Soft 404 errors in Google – continued in latest version

[melzar]

Hello, it’s me again, I’d like to add an update to this topic:

Soft 404 Errors in Google

I have downloaded the patch, and have also updated the very latest version of the plugin: Version 3.10.1

I am still getting tons of 404 errors, so the problem persists. Today, I have 274 new errors. They are to places like this:
http://kcpetproject.org/events/2072-06/

I know soft 404 errors technically don’t hurt me, but they are annoying to look at and they skew my stats in Google Webmaster Tools. I’d like to be able to show my client there are NO errors, not 274 soft 404’s!

Please, please help. I use this plugin on too many sites to ignore this problem!

Thanks!

[George]

Hey @melzar,

I’m sorry you’re still having trouble here – hopefully we can help.

First, I’m curious why that month link all way in 2027 would even be pinged by Google’s tools? Do you have events on your site listed five, seven, eight years in the future like that? Or is that just a random link that happens to be returning a “soft” 404?

As for using our patch – based on your original thread, what you mean by this is our “no-404s” fix plugin that our developer guru Barry made. It’s available at http://m.tri.be/no404s, for reference, and has worked really well for me (and a sizeable amount of other users, too).

So I’m curious – even before updating to 3.10, did this no-404s plugin work for you at all?

If so, did it stop working only after updating to 3.10?

And finally, not to insult your intelligence, but just to be 100% sure here, is the no404s plugin still installed and activated on your site?

Thanks for your patience with this issue @melzar – it’s true that “soft” 404s in those tools are not technically harmfully, but I can understand your frustrations with this and it’s worth a closer look for sure. It’s early in our discussion, but just to be forthright and prevent any unrealistic expectations, I’d like to make it clear that there may be a fundamental limit here: Google’s Webmaster tools are out of our control and it might pick up weird things on your site regardless of what we do. Pills like these can be hard to swallow, as we’ve experienced ourselves with other things that rely on third-party software like our Eventbrite and Facebook plugins, but even if there are limitations with the third-party, we’ll work hard to try to come up with something more appealing here.

Thanks,
George

[melzar]

This reply is private.

[George]

Hey @melzar,

To start answering your questions backwards: yes, we can remove links you’ve placed here to hide them search results 🙂

As for the other issues:

The recurrence time spans you’ve set up (3 months in the past / 12 in the future) could be at play here, and it’s potentially worth trying to shorten that time frame if you’re able to do so on your site.

As for the soft 404s, if the no-404s plugin is not working then trying your “404 to 301” plugin might indeed help. Worth a try!

[melzar]

Thanks 🙂

Okay, I changed the settings to be “cleanup after 2 months” and to only create recurring events 6 months in advance. I noticed that events that had already been created 12 months in advance are still there, so I just left them, but I guess going forward it will only do them for 6 months?

I reactivated the other plugin. I think I had deactivated it for awhile because it was causing a conflict with another plugin we had been using, I can’t remember.

I’ll clear all the 404’s I have now (it’s up to 46 as of today) and then report back in two weeks or so if I’m still getting lots of errors.

Thanks!

[George]

Thanks Melzar – if this thread auto-closes before you can reply (we have an automated Support Droid who comes around to close issues), just open a new thread and link to this one for reference.

Cheers!
George

[melzar]

Will do!

[George]

🙂

[Support Droid]

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