Production

Write the redirect before you delete the page

By Jasper

You're cleaning up old pages. One of them hasn't been updated in two years, gets almost no traffic, and doesn't fit your current site structure. You delete it, update the navigation, and move on.

A week later you notice a spike in 404 errors. Three months later you realize a well-ranked competitor page links to the URL you deleted. A year later someone emails asking where that resource went.

The redirect is part of the deletion decision

Before you delete any published page, write down the answer to one question: where should someone go if they land on this URL?

The answer might be:

  • A newer page covering the same topic
  • A category page that includes related content
  • Your homepage, if the content truly doesn't exist anymore
  • A custom 410 Gone response if you're explicitly sunsetting something

If you can't answer that question, you're not ready to delete the page yet. The redirect isn't cleanup you do after deletion — it's part of deciding whether deletion makes sense.

Redirects preserve inbound links you don't control

You can update your own internal links. You can't update:

  • Links from other sites
  • Bookmarks in browsers
  • URLs in printed materials or old emails
  • Search engine indexes (they'll catch up, but slowly)

Every published URL has a potential audience you can't see in your analytics. A 301 redirect is how you respect that invisible traffic.

Map before you execute

Create a simple spreadsheet before you delete anything:

  • Column one: URL you're removing
  • Column two: redirect target
  • Column three: reason for the redirect choice

This gives you something to review, something to hand to whoever implements the redirects, and something to reference six months later when you're trying to remember why you made that choice.

If you're deleting five pages that all cover variations of the same topic, they might all redirect to one new consolidated page. That's fine. The redirect map makes the pattern visible.

Implement immediately

Set up the redirect before or immediately after you delete the page. Not next week. Not when you have time to review the whole redirect file.

If your CMS or hosting platform makes redirects difficult, that's a workflow problem worth solving. Redirects aren't optional maintenance — they're part of content management.

Some platforms let you set redirects in the same interface where you delete pages. Use that. If you have to edit an .htaccess file or a redirect config, keep a template ready.

Test the redirect, not just the deletion

After you delete the page and add the redirect:

  1. Visit the old URL directly
  2. Confirm it goes to the right place
  3. Check that the redirect is a 301 (permanent) not a 302 (temporary)

Don't assume the redirect works because you added it to a file. Confirm it.

When not to redirect

Sometimes a 404 is the right answer. If the page was:

  • A time-sensitive announcement that's no longer relevant
  • Test content that was never meant to be permanent
  • Duplicate content you're consolidating

...you might choose to let it 404 or return a 410 Gone status. That's fine, as long as it's a decision, not an oversight.

Even then, consider whether a redirect to a related page would be more useful than an error. Search result snippets might still be sending people to that URL for months.

Track what you've redirected

Keep your redirect map even after implementation. It's a record of decisions, a troubleshooting reference, and a way to spot patterns.

If you notice you're redirecting a lot of old product pages to a single category page, that might mean your category pages need better structure. If you're redirecting outdated how-to articles to newer versions, that's a sign you should date your how-tos more clearly.

The redirect map is site maintenance documentation. Treat it that way.

Make it a standard step

Deleting a page should trigger the same checklist every time:

  1. Decide redirect target
  2. Add to redirect map
  3. Implement redirect
  4. Test redirect
  5. Delete page
  6. Update internal links

You can reorder steps three and five depending on your platform, but the redirect decision always comes first. No exceptions, no shortcuts.

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