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Change the WordPress permalink structure to the best format, and yes it’s a little bit scary :D

Posted by Daniel - 3,059 Views

Today this blog is about 2 months old. It is only 2 weeks ago when I began to put more attention on how search engines see my pages. Let me be honest with you that at this moment the search result from this blog on Google looks bad.

Speaking about search engine result, I think it’s related to what we call as Permalink Structure. It’s a URL path structure used to access every resources/pages on your site. If you use WordPress as your blogging platform you must be familiar with this term.

I had posted similar article titled “Something is wrong, the Google Search Result from my blog looks bad“. Listed there are several steps I had been done to get a better search engine optimized pages. You know what? By writing that post, actually I am waiting for someone who understand this stuff to give opinions about my todo list. And yes, I got lucky.

A friend from Netherlands, his name is Oeroek had posted very-very helpful comments on that post. His comments are useful for someone who new to this matter like me. One of his suggestion is: I should change my permalink structure from the current one to another pattern with less noise in it.

I agree with him in this matter because based on my recent search, his suggested permalink structure is the best one according to many sources. But I had put a tiny addition to the permalink structure, I had replaced the trailing backslash with “.htm” just because I want it to be recognized as a webpage instead of a subfolder. If you want to look more, Sumesh and Karthik have an overview why this permalink structure considered as the best one.

The best permalink structure for single page (most people in the neighborhood don’t deny it) can be seen on the address bar. And the format looks like the following.

You can set the permalink structure from your WordPress [Dashboard] - [Options] - [Permalinks] - [Custom Structure] textbox.

So which one is scary? :D OK, here is the list of scary things by changing the permalink structure (before I realized there is a solution for these scary things):

1. I will have duplicate contents. The pages from this blog has been indexed by Google, as we know they have my pages with my previous URL structure, and when their bot crawls my blog on the next visit - compared to pages they already have on their cache - they will find 2 pages with the same content but having 2 different URL structures.
2. My in-post-links will go to 404. All of my in-post-links which are pointing to the pages on this blog will not work because I use the previous permalink structure for those links.

There is a solution for those scary things. One solution. And I realized it after Oeroek told me about this:

The problem with duplicate content is that Google needs to know which page is the original and that both pages may have their own backlinks, splitting their voting power.

That is why you use a 301 redirect. This means a permanent move and states to Google that the 301 source is the old page and the 301 target is the new page. All backlinks, pagerank, etc, will be directed to the 301 target.
So using .htaccess the correct way, with a 301, does not lead to duplicate content.

“301 redirect” is the keyword! And of course it should be applied in .htaccess file. So this is my .htaccess file if you curios to see it.

OK, at this point I had sucessfully changed the permalink structure of this blog. Will it give me a better result or will it give me the opposite? Lets waiting for the effect to come :)

If you need a fast solution to change your permalink structure, you can use plugins designed to do it for you. There are many options but Andy Bailey said that a plugin called Permalink Migration Plugin is a good one.

As usual, if you find anything you think it’s incorrect, please let me know. I welcome you with your thoughts. And once again thanks to Oeroek for his great suggestions.

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10 Responses to “Change the WordPress permalink structure to the best format, and yes it’s a little bit scary :D”

1. oeroek Says:
   March 2nd, 2008 at 6:21 pm

   I am glad to hear that I have been of help to you.

2. eenx Says:
   March 2nd, 2008 at 9:25 pm

   I ever had the same problem with you when my blog was started at 4th January.

   It’s simple for me, just set the base_link on my old blog to new blog address with effect all links in old blog will be redirected into new blog.

   And I think googlebot was the cleverest machine. The bot can understand which one old.

   Now, my blog in “Googlebot eyes” clear as you see the sky without cloud. :D

3. Daniel Says:
   March 3rd, 2008 at 10:55 am

   @eenk: Looks like it’s not going to help me anymore since the migration of my blog had been done. But if you would like to describe more about your base_link method so everybody may get the benefit from it, please do…

   Makasih dah mampir :)
   ____________

   Daniel

4. oeroek Says:
   March 3rd, 2008 at 2:48 pm

   I think the base link approach can only change the main url. So from http://www.oldurl.com to http://www.newurl.com.

   The postname and directories can be changed by adjusting the permalink settings just as Daniel had sone above.

   @eenx.
   If the old url will contain the same page you will have duplicate content. Maybe Google will find out, maybe not, why take the risk. Second problem is that you would like all backlinks to the old url to also support the new url. A backlink is like a vote to a page. If you have two similar pages that both have votes you split your link power. It is better to have one page have all votes.

5. ridhocyber Says:
   March 4th, 2008 at 12:29 pm

   i’ll try!!!

   thank you for informations bro!!!

6. Daniel Says:
   March 4th, 2008 at 12:44 pm

   @ridhocyber: My pleasure :) And thank you for passing by. Looks like you already have your URL changed there :D
   ______________

   Daniel

7. Anak Medan Says:
   March 7th, 2008 at 3:27 am

   I’ve got similar problem with you in a pass time. Its make me hurt when visitor of some of my website was going down. And yes, theres duplicate indexing about some and each pages of my site. Honestly I just clean my old url using google tools. And i dont have thingkin about .htaccess before. FYI in this case i have using joomla.

   Thanks its very help me out and make me know.

   Anak Medan’s last blog post: Cara Meres Susu dan Menjilat Madu, Dari Paid Review

8. Karthik Says:
   March 8th, 2008 at 7:57 pm

   Glad to know my post inspired you :)

   Karthik’s last blog post: My first social media fame and how you can profit from it

9. Daniel Says:
   March 9th, 2008 at 5:03 pm

   @Anak Medan: You’re welcome. Glad to hear that my post is helpful for you. Your last blog post looks interesting :)

   @Karthik: Thank you for the visit. You made very good point there that’s why I recommend it here :)

10. Best WordPress Permalink Structure Says:
    January 27th, 2009 at 2:39 am

    […] Change the WordPress permalink structure to the best format […]

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