Member Avatar for happygeek

Are 404 errors a missed marketing opportunity for most web designers, or should they be left as a ‘page not found’ marker and nothing more?

Certainly the vast majority of sites would appear to point to nothing more useful than the Apache or ISS default error page, which strikes me as being one heck of a missed opportunity. Any reason you can think of for not using a custom 404 that points back to the home page, a site index, a site search, something, anything other than a large boot with which to kick a potential visitor away?

Free marketing opportunities are few and far between at the best of times, so why aren’t more people using custom 404’s? Is it down to ignorance on behalf of the customer or the web design company?

Finally, what information would you suggest including on a custom 404 page?

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  • Latest Post Latest Post by jbennet

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Custom 404s are worth doing — but do them correctly. The thread raises the right UX points (see , , and ), yet two practical things are often missed: the server must return a real 404 status, and 404s should be treated as signals to find and fix broken links.

Always send an actual 404 header and test it. Quick examples:

# Apache
ErrorDocument 404 /404.html

# nginx
error_page 404 /404.html;

# If generating a page in PHP
header('HTTP/1.1 404 Not Found');

# Test from a terminal
curl -I https://example.com/some-missing-page

If your custom page returns HTTP 200 (a “soft 404”), search engines and analytics will treat the missing page as valid content and you’ll lose visibility on real problems.

Make the page useful for recovery and for fixing root causes. Show the requested URL (helps spot typos), offer a tiny “report this broken link” action that captures the referrer/user-agent, and surface contextual alternatives by using the URL path (e.g., parent category or recent popular pages). Keep the design light and consistent with site navigation so users stay oriented. Avoid a blanket redirect to the home page — that hides broken links and makes diagnostics harder. Use explicit 301 redirects only when a page was permanently moved.

Operationally, log and aggregate 404s (server logs, app logs or analytics events), alert on spikes, and prioritize fixes for top offenders. And to clarify ’s point: missing browser plugins (Flash, etc.) cause client-side rendering issues, not HTTP 404 responses — two different problems with different fixes.

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Member Avatar for roryt

I think it is either down to laziness or ignorance. I think we should have custom error messages if you have the ability to, because on some servers you can't. I own a server that hosts multiple domains and I am pretty sure I can't have custom 404.

I have noticed recently that there are some error pages that are standard but just with some ads on them.

On a 404 page I would include

  • A Message that says that the page can't be found.
  • A logo.
  • A bit of information about your site.
  • A big link to the homepage.
  • A Search for your site.
  • A small link back to google.

I think those would create a good user experience. But just on a very simple but clean page.

BTW, the daniweb 404 page is very well done, you could include a search though, or a list of the forum categories.

Member Avatar for hiacclaimdir2

I do not think that many people really consider the opportunity in using 404 in any other way that its superfacial definition. I have redirected it back to my homepage in most cases.

This has both kept people in my site and improved my CTR

Member Avatar for roryt

No, I'm not sure about redirecting. Because people may then think that it is what they were looking for to find that it is actually nothing to do with it. I think a link is the best choice.

Member Avatar for satish.ambition

hi ,
Some times such errors occur because some of the plugins required to view that particular pages are not available.. Like if u donoit have Ther required flash players for the site u may not be able to view that page...

I came across such aproblem and i found that this problem is coming bacause i have not installed Flash player 9...

So this is also a reason why 404 error is displayed

Member Avatar for jbennet

on my personal website if the page is not found they get a sorry message and are taken back to the previous page in 3 seconds

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