Redirect Kill Spiders?

[hudson]

Hello All,

I've heard that a redirect link will stop "spiders" dead in their tracks. Is this true?

Thanks.

[seobook]

spiders will still look at other things on your page, but they sometimes do not like to follow certain types of redirect links to other pages.

google does tend to follow some meta redirects (though they may be discounted some)

search engines have no problems following 301 redirects.

[hudson]

What is a 301 redirect?

[seobook]

[QUOTE=hudson]What is a 301 redirect?[/QUOTE]

a perminant redirect using your .htaccess file. it tells search engines that a site has perminantly moved locations.

[owlcroft]

If you operate a web site, it is important for you to be familiar with HTTP Status Codes, or at least the more common ones.

You can look up their definitions (http://www.w3.org/Protocols/rfc2616/rfc2616-sec10.html), but for here: when a resource (typically a web page) has changed its URL, the host server is supposed to return to the calling client (typically a browser) a 300-series Status Code; the commonest are 302 ("Found"), used when the new URL is temporary, and 301 ("Moved Permanently"), which is self-descriptive. Such codes are followed by the new URL to use.

Most searchbots will readily follow redirect Status Codes; if the Code is 301, they will treat a link to the old address as being equivalent to a link to the new address (though it may take a while for the search engine to absorb and digest that situation).

The sole known exception is Yahoo, which has announced that it will not follow 301 redirects, which is, to use a technical term of art, stark raving nuts, but then, that's Yahoo.

Arranging the issuing of redirects when appropriate is the responsibility of the site operator, not the host server (which knows nothing of such things). One easy way to arrange them, if one is hosted on an Apache-based server, is by entries in the site's so-called ".htaccess" file. If one is not hosted on an Apache-based server, one is well advised to switch hosts, for--wait for it, wait for it--a host of reasons.

[Nick0r]

To do a 301 redirect, put in a .htaccess

Redirectpermanent oldurl.com/ newurl.com/

[northernq]

Or you can also use this
Redirect 301 oldurl.com/ newurl.com/

[soupline]

More spam

[gps31]

Referring back to the original post, re-directs will not stop the spiders, BUT you may be penalized for it. As mentioned by the previous posts, a 301 server side re-direct will not get you penalized. If you use any browser technology to do so (JavaScript, PHP, ColdFusion, ASP), you most likely will be penalized for it.