Soft 404 Crawl Errors in Google Search Console

[Lance]

Hello,

I’m finding the following soft 404 crawl errors in Google Search Console:

https://centerforworldmusic.org/events/category/sdcac/2017-02/

https://centerforworldmusic.org/events/category/passport/list/?tribe_event_display=list&tribe_paged=1

https://centerforworldmusic.org/events/category/sdcac/2017-02/

I note that they all have to do with the /events/category folder.

I’d appreciate advice as to why they are occurring, how to fix, and how to prevent recurrence.

Many thanks! Lance

[Lance]

Today, I notice a further URL causing “not found” errors in Google Search Console:

https://centerforworldmusic.org/events/page/3/

Any chance of some help with this?

Thanks! Lance

[Andras]

Hey Lance,

Thanks for reaching out! Let me try to help you figure this out.

I have checked your links and here’s my take on it.

https://centerforworldmusic.org/events/category/sdcac/2017-02/

The page itself loads properly with some dynamic content. However our calendar does not kick in, so it is likely not dependent on our calendar.

It looks like that event category doesn’t exist.

The page looks like a custom 404 page or a 404 page generated by an SEO plugin. This is why you don’t get a hard 404, but only a soft 404.

https://centerforworldmusic.org/events/category/passport/list/?tribe_event_display=list&tribe_paged=1

This url should list events from the “passport” category. The category seems to exist but there are no events in that category, thus you get an empty result set.

https://centerforworldmusic.org/events/page/3/

This should show you the 3rd page of your event list. However there are seemingly only 2 events in your calendar and they are both shown on the first page. So the third page doesn’t exist / nothing can be shown there.

Possibly with the help of a custom code or a plugin this could be redirected to page 1 instead.

 

I hope this clarifies a bit. Let me know if you have any further questions.

Cheers,
Andras

 

[Lance]

Andras,

Thanks for taking a look. Regarding your response:

https://centerforworldmusic.org/events/category/passport/list/?tribe_event_display=list&tribe_paged=1

This url should list events from the “passport” category. The category seems to exist but there are no events in that category, thus you get an empty result set.

I created a “dummy” future event in the passport category. It now shows up. Is it the case, therefore, that categories only display future events, and that once that event is over, the category for that event will start generating crawl errors? That would be less than ideal, no?

Thanks, Lance

[Lance]

Andras,

Regarding your response:

https://centerforworldmusic.org/events/page/3/

This should show you the 3rd page of your event list. However there are seemingly only 2 events in your calendar and they are both shown on the first page. So the third page doesn’t exist / nothing can be shown there.

Possibly with the help of a custom code or a plugin this could be redirected to page 1 instead.

Why does TECPro generate a page like that if it is not needed? Or, if it was once needed, at the start of the season, does it just remain, empty, when the season is over? Again, seems less than ideal.

Lance

[Lance]

Andras,

Sorry, but one more:

https://centerforworldmusic.org/events/category/sdcac/2017-02/

The page itself loads properly with some dynamic content. However our calendar does not kick in, so it is likely not dependent on our calendar.

It looks like that event category doesn’t exist.

First, to your final point. The category does exist. See:

https://centerforworldmusic.org/events/category/sdcac/

The category now has one event, the same dummy event I just created for my previous post.

This raises essentially the same question that I asked above: Do categories become empty, and thus generate crawler errors, after the event is over?

Regarding your thought that “it is likely not dependent on our calendar,” it may no longer be, but could it have been generated by an old version of TECPro? Otherwise, I am a loss to account for its existence.

Thanks again. Lance

[Andras]

Hello Lance,

Thanks for getting back to me.

Is it the case, therefore, that categories only display future events, and that once that event is over, the category for that event will start generating crawl errors?

You are right there. This is a tricky thing, let me try to explain why.

Imagine you are a user and you visit the “passport” category, which has 100 events from the past and 1 from tomorrow. What would you like to see? The 100 past events, or the 1 event which is coming tomorrow? I personally would like to see the one from tomorrow, that is the logical result set.

Based on that, that url will always show you the upcoming events of that category. If there are no upcoming events, then you will get the page with a message that “sorry, no events there”.

The url for the past events is very similar:

https://centerforworldmusic.org/events/category/passport/list/?tribe_paged=1&tribe_event_display=past

With some custom coding it would be possible to implement that if there are no upcoming events, then show the past events.

