How to Change Permalink Structure in WordPress without Duplicate Content
Wednesday, October 14th, 2009Recently we had a client who wanted to change their Permalink structure from
Old Permalink structure: /%author%/%category%/%postname%/
to:
New Permalink structure: /%author%/%category%/%postname%/%post_id%/
so that they would qualify for Google News. Apparently you need at least 3 digits in your URL in order to qualify for Google News.
I wanted to simply change the Permalink structure by going to Settings>Permalinks in WordPress. However, the problem is that Google sees 2 URLs for the same post which could cause Google to penalize you for duplicate content:
Google would see both the old and new Permalink structure for the same content:
For example, Google would see:
(old) http://example.com/Rebecca/News/MyPost/
and
(new) http://example.com/Rebecca/News/MyPost/222
So we need to make sure the old Permalink structure has a 301 redirect to the new Permalink structure.
Thankfully, after trying many plugins, we finally found and successfully implemented this plugin: Permalink Redirect WordPress Plugin
The directions on the site are very old and quite confusing.
Here’s how to use Permalink Redirect WordPress Plugin
- Download, Install and activate the plugin
- Go to Settings>Permalinks and copy down your old permalink structure
- While you’re in Settings>Permalinks, change the Permalink structure to your new permalink structure
- Go to Settings>Permalink Redirect and where it says “Old Permalink Structures”, paste in your old permalink structure
That’s it.
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