I've replaced .htm pages with .php how does this effect search engines [Archive]

davidM.ME

06-21-2011, 08:52 AM

Hi, I've rewritten my web site replacing most of the .htm pages with .php pages How will this effect search engine records? How do I inform them pages have been removed and new pages have replaced them? How do I redirect non existent pages to the new pages.

Thanks for any help.

(:Dav!d

"Paddling upstream searching for the source"

jrg_newtojs

06-21-2011, 12:57 PM

If you changed all your indexed .htm pages to .php, then you will have to wait for the SE's to index your new .php pages. Even though the page has the same content, technically the SE's do not know they exist yet. You could spend time submitting a site map to the major SE's, and wait weeks for the new site pages to be indexed. However, I would suggest that you keep your .php pages, and re-make your indexed .htm pages to redirect to the new .php page using javascript. (At least until your new .php pages get indexed.)

This will save you from losing visitors, however, you will lose any page rank that your .htm pages may have been credited.

You can accomplish the redirect by using a simple script placed in the head of your .htm pages. For example:

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-type" content="text/html;charset=UTF-8" />

<title></title>

<script type="text/javascript">

</script>

</head>
<body>

</body>
</html>

This would redirect visitors who enter your site through an .htm page to the new respective .php page.