Now if you are familiar with SEO and read about it online, you have almost certainly heard the phrase “link juice.” This is where the redirect status codes come in to play. If you need to suggest to the search engine crawlers that your page, content, URL, or site has moved, then you need to redirect them. The status of that redirect has substantial importance in properly reassigning the “link juice” or ranking value.
What is a 302 redirect?
A 302 status code means Found, or more commonly referred to as “temporarily moved.” This redirect doesn’t carry or pass the link value to the new location. What it does do is get the user to an appropriate location for you so that you aren’t showing them a broken link, a 404 page not found, or an error page.
When should I use a 302 redirect?
You might ask, “If it doesn’t distribute SEO value then why would I use it?” A good example of when to do a 302 redirect would be in an e-commerce setting. Let’s say you have a product that you no longer have for sale– maybe the product is seasonal, out of stock, or is something that you might sell again. In this case, you might want to use a 302 redirect to send the user to the category page.