Why Google didn't want to index our blog post
We have published a new article entitled “What is Website Management”. But even after several submissions to Google for indexing, the URL simply wouldn't appear in the index. Even content optimization did not lead to any success.
A deeper look into the Google Search Console and the TYPO3 backend finally brought clarity - and an important insight into automatic redirects in TYPO3.
307 Redirects: The hidden hurdle for search engines
When the URL was changed, TYPO3 automatically created a redirect with the HTTP status code 307 (Temporary Redirect). The problem: Google interprets this status code as temporary - and therefore keeps the original URL in the index. The new URL is ignored.
In contrast, a 301 redirect (permanent) signals that the old URL has been permanently replaced - and also redirects the SEO ranking.
More detailed explanations of the redirect can be found at Google at https://developers.google.com/search/docs/crawling-indexing/301-redirects?hl=en.
Practical example: How a 307 forwarding came about
So what exactly happened?
- We created a blog article - title: “What is website management”
- When saving for the first time, there was a typo in the title: “What is website management”
- TYPO3 automatically generated the URL /blog/wast-is-website-management
- Later, the typo in the title was corrected, but the URL was not
- The post was submitted to Google for indexing and ended up in the index
- Finally, the URL was manually adjusted to /blog/what-is-website-management
- TYPO3 automatically created a redirect with status code 307 from the old to the new URL
- This redirect was not checked - everything worked in the browser
- However, Google had already indexed the wrong URL and ignored the new one from then on
Diagnosis with the Google Search Console
What was the problem?
Since it was very mysterious that Google didn't want the URL at all, “investigations” were carried out.
The first port of call for indexing problems is usually the Google Search Console.
We analyzed the situation in the Google Search Console:
- Checking the URL under “URL check” - everything was ok with the URL
- Ensure that no robots.txt or noindex tags are blocking the page - everything was ok
- Check under “Indexing” -> “Pages” whether there are any suspicious entries - nothing suspicious, everything ok
- Insight into the crawling statistics: Here it became clear that the status code 302 (or 307) occurred several times - unusual for our website
In the crawling statistics of the Google Search Console, you can see exactly which pages were attempted to be indexed with which status codes.
Finally, a look at the crawling statistics was revealing:
In the following screenshot, you can see a line with 302 (temporarily moved). This looked suspicious, as there are normally no pages that are temporarily moved.
In the detailed view, we clearly saw that the redirection of the page with the wrong title was the cause. Both the German and the English version were affected.
The following screenshot clearly shows which pages triggered the temporary redirects.
It was exactly the blog post with the URL “wast-is-website-management”.
The error has been found!
How to fix the problem with the 307 redirect in TYPO3
The solution
Once the problem was identified, the solution was very simple and quick:
- Customize redirect: In the TYPO3 backend, change the 302 redirect to a 301 redirect: Under “Site Management” -> “Redirects” you can also filter for different redirects
- Remove the old URL: In the Google Search Console, have Google remove the old URL from the index: Under “Indexing” -> “Remove” create a new request to remove the URL
- Submit a new URL: Submit the new URL for indexing in the Google Serach Console
- Wait: After a few hours to days, the new URL was successfully indexed :)
Prevent permanently: Configure TYPO3 correctly
To avoid this problem in the future, we have changed the default redirect from 307 to 301 in the TYPO3 configuration.
To do this, the following must be added/adjusted in the sites/<mypage>/config.yaml file to create a 301 redirect by default:
settings:
redirects:
httpStatusCode: 301
This means that TYPO3 creates permanent redirects by default.
More about the redirect configuration in the TYPO3 documentation.
Conclusion: Small redirects, big impact
A seemingly small mistake - an incorrect redirect - can have a massive impact on the visibility of your content on Google and other search engines. If you use TYPO3, you should definitely know which redirect type the system uses - and consciously control this.
Tip: Regularly use the Google Search Console or SEO tools such as Screaming Frog to check redirects and detect SEO problems at an early stage.
![[Translate to English:] Ingrid Stürmer](/fileadmin/_processed_/4/2/csm_pixelstuermer_square_700_fd7c08d6e6.jpg){kind=tracking}
