301 Redirects

[Frostie]

Just a quick question I wondered if someone could answer.

I have a page that has links to various merchants via various networks, however instead of linking directly to the merchant, i.e;
a href="http://tracker.tradedoubler...blah blah blah

I have created a link to a none existent directory such as;
mydomain.com/merchant-name/

I have also created a .htaccess file, that has a load of 301 redirects in place so that mydomain.com/merchant-name/ redirects to http://tracker.tradedoubler...blah blah blah

I just wondered, firstly if there is anything wrong with doing this, and secondly whether it will affect any tracking, spidering etc?

[ChrisM]

I'd have thought that would be fine - unless TD are specifically trying to fish out that type of redirect.

Otherwise I dont see any reason why it wouldn't work. Assuming the link reaches the merchant site of course

[ChrisM]

Actually - having said that - if TD were trying to stop this, wouldn't it only be flagged up as a traffic error and leads/sales would track normally anyway? I'm sure I read somewhere that the only things that dont track properly are CPC programmes.

[Rich]

TD have said it will track OK: - http://www.a4uforum.co.uk/showthread...threadid=20921

[Retail-Therapy]

IMO you should only ever use 301 on your own sites, not to redirect to someone elses, google is in a pickle over 301 and 302 redirects to external sites at the moment, and I'd say its best avoided, as they're going to have to do something about the page-jacking thats currently rife.

What you're telling search engines with a 301 redirect, is, this (page-on-your-site) page has been moved permanently to this (page-on-other-site) page, which may sound like a good thing, but, as I said, google should be cracking down on external 301 and 302's anytime soon.

I bet, if you continue to use this method, your site will slide down and out of google in the next few months.

Tony

[Frostie]

I have used 301's in the past when .html have moved to .php, pages have been grouped etc etc. I just wondered whether there were any problems either with network tracking (which there appears to be none) or with affiliate ethics (which I presume not).

Take on board all thats been said, and I think I will give it a go for a while and keep eye on it and see how google takes it on board. As this site is relatively new, its going to be hard to compare against existing stats tho.

[Rich]

Well the networks use 30x redirects for their links;
Google users 30x links for adware, adsense and natural search results when they are testing;
Yahoo uses 30x links for all out clicks from their search engine;

If you want to link to a 3rd party site, but need to do something first - like update a click count in your database, you either use 30x redirects, meta refreshes or javascript. Yes Google has a bug with 30x redirects, but that is their bug to sort and they still handle 30x redirects a lot better than they do meta refreshes.

From the W3 spec: -

301 Moved Permanently The requested resource has been assigned a new permanent URI and any future references to this resource SHOULD use one of the returned URIs. Clients with link editing capabilities ought to automatically re-link references to the Request-URI to one or more of the new references returned by the server, where possible.

i.e If A links to B which 301's to C then it should be treated exactly as if A linked directly to C.

302 Found The requested resource resides temporarily under a different URI. Since the redirection might be altered on occasion, the client SHOULD continue to use the Request-URI for future requests.

This says you should continue to request B to see what url it redirects to as it might not always redirect to C. Which definately means that the url for B shouldn't be used as a replacement for C.

Either way a 301 or 302 is a pointer to a URL containg the data you are interested in, so the simple solution would be not to show them as results but to still follow links via them.

BTW if you are sending location: headers it's a 302 your sending not a 301.

[Retail-Therapy]

Originally posted by Rich Well the networks use 30x redirects for their links; Google users 30x links for adware, adsense and natural search results when they are testing; Yahoo uses 30x links for all out clicks from their search engine;

None of which rely on SE positioning, which was my warning point.

You can preface the "Location" with "301 Moved Permanently" status code to ensure a 301 header is returned not a 302.

301's from html -> php are fine, as they're within your own realm, but, using 301's to redirect to an external site, to my mind, somehow claims ownership of the external site, which, again is fine if its yours.

Depending on how the network deals with their own redirects, you are claiming that the tracker.tradedoubler...etc. links are yours to set the location of, which to some extent they are, but, when h**p://www.merchantsite.co.uk is found in SE's under h**p://frostiessite.co.uk/redirectscript+affid/ and you have page-jacked an index page of a merchant, I'm certain, they'll want to get on your case about it?

Ethically, its your call

Tony

[Rich]

My point was, if a 30x can cause a merchants site to be found in SE's under h**p://frostiessite.co.uk/redirectscript+affid/, it is equally likely to be found under h**p://network.co.uk/tracking-url.

If you are using it to get extra listings on search engines then it is unethical, but you say 'your site will slide down and out of google in the next few months' anyway, so its not a big issue.

If your using it for its intended purpose, then you are not being unethical. If google lists you before the merchant then the merchant should contact google's quality department and highlight the problem as, unfortunately, we have no control over how google list our sites or in what order they list them.

[Retail-Therapy]

Rich, whilst google is in this condition, shouldn't we do as little as possible to disrupt it?

it is equally likely to be found under h**p://network.co.uk/tracking-url.

I don't think so, these are external hyperlinks, and as such, are not associated with the reffering site, not internal click-counting redirects, I don't think TD or POR or Buy.at etc. are selling products on their own sites, so the standard links are linking from site1 to site2 then redirected (there are no physical displayed links on the network site) within the networks, whereas, the 301 redirect is redirecting and associating the network page with the affiliates domain.

Occasionally google, yahoo and msn confuse the network page with the affiliate page, but right at the moment google is the worst for this.

Working backwards from Merchant site.

Merchant Landing Page
Merchant Cookie setting page
Network Cookie setting page with 302 redirect (with no-cache and for good practice, no-store)
Affiliate Site

If there is a 301 happening at the affiliate site, then:

Merchant Landing Page
Merchant Cookie setting page
Network Cookie setting page with 302 redirect now associated with affiliate domain
Affiliate 301 redirect (introducing the network cookie setting page as existing in some fashion, associating it with the affiliates domain)
Affiliate Site

I'm aware there are different steps than this with some networks, but this is enough of an example to see that google already has enough problems coping with 302's never mind introducing another layer of redirection.

If your using it for its intended purpose, then you are not being unethical

The intended purpose being to redirect within ones own domain (or in the case of a domain name change, to the new domain). Not to provide the webmaster with some kind of cheap click-counter. However, ethics aren't my strong point

we have no control over how google list our sites or in what order they list them.

We can do as much as we can to make sure that poor little google doesn't get confused?

The site sliding down and out over a few months will be little recompense to the merchant whose homepage and possibly, whole site has been dropped because of googles current inability to determine the difference between domain 1 and domain 2.

Have you tried contacting google lately? Canned and response are the two words that spring to mind.

My original warning was and still is; google will do something about this, sooner, rather than later.

Tony
I'd rather be wrong than right about this