Help With Redirects

So I have an interesting scenario that I can't quite figure out how to deploy, we have a current website now at thomasprod.com which has some pages but not much content, pretty much everything lives at catalog.thomasprod.com, thats where all the products are and everything that people actually use. The new site I am building will be at the root - thomasprod.com. It is built in CS-Cart and so far is coming along very nicely, the problem is that I don't know how I am going to handle all of the 301's, there is something like 900 pages on my other site, probably like 850 of them are under the subdomain "catalog", my question is this, how do I efficiently go about deploying the new site? I am currently building it at store.thomasprod.com and when it was complete I was just going to point the DNS @ record to the new server so that it will be on the root, or is there a better way to do this?

I am afraid of when I point the DNS to the new server that pretty much every link is going to be a 404 due to it being a new URL for instance part number 18100 currently lives at http://catalog.thomasprod.com/item/thomas-products-flow-switch-fixed-set-point/1100-series/18100 but the new location is currently: http://store.thomasprod.com/flow-switch/liquid-calibration/1100/18100/ and will eventually be http://thomasprod.com/flow-switch/liquid-calibration/1100/18100/

How should I do this? The site won't be ready to go live for another month or so as we are still adding all the content so we have time to fix things like this.

Please let me know your thoughts!

Thanks!

2 options… Either make a large. htaccess file that will be parsed on every page load or create a static map of redirects and use one of the seo hooks to catch unresolved pages before generating 404 and adding a 301.

2 options... Either make a large. htaccess file that will be parsed on every page load or create a static map of redirects and use one of the seo hooks to catch unresolved pages before generating 404 and adding a 301.

The second option sounds really good, this way I can keep track of dead links and add the content as needed and what not, any tips on how to start doing this, or is this something that I might need to hire some help? I can use the store and add products but when it comes to hooks I am pretty much clueless, I can do some coding but I don't even know where to begin with CS-Cart honestly.

To be efficient, you should have this done by a proven developer (like me or several others here on the forum). The advantage of the hook approach is that it only engages when it's going to fail and doesn't get in the way for valid pages. Additionally you can use the system to redirect after you catch those pages.

The "gotcha" in all of this is that it appears your changes are more related to the path components (seo rules) versus the end name (seo name). This engages the 'seo rules' which are changeable via admin. So it might be possible after you have this all setup to cause it to fail if/when you ever change the seo rules.

You should think through your seo paths clearly for your objectives. Note that you don't get any ranking increase ot have a part category number and a part number in the path with the part name as the ending name. There are no rankings that I'm aware of for path components. It would be best to have everything in your ending name. I.e. xyz-1100-1200-my-widget.html instead of xyz/1100/1200/my-widget.html

And note that very little ranging actually goes to the name anyway. The important thing is that it's unique and that your page is keyword rich.

To be efficient, you should have this done by a proven developer (like me or several others here on the forum). The advantage of the hook approach is that it only engages when it's going to fail and doesn't get in the way for valid pages. Additionally you can use the system to redirect after you catch those pages.

The "gotcha" in all of this is that it appears your changes are more related to the path components (seo rules) versus the end name (seo name). This engages the 'seo rules' which are changeable via admin. So it might be possible after you have this all setup to cause it to fail if/when you ever change the seo rules.

You should think through your seo paths clearly for your objectives. Note that you don't get any ranking increase ot have a part category number and a part number in the path with the part name as the ending name. There are no rankings that I'm aware of for path components. It would be best to have everything in your ending name. I.e. xyz-1100-1200-my-widget.html instead of xyz/1100/1200/my-widget.html

And note that very little ranging actually goes to the name anyway. The important thing is that it's unique and that your page is keyword rich.

This is an interesting thought that gets me thinking, right now we have "models" of our parts that are like global categories, and then there are individual part numbers such as 18101 or 18541 etc. each part number is different than another by either a single small specification or it can be a bunch of things; the other thing is some are flow switches, some are level switches, some flow switches are calibrated for air some are for liquid etc. I made the categories as broad as possible so that there isn't like 5 categories deep until you hit the parts; is this good, or are you saying there should be even less sub-categories in lieu of putting the model/ type in the SEO name?

I do not know all the details of your products or business operations. But GENERALLY, I would NOT use category/subcategory paths in SEO names but instead pack much of that info into the actual SEO name (as shown above). This gives you much more flexibility for future redirects (if needed).

You should have categories that matter and if you want to have customers use a drill-down approach then you can do it via categories. But you might want to investigate product features where someone could then search by selecting various features rather than having to drill down through countless category levels.

Hello, i have a result of 2.153 / 301 redirects . Should i delete them or need to stay there?

Your question is not clear to me.