301 Redirects are a search engine friendly form of redirects that allow users to be directed to a pages new location. A redirect traditionally is put in place when a page changes its filename, extension or location. When the page has moved, search engines still return the old url, which equates to a broken link. Placing a redirect in place means that when the old page is requested, the user is automatically forwarded onto the new page location.
There are many different types of redirect. The reason for this is because of the nature of website technology, and the way that the page has changed its target URL. For example, a temporary redirect is known as a 302 redirect, this tells search engines that although the location has changed, it is only temporary, therefore search engines tend not to update search listings for these redirects.
301 redirects are known as a permanent redirect, this is because of the 301 code which in HTML standards equates to a permanent status. When using a 301 redirect, search engines such as Google, Yahoo and MSN will update their site records to return the pages new location instead of the old location, this process however can be slow. 301 redirects are vital, as they prevent masses of broken links, and the potential loss of rankings and traffic as a result.
301 redirects are known as search engine friendly redirects, because they do not pose as a risk to rankings. These redirects are very common for implementation, and are very easy to implement, in PHP, and ASPX (Classic ASP). They can also be implemented via alternative means such as the configuration of .htaccess files. Also, within certain types of web server technology, the redirect can even be implemented in a dummy file that mimics the file name of the old filename to have been moved.
For example, lets say you have a product page under the following URL,
www.mywebsite.com/product/kettle.php
if you have a new target page, you would create the target page as
www.mywebsite.com/product/latest-kettles.php
And in the old kettle.php file you would replace the code with the re-direct code, which would mean that the old file exists, but the users would not see it, instead they would be redirected to the appropriate page.
