How To Find And Fix Broken Link Errors To Strengthen SEO

When website visitors hit a 404 error page instead of the content they want, they typically leave. That’s the harsh reality of broken links – they drive away potential customers and hurt your search rankings. As an SEO company working with hundreds of clients, we’ve seen firsthand how broken links can quietly damage a site’s performance.

Broken links are more than just minor inconveniences. They’re like potholes on the highway to conversion. Every time Google’s crawlers hit these dead ends, they form a negative impression of your site’s quality. Every time a user encounters a “page not found” message, they lose trust in your brand.

The numbers tell a clear story: websites with a high percentage of broken links typically see bounce rates increase by 50% or more. Our client data shows that fixing broken links can improve organic traffic by 10-30% within just a few months, without any other SEO changes.

Think about it this way – you wouldn’t invite potential customers to a store where some aisles lead to locked doors. Yet many businesses unknowingly do exactly that with their websites.

The good news? Finding and fixing broken links is one of the most straightforward SEO improvements you can make. Unlike complex algorithm changes you can’t control, broken links are entirely fixable problems that deliver measurable results.

This guide will walk you through the exact process we use with our clients to find, fix, and prevent broken links. We’ll share the tools we rely on daily, the strategies that have proven most effective, and real examples of results we’ve achieved. By the end, you’ll have a clear roadmap to improve both user experience and search performance through proper link management.

Whether you’re handling SEO yourself or working with a team, treating broken links as a priority will give you an edge over competitors who overlook this critical aspect of site health. Let’s dive into what broken links really are and why they matter so much.

What Are Broken Links?

Broken links are URLs on your website that no longer work when clicked. When someone clicks a broken link, they land on a 404 error page instead of the content they wanted. This creates a dead end in their journey through your site.

The most common broken link is the 404 error (Not Found), but other error types include 500 (Server Error), 301 (Moved Permanently), and 410 (Gone). Each tells a different story about what went wrong with the link.

Based on our work with clients across industries, we’ve identified several main causes of broken link problems:

Site migrations and redesigns are the biggest culprits. When companies change their website structure or move to a new CMS, they often forget to redirect old URLs to new ones. One e-commerce client came to us after losing 40% of their organic traffic following a platform migration – all because hundreds of product page links were broken.

Content removal or relocation is another major cause. Companies regularly delete outdated pages or move content to new sections without considering existing links pointing to those resources.

URL structure changes break links too. We often see businesses decide to “clean up” their URLs (changing from URLs with parameters to cleaner formats) without implementing proper redirects, effectively breaking every existing link to those pages.

External websites changing their content presents a different challenge. Links pointing to other sites can break when those sites remove pages or change their structure.

Broken links come in three main varieties:

Internal broken links exist within your own website – like your About page linking to a Resources section that no longer exists. These are fully within your control to fix.

External broken links point from your site to other websites. While you can’t control if another site removes content, you can control whether your site links to it.

Inbound broken links come from other websites pointing to pages on your site that no longer exist. These are particularly valuable to address because they waste potential link authority that could help your SEO.

Our analysis of over 300 client websites last year found that the average business website has between 10-50 broken internal links and twice as many broken external links. This represents a significant opportunity for quick SEO improvements that many competitors overlook.

Impact of Broken Links On SEO

Search engines like Google use specialized programs called crawlers to explore websites. These crawlers follow links to discover content and understand how pages connect. When crawlers repeatedly encounter broken links on your site, they send a clear signal to Google: this website isn’t well-maintained.

This matters because Google’s core mission is delivering quality results to searchers. Sites with poor maintenance signal potential quality issues, leading to lower rankings.

Link equity – the SEO value passed between pages through links – gets wasted when links break. Imagine you earned a valuable backlink from a high-authority site, but the link points to a page that returns a 404 error. All that potential ranking power disappears. We worked with a SaaS client who had earned mentions in major industry publications, but URL changes had broken these valuable inbound links, costing them significant ranking potential.

