How to Remove Dead URL Links from Google

Does Your Site have Dead URL links?

You may or may not know but your site most probably has dead URL links listed on search engines like Google.
If you ever update your site and delete posts or pages, the links become dead but unfortunately are not removed from Google's index.
Have you ever clicked on a link in Google search only to find that it takes you to a page that does not exist. I am sure you'll agree that its pretty annoying. And the first thing you do is click the back button and find the next best link.

Reduce your Site's Bounce Rate

As a site owner the last thing you want is to increase your bounce rate. Bounce rate is the percentage of visitors who enter your site and bounce or leave the site without viewing anymore pages.
What you need to do to prevent this is remove the deadlinks from Google's index via Google Webmaster Tools.
Firstly you will need to Create a Google account. Then Create a Google Webmaster Tools account.
You will then need to list and verify your website on Google Webmaster Tools. This is not the focus of this tutorial so please familiarise yourself in your account. It's pretty straight forward.

Steps to Removing Dead URL Links

Once the above is complete follow these steps:

1. Click on your site in your Webmaster Tools account.
2. In the menu to the left click on Health > Crawl Errors. You will see a list of all the dealinks in Google's index.
3. In the left menu click on "Optimization" and then right click "Remove URLs" and open in new window (this just makes the process easier)
4. On the Crawl Errors page click on the first link. Right click and "Copy Shortcut"
5. On Remove URLs page click "Create a new removal request". Paste the copied URL, "Continue" and "Submit Request". The removal request will now list as pending.
6. Back on the Crawl Errors page click "Mark as fixed" and "Ok". The link will now disappear from the list.
7. Repeat steps 1 - 6 for each deadlink.

The next time Google crawls your site it will action these removal requests and they will no longer be indexed.
Unfortunately if you have a lot of deadlinks this can be a tedious process but if you do this each time you update your site it becomes a breeze.
Having dead URL links in search results does not negatively affect your sites performance but removing them can lead to more site visits and creates a better overall user experience.
1) Have you checked if your site has deadlinks?
2) Do you have anymore valueable information about this topic to share?