Getting a Vanity (Clean) URL indexed

[Digi1234]

Hello, I have a vanity (clean looking) URL that 302 redirects to the ugly version. So in other words

http://www.site.com/url

302 >>>

http://www.site.com/directory/directory/url.aspx

What I'm trying to do is get the clean version to show up in search. However, for some reason Google only indexes the ugly version.

cache:http://www.site.com/directory/directory/url.aspx is showing the ugly URL as cached and cache:http://www.site.com/url is showing not cached at all.

Is there some way to force Google to index the clean version? Fetch as Google for the clean URL only returns a redirect status and canonicalizing the ugly to the  clean would seem to send a strange message because of the redirect back to the ugly.

Any help would be appreciated.

Thank you,

[Devanur-Rafi]

Hi,

You need to go in for server-side URL rewrites in this case. With URL rewrite in place, the URL in the address bar for the visitor will be your SEO and user-friendly, vanity URL and the same will be in search engines' indices there by accomplishing your mission. Then you might want to make sure that your old, ugly URL passes on all its SEO goodies to the vanity URL. For this, you can go in for a 301 redirection from the ugly URL to the vanity URL.

Here is a beautiful article from Moz: http://moz.com/blog/url-rewrites-and-301-redirects-how-does-it-all-work

Hope it helps. Good Luck.

Best regards,

Devanur Rafi

[Davinia22]

Agree with Devanur - you need to use a 301 permanent redirect not a 302 temporary redirect.

[Digi1234]

Thank you, great answer.