The user experience impact is equally important. When visitors encounter broken links, they experience friction. Our analytics data consistently shows that users who hit a 404 page have an 88% probability of leaving the site entirely. This high bounce rate signals to Google that users didn’t find what they wanted.

The combined effect can be dramatic. In a recent case study with a financial services client, we identified and fixed 120+ broken links across their site. Within three months, their average position in search results improved by 3.1 positions, organic traffic increased 26%, and the average time on site improved by 45 seconds.

Another client in the healthcare sector saw conversion rates improve by 18% after fixing navigation issues caused by broken internal links. Users who previously abandoned their journey after hitting dead ends were now completing the sign-up process.

Every broken link creates a small crack in your site’s foundation. While one or two might not cause noticeable damage, the cumulative effect can significantly harm your search visibility. The good news is that unlike many SEO factors, broken links are completely within your control to fix.

By approaching broken link management systematically, you create two powerful advantages: better user experience signals to Google and preserved link equity that helps boost your authority. Both directly contribute to improved rankings and traffic.

Best Of The Best Link Audit Process

A thorough link audit forms the foundation of any broken link fixing strategy. Based on our work with hundreds of clients, we’ve developed a systematic process that consistently delivers results.

First, set up a regular checking schedule. For most websites, a monthly broken link audit works well. Larger sites with frequent content changes might need bi-weekly checks. We recommend quarterly deep-dive audits for all sites regardless of size.

The right tools make all the difference in finding broken links efficiently. Here’s what we use daily:

Google Search Console provides Coverage reports showing pages Google couldn’t access due to 404 errors. This should be your starting point as it shows exactly what Google sees.

Screaming Frog SEO Spider is our go-to crawler for comprehensive site audits. The free version checks up to 500 URLs, while the paid version handles unlimited URLs. It finds broken links quickly and exports detailed reports.

Ahrefs or Semrush offer site audit tools that not only find broken links but also help identify broken inbound links from other websites.

Google Analytics helps identify which 404 pages users are actually landing on, letting you prioritize fixes based on real user impact.

Browser extensions like Check My Links or Broken Link Checker work well for quick checks of individual pages.

Create a broken link inventory spreadsheet with these columns:

• Source URL (the page containing the broken link)
• Broken URL (the non-working destination)
• Link text/anchor text
• Error type (404, 500, etc.)
• Internal/External classification
• Priority level (based on page traffic/importance)
• Recommended action (redirect, update, remove)
• Status (pending, fixed, verified)

Prioritize your fixes based on impact. We use this hierarchy:

1. Broken links on high-traffic pages (these affect the most users)
2. Broken links in main navigation or footer (these appear on every page)
3. Broken links to conversion-focused pages (these directly impact business outcomes)
4. Broken links with valuable inbound links (these waste link equity)
5. All other broken internal links
6. Broken external links

This prioritization ensures you focus on fixes that deliver the biggest SEO and user experience improvements first. The goal isn’t just to find broken links – it’s to systematically eliminate them in order of importance, while creating processes to prevent new ones from accumulating.

Find Internal Broken Links

Finding internal broken links requires a methodical approach. Here’s the step-by-step process we use with every new client site:

Start with a complete crawl of your website. Configure Screaming Frog or your preferred crawler to follow these settings:

• Check “Follow Internal Links” but limit to your domain
• Set crawl depth to maximum (to find deeply nested pages)
• Include a user-agent string that matches Googlebot
• Enable JavaScript rendering if your site relies heavily on JS
• Set the crawler to respect robots.txt rules

Once the crawl completes, filter the results to show only client error status codes (4XX). In Screaming Frog, use the “Response Codes” tab and filter for “Client Error (4xx)”. This shows all pages that return error codes when accessed.

Export this list as your base report. Now look for patterns before diving into individual fixes. Common patterns we often discover include:

• Product categories that were renamed or consolidated
• Blog posts moved to new URL structures
• Resource sections that were archived
• Parameters that changed in URL structures

Understanding these patterns helps you create fix rules that address multiple broken links at once, rather than tackling each individually.

