How to create a quick 404 Error page in WordPress

It can be super frustrating to click on a blog post that you found on Pinterest, and you come to see that the post is no longer available.

The error page that you pull up doesn’t offer any help either. It just displays an error message without any assistance on where to go or what to do next.

The 404 Error Page is one place that I feel many online business owners are losing people when instead they can be strategically guiding their audience where to go rather than leaving them to click away from their site.

In today’s video, I share with you how to make a simple custom 404 Error Page using two of my favorite tools, Beaver Builder and Beaver Themer. It takes a few minutes to set up the error page itself, but you’ll want to spend a little bit of time concentrating on the strategy that you plan to use to get people to stay on your website longer, even if they’ve reached an error page.

Creating a 404 Error Page in WordPress

First up, you’ll probably need a plugin like Beaver Themer in order to create this page on your website. There are usually plenty of plugins out there that you can use to create this page but this is by far my favorite plugin to make this happen.

Next, you’ll want to create the custom 404 Error page by going into Beaver Themer and adding this new layout.

After you’ve added a new layout, you’ll want to figure out your settings for who will see this custom 404 page. You can create different 404 pages for someone who is logged in versus someone who is logged out. If you have a membership site this makes it easy to customize the messages for the appropriate audience.

After you’ve edited these settings, you can then launch Beaver Builder and make the page look exactly like you want it to look. Setting up an error page is relatively simple and doesn’t take much time, but I want you to consider what you’d like to add to the page to keep people from clicking away from your site.

Here are a few things that you might want to consider to add to your 404 page:

#1 – Links to your most recent blog posts

Most of the time the people who find this error page while visiting your site came to this page because they were looking for something on your blog. So while they may have wanted another post, if you have your most recent posts available for them to scroll through, they might find something else that catches their eye.

#2 – A branded message that tells them sorry that the page is no longer available

I love when I come across an error page with a cute message that tells me that “somehow the Internet ate their page”. It’s fun to find little messages like this where you can clearly see that the owner of the site has gone the extra mile and paid attention to all the details.

#3 – Links to your shop favorites

Another great way to keep your audience on your website is to share a few of your shop favorites. Not only will they have something fun to look at when they click over to this error page, but they’ll also know a little bit more about what your site is all about.

#4 – A chance to hop on your email list

Any time that you have an opportunity to have people join your email list is a great time for you to have a link or form. Just make sure that you’re offering them something pretty awesome in return for the exchange.

#5 – More information about how to work with you

Lastly, I recommend adding a little bit of information about what you do and how you help your ideal audience to meet their end goal. By adding this information to your error page, you’re reinforcing what you offer and also letting the reader know if they’re in the right place.

There are other things that you can add to this page but the most important thing is to help them and not leave an opportunity on the table.

If you’re looking to up your website game this year but need an extra helping hand to guide you along, be sure to check out my Work With Me page for my newest consulting packages.