Google Advice On E-Commerce Sites Closed Due To COVID-19

Mar 25, 2020 - 7:10 am 0 by

Google Close Site Covid

Gary Illyes from Google said the company is working on putting together "some more thorough do's and don't's" around what e-commerce and other site owners should do with their web sites if the business is temporarily closed due to the coronavirus. But for now, he said just put a message up and disable the shopping cart from checking out.

Gary Illyes posted on Reddit "in the meantime, closing the cart and putting up a message that explains to the user what's happening should be the way to go if you're planning the closure will last a long time."

He said Google is "going to put up some more thorough do's and don't's" around how to handle e-commerce sites closing now. But he said "redirects, 503s, etc, will have unwanted effects on the site from SEO perspective if lasts for more than just a couple days." So try to avoid those if you can.

Make sure to check out the whole thread, it is interesting. And I hope you are not in this situation.

Forum discussion at Reddit.

 

Popular Categories

The Pulse of the search community

Search Video Recaps

 
Video Details More Videos Subscribe to Videos

Most Recent Articles

Search Forum Recap

Daily Search Forum Recap: August 28, 2025

Aug 28, 2025 - 10:00 am
Google Search Engine Optimization

Some Sites Have Huge Crawl Rate Declines In Google Search Console

Aug 28, 2025 - 9:30 am
Google Search Engine Optimization

Bug: Google Search Console Performance Report Search Appearance Android App

Aug 28, 2025 - 7:51 am
Bing Ads

Microsoft Testing Tests Larger Titles For Ads In Bing Search

Aug 28, 2025 - 7:41 am
Google Ads

Google Ads Gets Audience Exclusions For Shopping Campaigns

Aug 28, 2025 - 7:31 am
Bing Search

Bing Tests Bolding Site Name On Hover

Aug 28, 2025 - 7:21 am
 
Previous Story: Google Dog Dressed Up In Shiny Blue Hair