301 redirect from root to /index.aspx

[QubaSEO]

I have taken over the SEO for www.domain.net.

The way i've inherited the setup is that www.domain.net is 301 redirected to  www.domain.net/index.aspx Looking at top pages and linking root domains in Opensiteexplorer I can see that

www.domain.net/index.aspx has 1,006 linking root domains www.domain.net has 806 linking root domains.

I assume that www.domain.net is passing the value of it's 806 domain links to www.domain.net/index.aspx via the 301 redirect and because of this would expect www.domain.net/index.aspx to be the strongest page on the site and be the url that ranks in the listings for many relevant searches.

It appears however that www.domain.net is what is shown in listings and not www.domain.net/index.aspx ??

Can anyone explain why this might be??

If I do a site: search in Google then www.domain.net is indexed and not www.domain.net/index.aspx ??

[edwardlewis]

Why has the main domain been redirected to index.aspx? it makes no sense

[Brian-M]

Quba it's hard to say, but....

1. We know that (according to Google) some PR is lost in redirection, and it could be that most of the links are initially directed at www.domain.net.

2. Where is your non-www domain directed?  Is it directed to www.domain.net or or www.domain.net/index.aspx ?  If it's directed to the former then that could explain some or all of your issue.

[QubaSEO]

Thanks for your response Brian,

it could be that most of the links are initially directed at www.domain.net.

According to Opensiteexplorer www.domain.net/index.aspx has more links than www.domain.net though?

Where is your non-www domain directed?  Is it directed to www.domain.net or or www.domain.net/index.aspx ?  If it's directed to the former then that could explain some or all of your issue.

domain.net redirects to www.domain.net/index.aspx

[Brian-M]

Quba I've thought about this more, and...I have to say that I'm at a loss.  All of the links to the domain.net should be lost to domain.net and gained by domain.net/index.aspx

Is it possible that the index.aspx url has a noindex instruction from the robots.txt?.  Is index.aspx showing up at all?

[QubaSEO]

Thanks again for giving this some thought and trying to help!

OK, I left out some info that I thought would complicate my description of setup but I wonder whether it is pertinent to the problem....

The site has international content areas and is geo-targeted using the directory method i.e /en-gb, /en-au,, /en-us  etc

I have mentioned that www.domain.net does a 301 redirect to www.domain.net/index.aspx but I did not mention that www.domain.net/index.aspx then 302 redirects to the relevant international landing page based on IP address.

I'm pretty sure that the Google spider crawls from a US IP address so I believe that what it will see is:

www.domain.net 301 redirects to www.domain.net/index.aspx

www.domain.net/index.aspx 302 redirects to www.domain.net/en-us/index.aspx

Could the 302 redirect from www.domain.net/index.aspx be responsible for Google keeping www.domain.net in their index despite the 301??

Also, and concerning me more, do you think the considerable link juice to www.domain.net/index.aspx is being lost in all of this??

[Dr-Pete]

Google seems to have a strong preference for the root domain, and I've seen this before. Unfortunately, ASP/.NET can be really stubborn about going for the "index.aspx" or "default.aspx" page. You're probably still getting credit for the back-links, but it can be tough to tell. A couple of things:

(1) Make sure you're linking internally to the canonical version (in this case "index.aspx"). Otherwise, you're sending a mixed signal and that can disrupt the 301.

(2) Add a canonical tag to the "index.aspx" page. It can't hurt to double up, in this case.

Oh, sorry - just saw your follow-up. That 301/302 chain could exacerbate the problem, although it would typically leave link-juice after the 301. It's a bit complex, though. You could consider moving your English home-page up a level and only redirecting other audiences. That is a tricky proposition, though, and carries risk.

I'd also grab a header checker and just make sure Google is seeing what you're seeing. It's always best to verify that your redirects are working as expected.

[Brian-M]

Well, here are some more possible issues....

1. Are you sure the redirect to the English page is a 302 and not a 301? As Dr Peter suggested - check the headers.

2. Google has said that in cases where it believes the 302 is a mistake it will treat the 302 as a 301....if this is the case, there's really nothing you can do, besides getting rid of the 302 and using a meta refresh instead.  The meta refresh is commonly used in situations like yours, and while not a perfect solution, it would seem to be better than using a 302, which is typically not a good solution at all anymore.  I'd bet this is your issue.

[QubaSEO]

Thanks Dr. Pete,

I am comforted slightly  by what you say about Google having a strong preference for the root and that you've seen it before. With the volume of links coming in to "index.aspx" you can see why seeing the root in Google listings made me nervous that all of those links were being ignored.

This comment also comforts me..

301/302 chain could exacerbate the problem, although it would typically leave link-juice after the 301

as that is what I would expect too.

I am hesitant to make changes because of the risks it involves and might just have to accept that I'll never know for sure whether those links to "index.aspx" are definitely being counted.

[QubaSEO]

Thanks once again Brian.

I have double checked the header response and the redirect from "index.aspx" to the international pages is definitely a 302.

I'm hoping that Google is not assuming that the 302 is intended to be a 301 as I want the link juice to stay at the root domain and I assume this is why 302s were used by whoever setup the IP redirects to international pages.

[Dr-Pete]

These could be mostly internal links - are you linking to "/index.aspx" from your navigation, logo, etc.? In OSE, select "from [only external]", and you won't see your internal links. That can really skew the count.