Question

I have some script in my default page that redirects users to language specific versions of my website depending on the language of the browser. I want to add something that redirects those users who do NOT have Javascript enabled.

Currently I have the following :

<noscript>
  <META HTTP-EQUIV=REFRESH CONTENT="1; URL=en/index.htm">.
</noscript>

But I’ve read this is not too wise as some search engines frown upon it. How do I do this and keep search engines happy?

Answer 1

You can redirect at server side with 301 HTTP status code too. This is the best way to do it for good SEO. The example is in C# but every plattform has his own method to add headers to the response:

Response.Clear();
Response.Status = "301 Moved Permanently";
Response.AddHeader("Location", "/newfolder/newfilelocation");

The reason to use the 301 status code is that the search engine indexes the new page because it was “Moved permanently” instead of the 302 that was “Moved temporarily”.