301 multiple redirects to one page

[GregD]

Hi, I have a question about redirects.

We have 5 pages with individual URL’s that are out dated and have irrelevant content. These 5 old URL’s all rank well in Google. We have designed 1 new page that incorporates all these 5 pages into one. If we set up 301’s in IIS for all 5 pages to redirect to this new page will Google penalise us?

We are not concerned with losing these 5 old pages from the index. We don’t expect this new page to rank for the queries that all the old pages did. We just want to get rid of these pages and in the mean time we need to direct the traffic to this new content. Are main concern is with duplicate content. Will 5 URL’s redirecting to 1 URL’s cause a problem? We don’t want these redirects to have a negative effect on the rest of our site.

Thank you in advance

[JohnW]

IMO it would be totally safe especially if the content of the redirected pages is also substantially on the new page. I would guess that there are limits to this sort of thing depending on how it is done but I don't know what they would be. One thing to consider - there are websites out there that have ranked well for a long time and have dozens of other domains 301d to them.

[GregD]

Thank you JohnW. That's some good advice. I'm going to go ahead and make the redirects.