Page 3 – Why does TECPro generate a page like that if it is not needed?

This is not TECPro, this is generic WordPress. If you look at your blog page – let’s say centerofworldmusic.org/blog/ – there you could also check “/page/99/” and if you don’t have that many blog posts to cover 99 pages, then you’ll get the same result as above.

If it was crawled, the likely once you had 3 pages. Now that you don’t I’m not quite sure how, but you probably can remove it from the crawl. Maybe with the robots.txt file.

Third question

Basically yes, see my reply above. The url will always show you the upcoming events in that category. If no future events, then empty result set.

Again, you would have a similar result with your blog posts and categories. The difference is that with the blog post, if you look at the category, you will see past posts, as that is the purpose of a blog. With a calendar you will see future events, as that is kind of the purpose of an events calendar.

I hope my answers make sense and help clear things up a bit. Let me know if you have any more questions.

Cheers,
Andras

[Lance]

Andras,

Thanks for your careful and complete answer. The bit about past events not showing up makes sense in most applications. However, we are a nonprofit that depends on grants to support our programs. So the history of past programs is often important to us, so that we can show granting agencies what we’ve done with their money.

Several of our categories were created with this idea in mind. I thought we could just tell the granting agency to click on a certain category, and lo!, they’d be able to easily see what we’ve done with their $$$. Would I be right, then, that this is not possible with TECPro, without, as you say, “some custom coding.”

I understand that this is not the primary purpose of an events calendar, but it certainly might be a useful option for some nonprofit groups. I don’t imagine that we are the only one that has to report back to granting agencies.

Anyhow, again, many thanks. Lance

[Lance]

. . . . or, granting that seeing future events is the primary purpose of an events calendar, there could be an option for events categories to show all events, but in reverse chronological order, with the most recent at the top, so folks could find the future events easy enough.

But what you say above also does not solve the problem of categories with no future events generating errors in the Google Search Console, does it?

Lance

[Andras]

Hello Lance,

I can understand that in your case it is important to show the granting agencies what happened with their money.

I’m not sure how many nonprofits need to report back. Certainly this is the first case for me.

What I can do for you is check if it would be quick to do a custom code that would show you the past events, if there are no upcoming events in a category. Would that help?

there could be an option for events categories to show all events, but in reverse chronological order, with the most recent at the top

This needs some clarification. You want to see the most recent (event from tomorrow or this week) at the top, of the one furthest in the future? I’m sure any of the 2 would be possible with a bit of customization.

But what you say above also does not solve the problem of categories with no future events generating errors in the Google Search Console, does it?

I’m not quite sure how GSC works so cannot give you a definite answer. If the result page is empty, then likely you are going to get an error. If it has any content – past or future events or anything else – then it is likely going to be OK.

Andras

[Lance]

Andras,

Thanks for this helpful response.

What I can do for you is check if it would be quick to do a custom code that would show you the past events, if there are no upcoming events in a category. Would that help?

there could be an option for events categories to show all events, but in reverse chronological order, with the most recent at the top

This needs some clarification. You want to see the most recent (event from tomorrow or this week) at the top, of the one furthest in the future? I’m sure any of the 2 would be possible with a bit of customization.

We’d be delighted if there was an option under categories to show all events in reverse chronological order, starting with the furthest in the future (if such exist) or otherwise, if there are no future events, the most recent.

Then I suppose this would also, at the same time, solve the issue of empty results pages generating GSC errors. (I imagine that our page is not the only one that might experience this latter issue.)

Thanks! Lance

[Andras]

Hi Lance,

Thanks for the clarification!

I will try to look into this. Please note this might take a couple days.

I’ll be in touch.

Cheers,
Andras

[Lance]

Andras,

I’m curious as to whether there’s any progress, or further thought, on this prospect. It certainly be useful to us, and perhaps others.

Thanks! Lance

[Andras]

Hey Lance,

I asked a colleague to look at this. He was kind enough to whip up the following snippet. When looking at a category it will list the events from newest to oldest.

Copy it into your functions.php file:

https://gist.github.com/andrasguseo/60cd347b4cb9e6cd70d10f64152e601a

Hope this will be useful for you.

Cheers,
Andras

 

[Lance]

Many thanks, Andras and colleague. You guys are fantastically helpful.

I’m just leaving the US for a few weeks, but will try it out upon my return and report back.

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