Comments on: Inspirational 404 Error Pages

By: Vivien

Vivien — Tue, 31 Jul 2007 07:38:36 +0000

They most certainly do. Hopefully, people do get their message.

By: Jatinder

Jatinder — Tue, 31 Jul 2007 07:34:18 +0000

GreenPeace has a better sales pitch on their 404 page then most people have on their homepages.

They definitely know their priorities and how to push the message across.

By: Vivien

Vivien — Fri, 25 May 2007 15:20:38 +0000

David, I was following the instructions on Codex Wordpress page to create user-friendly error messages and get email notifications when someone lands on your page.

By: David Airey :: Graphic Design Edinburgh

David Airey :: Graphic Design Edinburgh — Fri, 25 May 2007 15:01:39 +0000

Vivien,

I don’t receive emails alerting me when someone hits a 404, but if you could point me in the right direction it’d be very much appreciated. That sounds like a very useful alert!

MiSc,

I agree with Vivien when she mentions a potential problem when users are automatically given search results. The search isn’t entirely accurate, and the user still isn’t finding exactly what they’re looking for, so that could be confusing.

Thanks to you both for taking a look however. I’ve just changed my 404 page so the title includes ‘404′ and the text refers the user to where my search box is (at the top right of the page). It’s a good idea to place a search box within the main text body, and I’ll look into that shortly.

By: Vivien

Vivien — Fri, 25 May 2007 14:01:32 +0000

MiSc, the problem is that even redirecting the request to the site’s search often doesn’t help that much - it usually results in bunch of pages that search engine thinks are related to my request, so I have to browse through all those search results and maybe find something remotely close to what I was looking for or maybe find nothing.

I don’t think that “The century of displaying 404s is over”. It’s like coming to a store looking for a product I was thinking they had, but not finding it, however the store had so many other interesting products to offer that I end up buying those.

@David, I think that the other thing you might need to add to your 404 is either pointing the visitor to the location of the search box, or adding another search box below the image. Also, maybe adding the numbers “404″ before saying “No walk today”, just because most people are aware of the 404 errors by now, so they’ll know they landed on one.

By: MiSc

MiSc — Fri, 25 May 2007 08:19:15 +0000

@David: Well, additions…
The problem is, your 404 page actually doesn’t look like one. It looks like a content page, with a big image, lots of text and navigation.

So how many of your users will immediately know that it’s an error page?
They have to read through your sorry-text, check the huge page overview on the right, and one day will find the search field in the middle of nowhere.

The century of displaying 404s is over. Take your requests to your site’s search - and find related stuff. One step less annoying.

By: Vivien

Vivien — Fri, 25 May 2007 00:45:02 +0000

haha, what a cute 404 page you’ve got there, David. I think you’ve addressed all the things that should be on 404 error page - you’ve kept the site navigation, the sidebar, and even linked to featured articles and contact you page.

Do you get email notifications when someone is landing on your 404 page? Where they came from and which page is missing?

By: David Airey :: Graphic Design Edinburgh ::

David Airey :: Graphic Design Edinburgh :: — Thu, 24 May 2007 23:23:11 +0000

Hi Vivien,

I’ve recently changed my 404 page (again - my habit of never being happy with my own work) and have linked to it through my name above.

Would you have any suggestions for possible additions?

By: Vivien

Vivien — Tue, 22 May 2007 20:10:33 +0000

Shelly, I’m so glad to see that you’re enjoying your surfing/reading time at InspirationBit. I think I need to get more coffee to keep up with all your comments today. Thank you

By: This Eclectic Life

This Eclectic Life — Tue, 22 May 2007 19:49:01 +0000

It has never even occurred to me to think about my 404 page! See what reading someone’s archives will tell me? Number 6 was my favorite. I think I’ll go get some coffee and think about my 404.