Deleting events after event means broken links

  • Resolved persist9

    (@persist9)


    7 years, 6 months ago

    Re “The Events Calendar” WordPress free plugin by Modern Tribe.

    I want to keep the site small, but if I delete events I might generate broken links.

    Beyond Zero Emissions (bze.org.au) runs two radio shows a week. We want to:
    . Advertise each show via our calendar. To do this we have been producing a calendar event with a URL like bze.org.au/event/radio-show-slug
    . After the show, have a description of the radio show with the podcast. To do this we have been creating an ordinary post with category “podcast” and a URL like bze.org.au/radio-show-slug
    . Display past radio shows. To do this we have an Avada blog of all posts with category “podcast”

    So, this system could produce 100 calendar events and 100 ordinary posts each year. This difficulty is replicated in how we deal with our monthly discussion groups and our intermittent report launches, our annual general meetings and more.

    I have experimented with several ways around this:

    ** Solution 1: We could keep the advertisement events. This would bloat our site with too many entities and repeated content. Also Google searches might then find the advertisement for the radio show and not find the podcast. This seems to be a bad solution.

    ** Solution 2: We could delete the advertisement events. By doing this we could have broken links in our newsletter, on social media and elsewhere. Search engines may downgrade our site. This is not a good solution.

    ** Solution 3: We could delete the calendar event and then create an ordinary post with the same URL as the calendar event, that is bze.org.au/event/radio-show-slug. However, WordPress sets my URLs to the format bze.org.au/my-post-name, and when I created a new post and changed the slug to /event/radio-show-slug, WordPress converted this to the slug /eventradio-show-slug. This approach did not work.

    ** Solution 4: We could get the calendar plugin to generate a URL without the /event/ in the URL. In the settings you can change the “event” in /event/. When I tried to change this to blank, the plugin would not accept this change. This approach did not work.

    ** Solution 5: We could delete the event and redirect the event URL to the post URL. This would mean a steadily growing list of redirects. And people would have to remember to do this. That could be a solution.

    ** Solution 6: After the event, we could change the event into a post and modify the post. I have a plugin that can edit an event, changing the event into an ordinary post. I was hoping that the URL would stay the same including the /event/. Unfortunately, the URL was changed, becoming bze.org.au/radio-show-slug. This is then a variant on solution 2, not a good solution.

    Solution 7: Currently I am trying to get people to create event URLs that can be used repeatedly, to avoid broken links. It is complicated and our people are finding it difficult.

    To advertise three discussion groups ahead, use 3 URLs
    URL1 = bze.org.au/event/future-discussion-group-01
    URL2 = bze.org.au/event/future-discussion-group-02
    URL3 = bze.org.au/event/future-discussion-group-03

    Repeatedly create, use, delete and recreate these three URLs.

    *** Advertise before the group, say due on 5 May 2017

    . Pick one URL that is not being used to describe a future event, say URL2. Unfortunately, if you simply change the date of the event in URL2 and update the content, the event does not show in the calendar, so we must:
    . Delete event URL2
    . Recreate event URL2
    . Set date = 5 May 2017
    . Enter Text describing the 5 May group
    . Re-enter unchanging data, e.g. the group is held at the same time and place each month.
    . Set Title = Future discussion group 02
    . Publish the calendar event
    . The title sets the URL when you “publish” giving
    . URL = URL2 = bze.org.au/event/future-discussion-group-02
    . Now you can change the title to describe the May group

    *** After the 5 May show

    . Create a post to describe the 5 May group, including a link to the video.
    . Copy any advertising text that you want to retain from the calendar event
    . Paste it into the ordinary post
    . Edit event URL2 replacing the advertising text with “This event is now over, see our calendar for future events”
    . Leave the date of URL2 unchanged so it now appears in the calendar “past events”, waiting for reuse.

    As you can see, solution 7 is not simple, but I am trying to get people to use it.

    I would welcome any assistance you can give.

Viewing 2 replies - 1 through 2 (of 2 total)
  • Thread Starter persist9

    (@persist9)

    What to do with WordPress calendar events once the event has occurred

    Here is my current answer to my own question. I will:

    . Delete all calendar events, after the event
    . Create an ordinary post to describe some of these past events, for example we briefly describe our radio-shows, including a podcast of the show.
    . Make this ordinary post URL different to the calendar event URL.
    . Note, if I could make these two URLs the same, this would be the best solution to my problem, but I cannot see how to do this.
    . Allow links to the deleted calendar event URLs to generate 404 errors
    . Use plugin “404 to 301” to redirect 404 errors caused by these deleted URLs. This redirects 404 errors to our own customised 404 error page.
    . Note, the 404 to 301 documentation suggests that search engines will not see these as broken links and downgrade our site. I hope this is true.
    . On my customised 404 error page, include a message like, “If you are looking for details of one of our future events, please view our calendar”
    . We have social media sharing buttons at the foot of each individual calendar event description, so people can share these future calendar event URLs. After we delete these URLs, these links will become broken links and will lead people to our customised 404 error page. As the social media focus is on recent postings and happenings, this should not happen much.
    . In our newsletter we can advertise future events, linking to our “future events page”, not to the individual calendar event. This will avoid broken links in the newsletter.
    . Include, at the foot of each calendar event, a message like, “We delete calendar events after the event. Please link to our “future events page”, rather than to individual calendar event URLs.”

    I’m puzzled as everyone who uses this plugin must decide what to do with old calendar events – and I have not found other discussion of this on the web.

    I’d be pleased to hear if you have any feedback on this

    Plugin Contributor Victor Zarranz

    (@vicskf)

    Hi there!

    I’m sorry for the delay in getting back to you.

    We really appreciate you following up with your progress on your site. We unfortunately cannot provide much support for this type of inquiries as we state here.

    Just a thought on your situation, I believe most of the users keep their old past events, at least for a certain amount of time. Some might leave it for a month and then delete it, others might event wait for a year and many others don’t ever delete them and just like keeping them as a record.

    I think your solution is certainly valid if you think it meets you needs. As a tip, instead of deleting the events, you can always edit them and change their start and end date/time and all of its data.

    We welcome any other comments on this, so I will leave this thread open so other users in the community can post and share their thoughts.

    Thanks for using our plugin ??

    Best,
    Victor

Viewing 2 replies - 1 through 2 (of 2 total)
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