How To Find Broken Links on Your Website

Website designers will always face some problems when creating or programming their websites. These problems may harm the business using the website or its links. However, companies or business owners can solve this problem quickly if detected early. For this purpose, website designers and programmers often check for bugs or viruses.

What are Broken Links?

Every website will have links that connect back to them. A link that does not connect to any website is called a broken link. It will lead to an error page instead of a web page. A website may have these links on its home page or menu. The link to the website itself can also be a broken link. A broken link can make it difficult for people to find the website when needed.

Several reasons can cause a link to break. The web page may no longer be online, the URL may be wrong, or the page may not be available to the public. While fixing a bug, the developers may make the page available only to the owners. So if any customer clicks on the link, they will be redirected to an error page. These are all causes that can be fixed and should be immediately fixed.

Broken links will harm your website. If your website has too many broken links, Google will list it lower on search rankings. However, Google knows that customers do not like broken links and will give them a website where they will have few if any, broken links.

Another reason a broken link will be a disadvantage is that it will drive away potential readers or clients of your website. A person who visits a website would prefer a smooth browsing experience. If error pages disrupt their browsing experience, they close the website completely. Error pages are not pleasant and often irritate potential clients. It also creates a wrong first impression of the website.

How to Find Broken Links on a Website?

Developers can use a list of resources to detect a broken link on their website. Some plugins will allow you to go through this process easily and quickly if you use WordPress. Unfortunately, developers will often not check their website that often. But the moment you find a broken link, it is best to solve the problem so that it does not cause further issues.

Google Webmaster Tools

This resource works on any website. WordPress users often use it to look for broken links. GWT helps you detect the page with the broken link. Detecting the page will make it easier for developers to remove the URL if needed. Or they can fix it as needed.

You can use the “Diagnostics” option provided by GWT. It is user-friendly and will not take much time to detect broken links. Instead, it will detect the problem, give you a result, and view the page with the broken link. Following this, you can choose to fix the problem or remove the page altogether.

Google Analytics

Another Google tool that helps detect broken links on websites is Google analytics. It is a free tool that can assist you with your website management. You can use it to scan and manage your website. It also detects broken links on your website while doing the scans.

It is a simple process; you can explore the tools to figure out which works best for you. There are various options for when you scan. But it will always give you a lot of pages that have broken lin and redirect people to a 404 Error page. You can use Google Analytics to study the monthly results and find a solution. It can also be set to scan at specific days and times. After automatically checking at the specified time, they can send you an email alert and the report.

Xenu Link Sleuth

Xenu is another free tool that people often use. It is easy to use, and you need to install it. Once installed, you can use its various features to check whether your website or web pages have broken links.

It can help organise the list to make it easier for you to fix them one after another. However, the list will need immediate attention on your part. The problem should not be left as it will disadvantage your website. However, Xenu may take a little longer to scan the URLs and your website if you are a first-time user.

What Should Be Done With Broken Links?

Once you have scanned and compiled together all the broken links, you can decide which links to fix and which to remove. After watching, you can try to analyse the data to find out what caused the link to break. It can help you fix the problem.

At the same time, there may be too many broken links to fix. Instead, you can decide which ones to select and which to discard. Some web pages can bring in more traffic than others. A link for pages that benefit your website will need to be fixed. It is a good source of traffic and should not be removed.

However, there are pages with less traffic and hardly any viewers. Pages like this can be removed or replaced with more exciting content. In addition, developers can fix their links to ensure that it is not broken again.

After finding the problem and applying the solution, it is still necessary to do frequent checks that will ensure your website stays free of broken links. Using more than one of these resources also helps with the accuracy of the scans. So scan as often as possible and with as many websites and plugins. Double-checking will help prevent your website from crashing.

Conclusion

Broken links are not just inconvenient but also harmful. They are inconvenient for clients or visitors of the website. But for those who own the website and earn from it, a broken link can mean a loss of income. People not using the website because it has too many broken links will lead to lesser revenue for the owners.

2024 is an advanced year; you do not need full experts to fix your problems. Instead, you can quickly learn from efficient Youtube videos and lectures that teach you almost everything. People willing to learn can make the most of technology in 2024. Instead of hiring people, they can learn to fix problems like broken links on their own.