301 redirects made via .htaccess are going to 404 pages

  • Hi helpful people,

    I have an old site zoes.gallery which contains much amateurish work which I don’t want associated with myself professionally, and I have a new site zoelarkin.com. My old site however contained about 8 blog posts which regularly get 50+ hits a day and seem useful to people (reviews, info).

    I’m getting these handful of popular posts redirected to my new domain.

    I’m using Filezilla and modifying my .htaccess file to redirect those popular blog posts (not all. Just 5 or so, plus eventually the homepage) to my new site with the hopes that the many random Googlers & people that have my old URL, will get straight to my new site.

    I did a test after much research, attempting to redirect 3 URLS from my old site (zoes.gallery) to the new (zoelarkin.com). However, my posts were not visible after redirection. I don’t understand what I did wrong.

    Here’s my code added to my .htaccess file of my OLD website FTP .htaccess file.

    # BEGIN 301 Redirects
    Redirect 301 /2016/12/23/photographing-the-bay-bridge-san-francisco// https://www.zoelarkin.com/photographing-the-bay-bridge-san-francisco/
    Redirect 301 /2016/12/08/the-joy-of-oakland-oaklandloveit// https://www.zoelarkin.com/2016/12/08/the-joy-of-oakland-oaklandloveit/
    Redirect 301 /2017/03/31/simple-text-post// https://zoelarkin.com/2017/03/31/simple-text-post/
    # END 301 Redirects

    The original posts are:

    https://www.zoes.gallery/2016/12/23/photographing-the-bay-bridge-san-francisco/
    https://www.zoes.gallery/2016/12/08/the-joy-of-oakland-oaklandloveit/
    https://zoes.gallery/2017/03/31/simple-text-post

    With the first redirect, the message comes: Not Found. We couldn’t find what you were looking for.
    With the second, the message comes: This page isn’t working. https://www.zoelarkin.com redirected you too many times.
    With the third, it’s the same as the second.

    I’m not an expert with coding/websites and this is my first time. What am I doing wrong? Why are the 3 redirects showing 2 different error codes and more importantly they are not going to my new domain zoelarkin.com and showing the same content as the old, original post? I thought I’d followed the instructions fully and I have spent many hours researching how to do this and practising through trial and error.

    Any help appreciated.

    Thank you.

Viewing 4 replies - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)

  • First message is pretty self-explanatory. The link you’re redirecting TO, on your new website, doesn’t exist. If you click on it directly, you’ll see it doesn’t.
    With the other two, I don’t know, maybe you’ve messed up something on your new website so you’re trying to redirect those links somewhere else? What’s in your .htaccess file on the new website?

    Thread Starter zoes0702

    (@zoes0702)

    Hi sinip,

    Right, this is new information to me, that I need to create the link I’m redirecting TO on my new website. Thanks for that. Funny, nowhere in the step-by-step guides for dummies, does it mention this. Might be obvious to people that know, but not to newbies.

    I’ve changed a few things now.

    The .htaccess of my OLD website is: 

    AddHandler application/x-httpd-php56 .php .php5 .php4 .php3

# BEGIN 301 Redirects
Redirect 301 /2016/12/23/photographing-the-bay-bridge-san-francisco// https://www.zoelarkin.com/photographing-the-bay-bridge-san-francisco/
Redirect 301 /2016/12/08/the-joy-of-oakland-oaklandloveit// https://www.zoelarkin.com/the-joy-of-oakland-oaklandloveit/
Redirect 301 /2017/03/31/simple-text-post// https://zoelarkin.com/simple-text-post/
# END 301 Redirects

    The .htaccess of my NEW website is now

    AddHandler application/x-httpd-php56 .php .php5 .php4 .php3

    I had some redirection links in the new site from when I was figuring things out, but I’ve taken them out now because they were in there erroneously, whoops.

    Unfortunately, having now created the new links on my new website following your advice, I still can’t see my old content (words, images etc)

    • This reply was modified 7 years, 11 months ago by zoes0702.
    Thread Starter zoes0702

    (@zoes0702)

    Hi sinip,

    Right, this is new information to me, that I need to create the link I’m redirecting TO on my new website. Thanks for that. Funny, nowhere in the step-by-step guides for dummies, does it mention this.

    I’ve changed a few things now.

    The .htaccess of my OLD website is:

    AddHandler application/x-httpd-php56 .php .php5 .php4 .php3

# BEGIN 301 Redirects

Redirect 301 /2016/12/23/photographing-the-bay-bridge-san-francisco// https://www.zoelarkin.com/photographing-the-bay-bridge-san-francisco/

Redirect 301 /2016/12/08/the-joy-of-oakland-oaklandloveit// https://www.zoelarkin.com/the-joy-of-oakland-oaklandloveit/

Redirect 301 /2017/03/31/simple-text-post// https://zoelarkin.com/simple-text-post/

# END 301 Redirects

    The .htaccess of my NEW website is now

    AddHandler application/x-httpd-php56 .php .php5 .php4 .php3

    I had some redirection links in the new site from when I was figuring things out, but I’ve taken them out now because they were in there erroneously, whoops.

    Unfortunately, having now created the new links on my new website following your advice, I still can’t see my old content

    You’ve made all the links on your new website. Half job done. ??
    Now, you have to understand that 301 only redirects links from website A to website B, so to say. It does not redirect the actual content. So, when someone visits your old website, that one will be redirected to your new website but it is you who have to provide the same content on the new website. ??

Viewing 4 replies - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)
  • The topic ‘301 redirects made via .htaccess are going to 404 pages’ is closed to new replies.