301 Redirect

Why it matters: a 301 tells search engines the move is permanent, so Google transfers the large majority of the old URL’s link equity and ranking history to the new page. A 302 (temporary redirect) does not reliably pass that value, so using the wrong status code during a permanent move is the single most common way Central Florida businesses quietly lose rankings after a redesign or a platform migration , for example, moving off Wix or Squarespace onto WordPress.

How it’s measured and verified: check the response header for a literal “301 Moved Permanently” using a redirect checker or your browser’s network tab, and confirm the chain is a single hop. Redirect chains (URL A to B to C) and redirect loops waste crawl budget and bleed link equity, so always point the old URL straight to the final destination. In Google Search Console, watch the old URL drop out of the index while the new URL gets indexed and holds its impressions and clicks.

Common mistakes and the local SEO and AEO angle: redirecting every retired page to the homepage instead of the closest relevant page (Google often treats homepage dumps as soft 404s and drops the equity), and forgetting to update internal links, your Google Business Profile, and citation URLs so they hit the live page directly. For answer-engine optimization, clean 301s keep one canonical URL that AI assistants can cite confidently, instead of splitting your authority across stale duplicates.