SUBJECT: Lesson #4 - Profit From 404 Redirects!

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Whenever you are making constant changes to your site it is
important to realize that any change in the Search Engines are
not instant. So if you change URL's on your pages then the
search engines will take a while to update with the new URL's.
Even at that, they will still hold your old URL indexed for some
time.

What this means is that anyone finding the old URL will receive
a 404 (Page not found) Error.

It is possible to customize the 404 Error so that the page
redirects to the home page, to a site map, or sales page or
squeeze page. This would allow the visitor to navigate away from
the 404 page and keep them in your website. With a generic or
plain 404 page the visitor may get annoyed and leave your
website.

To redirect visitors to a customized 404 error page requires
just a few simple steps. In your file directory of your website
you should have a file ".htaccess". If not, just create a blank
text document and use your ftp program of choice and upload it
to the website.

Open the file ".htaccess" and add the following line.

ErrorDocument 404 www.yourdomain.com/404error.html

"yourdomain" is of course the http:// to your website.
404error.html can be any file name you want, but I like to keep
it simple and something that I think will make sense to anyone
looking at the file directory.

Now you can hand code or use your favorite web editor to create
your custom 404 page. I would recommend keeping it simple and
not include a lot of content. Use it get your visitor back to
looking at your site.

Hopefully your visitors will not ever land on your 404 error
page. If a visitor does find it, your website will look much
more professional by taking this small step. If you have a
website that is selling, by all means use this page as another
source to expose your client to your sales pitch.

More tips and tricks like this are available below...

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