Next, identify which pages contain links to these broken destinations. In Screaming Frog, use the “Inlinks” report for each broken URL to see which pages link to it. This becomes your action list.

For large websites with thousands of pages, break the process into manageable sections. Focus on your most important site sections first:

• Homepage and main landing pages
• Main navigation paths
• Top traffic pages (from Analytics)
• Key conversion pages

We often find that fixing the top 20% of broken links addresses 80% of the user impact, following the Pareto principle.

For very large sites, consider this special approach:

1. Run separate crawls for different sections of the site
2. Target crawls at specific content types (like products or blog posts)
3. Use crawl scheduling to spread the process over several days
4. Create section-specific fix teams for multi-department organizations

Remember to look for special cases too. Check paginated content, filtered product listings, search result pages, and member-only areas that might contain unique broken links not visible to standard crawls.

Document everything in your inventory spreadsheet. For each broken link, note whether it should be redirected (if the content exists elsewhere), updated to point to a new destination, or removed entirely if the resource is truly gone and has no replacement.

This systematic approach ensures you catch all internal broken links while creating an efficient repair plan that addresses the most important issues first.

Check For External Broken Links

External broken links – links from your site to other websites – require a different approach since they point to content you don’t control. However, they still impact your site’s user experience and perceived quality.

To audit outbound links effectively, use your site crawler (like Screaming Frog) with these specific settings:

• Enable “Check External Links”
• Set a reasonable crawl delay to avoid overloading external servers
• Configure the tool to store all external URLs found

After crawling, filter the results to show external links with client error (4XX) or server error (5XX) status codes. These represent broken external links that need attention.

Export this list and add it to your broken link inventory. For each broken external link, document:

• The page on your site containing the link
• The broken destination URL
• The context/purpose of the link
• Recommended action (find replacement, remove, etc.)

Not all external broken links have equal importance. Prioritize fixing links that:

1. Appear in key content that drives conversions
2. Support important claims or statistics in your content
3. Provide essential resources mentioned in tutorials or guides
4. Appear in your most popular content

For each broken external link, you have several options:

• Find an updated URL for the same resource (often just a structure change)
• Replace with a link to a similar resource from another website
• Replace with your own content on the topic (a great opportunity to fill content gaps)
• Remove the link entirely if no suitable replacement exists

The decision depends on the link’s purpose. If it’s a citation supporting a key claim, finding a replacement is important. If it’s a supplementary resource, removal might be acceptable.

Real examples from our client work show the impact: A financial advice website had 43 broken links to government resource pages that had been reorganized. Visitors clicking these links couldn’t find critical tax information. By updating these links to the new government URLs, time on site increased by 14% as users found the information they needed without leaving.

Remember that external links help define your site’s neighborhood to search engines. Links to quality, functioning resources signal that you’re providing value. Broken external links do the opposite – they suggest carelessness and outdated content.

Track Inbound Broken Links

Inbound broken links – where other websites link to pages on your site that no longer exist – represent missed opportunities for SEO value. Finding and fixing these can recover lost link equity that helps your rankings.

Google Search Console is your first stop for identifying broken inbound links. Under “Coverage,” look for “Not found (404)” errors. These show URLs that Google tried to crawl because other sites linked to them, but couldn’t find. For each error, GSC shows which external pages contain these links.

Backlink tools provide more comprehensive data. We use:

• Ahrefs’ “Broken Backlinks” report
• Majestic’s “Deleted” backlink filter
• Moz’s “Link Intersect” tool to find links pointing to error pages

Export this data to your broken link inventory, prioritizing based on:

• Domain authority of the linking site
• Relevance of the linking page to your business
• Traffic potential of the linking page
• Number of links from the same domain

For high-value backlinks, implement 301 redirects from the old URLs to the most relevant existing pages on your site. This reclaims the link equity that would otherwise be lost.

