Webmaster Tools Adds 'Crawl Error' Alerts & Latest Links


Google has rolled out Crawl Error alerts in Webmaster Tools that will inform you of any serious errors or unusual spikes in errors that are occurring on your site. Since Googlebot crawls your site regularly it's a great idea for it to give you a heads up when it detects a problem.

Google has divided the Crawl Errors into two types: Site Errors and URL Errors.

Site errors usually occur when there is a problem with a configuration, or a server problem and usually affect your entire site. Some common causes for site errors include:

  • Your DNS server is down or misconfigured.
  • Your Web server itself is firewalled off.
  • Your Web server is refusing connections from Googlebot.
  • Your Web server is overloaded, or down.
  • Your site's robots.txt is inaccessible.

If Googlebot detects too many site errors they will send you an error notice within your Webmaster Tools. The message will tell you the percentage rate of the error and suggestions on how to solve it.

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URL errors are more common even on a well configured site. Depending on the size of the site and the number of pages it has there could be a fairly large number of URL errors on a regular basis. Googlebot detects these errors and only sends you a message when the amount of errors has a big spike.

These errors could be caused by things like soft 404's, a moved directory, or even someone linking to a page on your site that doesn't exist, meaning that it might not even be a problem you have to address.

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Unless you login to your Webmaster Tools every day to check messages, you need to consider enabling the Message Forwarding feature. This will allow Google to send these alerts directly to your email address so that you don't miss anything important.

Download latest links

In addition to the Crawl Errors alerts, Google has also added a new feature allowing you to download a list of newly discovered links that you've acquired - sorted by date.

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