Having Yoast SEO as a plugin is crucial for optimizing your website for search engines. SEO involves more than just keywords and meta tags, it also involves ensuring that your users are directed to the appropriate pages. This is where using redirects is necessary. With Yoast SEO, adding redirects is a straightforward and easy procedure.
What Are Redirects?
Essentially, a redirect is a way to send both users and search engines to a different URL from the one they originally requested. This can be handy when you’ve deleted or moved a page, but people are still linking to the old URL. By setting up a redirect, you can make sure that they end up on the right page.
Adding Redirects in Yoast SEO
To add redirects in Yoast SEO, you first need to have the premium version of the plugin. If you do, follow these steps:
- Log in to your WordPress admin dashboard.
- Go to ‘SEO’ in the menu on the left, and then click on ‘Redirects’.
- Click on the ‘Add Redirect’ button.
- Input the old URL you want to redirect from in the ‘Old URL’ field.
- Input the new URL you want to redirect to in the ‘URL’ field.
- Choose the type of redirect you want to use. The 301 redirect is usually the best choice, as it tells search engines that the page has permanently moved.
- Click on ‘Add Redirect’ to save your changes.
Using the Yoast SEO Redirects Manager
Yoast SEO also includes a handy Redirects Manager feature when you’re editing a post or a page. This will automatically prompt you to create a redirect if you’re changing the URL of an existing page.
That’s essentially all there is to it! Adding redirects in Yoast SEO is simple, and it’s a crucial part of maintaining good SEO for your website. Next time you need to move or delete a page, don’t forget to set up a redirect. You’ll keep your users happy, and help ensure that your site ranks well in search engine results.
Remember:
Always double-check your URLs and make sure they are correct before adding a redirect. A mistake could lead to a non-working link or even a loop, which could harm your SEO and user experience.