Sometimes you will want to point a particular URL to another place on your site. This could be because a page or post has moved, or you want to create a different or simpler URL.


How-To


Go to Tools >> Safe Redirect Manager. 



Click the button at the top that says “Create Redirect Rule.”


  • Redirect from = the link you are publicizing or the old URL

  • Redirect to = the new URL or the actual URL on the site. This is where you include “utm source codes” in your URL. 


Hit Publish.



 ("301" refers to the technical details of how the redirect works, but those details aren't important to understand here.)


An Example

We'll use an example of creating a special, short URL for a particular event. If someone types in http://gameflow.design/gala, we want them to be redirected to the event page https://gameflow.design/events/gala-2016/.


Check for conflicts

First of all, enter your desired URL into the browser, and make sure it returns a "Not Found" page. We don't want to create a duplicate of an existing URL.


NB: For both sides of the redirect pattern, you can choose to either put the full URL (e.g. http://gameflow.design/gala), or just the portion that comes after the base site address (e.g. /gala).

  1. In the "Redirect From" box, put the desired new URL. In our example, that's /gala.
  2. In the "Redirect To" box, put the URL of the target page. In our example that's /events/gala-2016/.
  3. Save, and test.


Wildcards

Checking the "Use Wildcards?" box allows you to use an asterisk (*) as a wildcard match. So /seasons/2015* would match /seasons/2015-2016, /seasons/2015Spring, but not /seasons/2014–2016. This option allows you to match whole subsections of the site and redirect them to a single target.


Using Redirects + Facebook  

If you're using a redirect in Facebook, like domain.com/party - Facebook may add a tracking tag to the end of the URL after it's clicked. For example: domain.com/party?fbclid=IwAR2e_7gi8h3noIkT8A8tA4AymvEODH3Y6hBVH2SWPu8C79yMcNFJGN3rpaI


To get around this, add a * to the end of your redirect to create a wildcard rule like so: 




Be careful

URLs are forever. At least, they should be. The point of this process is so that users of the website don't encounter dead links that point to non-existent pages. Only create a redirect if you're confident it will be something you keep for the lifetime of the site. (And this warning applies doubly to any wildcard matches.)