Soft404 error

  • Resolved Steve

    (@aksteve)


    1 year, 9 months ago

    This is a first. I have never gotten a soft 404 error. Looks like google is trying to index a media library file attachment. I didn’t think I had media files set to be indexable. And even if they are indexable why would I be getting a soft404?

    In the end, I just want to fix this. Either get the soft 404 error fixed. Or get google to stop trying to index media file attachements.

    Here is a link to the page that is causing the issue – https://grantwritingandfunding.com/where-to-find-and-manage-grants-for-nonprofits/tammy-2/

    Any advice you can provide would be great. I don’t quite understand what is going on. Thanks.

Viewing 2 replies - 1 through 2 (of 2 total)
  • Plugin Support Prabhat

    (@prabhatrai)

    Hi @aksteve,

    Thanks for reaching out!

    Soft 404 describes a situation when the server presents a webpage and responds with a 200 OK status code, indicating success when the page or content is actually missing or very thin.

    I checked your attachment page, and it has very thin/little content. It is common for Google to treat pages with thin/little content as a soft 404 – which seems to be the case on your end.

    Please go to All in One SEO > Search Appearance > Image SEO tab and set the Redirect Attachment URLs option to Attachment – https://a.supportally.com/i/LEGawm

    This would automatically redirect the attachment pages to the actual attachments (images) and Google would eventually drop these pages from the search results.

    Here’s a guide with more details –

    https://aioseo.com/docs/what-are-media-attachments-and-should-i-submit-them-to-search-engines/

    Please let me know if you have any questions.

    Thanks!

    Thread Starter Steve

    (@aksteve)

    Thanks for the help. Of course there is thin content, it is just a page the media manager created. Not something we intentionally did. I am just surprised Google flagged it as a soft 404. I manage a bunch of websites and all will have similar type pages, but none get flagged.

    Anyway, you gave me a super helpful answer and advanced my understanding of your plugin. Appreciate it.

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