemap again?0 -
Blog links: Going out or staying in?
I am a wedding photographer and have a "Venues" page on my website. Am I better associating the links to the venue's actual website or to a blog post featuring a wedding I did there? (PS: In the blog post there will be a post aiming at the venue's website.) Thanks!
Link Building | | IoanSaid0 -
Do footer links pass less link juice?
One of my best inbound links for PA and DA happens to be a footer link, curious if it's less valuable or has any value at all.
Link Building | | Theskimonster0 -
Are you careful about linking back to sites that link to you?
Suppose that a trusted website added you to their recommended links page. Do you worry that linking back to them from a page on your site will diminish the value of the original link?
Link Building | | Charlessipe0 -
Linking Root Domains V.s Total Links
When analysing a company's inbound links, what is more important to note: The number of linking root domains, or the total number of links? And why?
Link Building | | SEOrookie170 -
Blog Roll Links - A good or bad thing ?
I Use Blog roll links all the time but recently they seem to be having a lower effect on listings. Is there a limit on Blog roll links you place on a blog. Internal blog roll links and external blog roll links. Also do you rename your blog roll to something such as popular links like we do ?
Link Building | | onlinemediadirect1