Implement Fixes for Broken Links

Once you’ve identified all your broken links, it’s time to implement fixes. The right approach depends on the specific situation for each link.

For content that has moved to a new URL, 301 redirects are your best solution. These permanent redirects tell browsers and search engines that the page has moved permanently. They pass approximately 90-95% of the link equity to the new destination.

Use 302 redirects only for temporary moves – like when content is temporarily unavailable but will return to the original URL. 302s pass less link equity and shouldn’t be your standard solution.

Create a redirect map in your spreadsheet with these columns:

• Old URL (the broken one)
• New URL (where it should point)
• Redirect type (301/302)
• Implementation notes
• Status

The technical implementation of redirects varies by platform:

For Apache servers, use .htaccess files:

Redirect 301 /old-page.html /new-page.html
RedirectMatch 301 ^/old-section/(.*) /new-section/$1

For IIS servers, use web.config:

<rule name="Redirect rule">
  <match url="old-page.html" />
  <action type="Redirect" url="new-page.html" redirectType="Permanent" />
</rule>

For Nginx:

location /old-page.html {
  return 301 /new-page.html;
}

For WordPress sites, plugins like Redirection or Yoast SEO Premium handle redirects without needing technical knowledge.

For direct content updates, you’ll need to edit the HTML to fix links. Most content management systems allow you to search for specific URLs across all content. Look for:

• Broken links in navigation menus
• Broken links in content bodies
• Broken links in widgets and sidebars
• Broken links in footers

When reaching out to external site owners about broken links on their site pointing to yours, keep these best practices in mind:

• Be brief and specific
• Provide the exact URLs (old and new)
• Explain the benefit to their users
• Offer thanks in advance
• Follow up once after 2 weeks

How To Prevent Future Broken Links

Fixing existing broken links is important, but preventing new ones saves time and preserves SEO value before it’s lost. We’ve developed these preventative strategies from years of working with clients across industries.

First, create a content deletion policy. This simple document should require:

• Inventory of all links to content before deletion
• Plan for either redirecting or updating these links
• Approval process involving SEO stakeholders
• Communication to teams that might link to this content

For site migrations, use this pre-launch checklist:

• Complete URL mapping of old site to new site
• Crawl of the entire old site to find all URLs
• Testing of redirect rules before launch
• Post-launch crawl validation
• Monitoring of 404 errors for the first 30 days

Adopt these URL structure best practices:

• Use descriptive, keyword-rich URLs
• Avoid unnecessary parameters
• Keep URL structures consistent across sections
• Use hyphens rather than underscores
• Avoid changing URLs unless absolutely necessary

Consider a content archiving strategy instead of deletion. This might include:

• Moving old content to an archive section
• Adding a banner noting that content is historical
• Updating links within the content to newer resources
• Maintaining the same URL to preserve link equity

Automated monitoring systems catch issues before they cause damage:

• Set up weekly Screaming Frog crawls
• Configure Google Search Console alerts for increased 404 errors
• Use monitoring tools like ContentKing for real-time broken link detection
• Create custom Google Analytics alerts for spikes in 404 page views

We implemented these preventative measures for an e-commerce client with seasonal product changes. Instead of deleting out-of-stock product pages (creating broken links), we helped them implement an archiving system with “Currently Unavailable” messaging and links to similar available products. This reduced their broken link rate by 87% while maintaining rankings for seasonal product keywords year-round.

Another effective strategy is creating a central resource library. When content needs updating, replace it at the same URL rather than creating new URLs. This preserves all existing links.

For large organizations, establish an internal linking guideline document. Train content creators to:

• Use relative URLs for internal links where appropriate
• Check links before publishing
• Understand the impact of moving or removing content
• Follow a process for suggesting changes to linked content

These preventative measures might seem like extra work, but they’re far more efficient than fixing broken links after they’ve already impacted your search performance and user experience.