Chapter 14: Waste Not, Want Not

Idea 114: Don't Throw Away Traffic

• If your are a small business, get a domain name from day one. This means that if you change web hosts, your URL does not need to change. (Whereas if you use a typical free web host without a domain name, when you move to a new web host, any online and offline links to your old site wouldn't follow you).
  
  
• If you ever change domain name (for example, if the name of your business changes), make your old domain name forward to your new site.
  
  
• Don't change the names of files and folders on your site unnecessarily. People may have bookmarks to your existing pages. Other web sites may have links to your pages. If you change the names of files or folders on your site, you'll break all those links.
  
  
• If you need to remove or rename a file on your web site, try to avoid simply deleting it, you could instead put up a page telling visitors where the information is now located, or directing them to other pages of your site.
  
  
• If your web host allows it, (and if they don't, may be it's time to find another web host), you should set up a .htaccess file to catch any 404 errors. 404 errors are accesses to missing/deleted pages on your site (and people who accidentally mistype the file/folder name parts of your URLs). Your .htaccess file can automatically redirect visitors to an appropriate alternate page, or your web site's main page.

• .htaccess Tutorial - Part 1
  Free online tutorial on how to set up .htaccess files.