How to "Hide" a Page

If you would like a page to be hidden from view from your visitors, without deleting the page entirely (for example if you're working on it and aren't ready to show it yet) - Take these steps:  

Step 1) Don't link to the page! :)

By removing the link to that page from all navigation menus, buttons, hyperlinked text, etc. - visitors will simply not know it exists and NOT be able to "click" anywhere to get to it.

By deleting a menu item (ie: page name) from the MENU widget in your Header, it will NOT remove the PAGE itself. It just takes away the visual displayed link to that page so your visitors will not have a link to get there.

Your actual PAGES you have created - that you will be linking to from your menu are accessed via your Pages & Popups list (top icon of three stacked lines on the left side of your builder).  

Your MENU on the other hand is simply a visual display of the links you choose to display. These can be links to PAGES on your site, items in your store, blog posts, external links, etc. (See the Linking 101 article tutorial below here for reference: https://help.shinepages.com/article/linking-101-how-to-use-the-select-a-link-window

When you Add or Delete a "menu item" - ie: a link to a page - you are NOT adding or deleting the page from existence on your site. You are simply taking away the link to that page. (See the article tutorial on adding and editing Menu items here for reference: https://help.shinepages.com/article/how-to-add-or-edit-a-menu-in-your-header)

This is the first step to "hide" pages - simply remove all links to that page. :)

In your menu - click on the “EDIT MENU” button.

In the menu "EDIT" window - click on the trashcan icon next to the menu item you would like to remove from your menu.

Step 2) Remove the page from the SiteMap

The Second Step to take if you want to hide your page from visitors AND from the Search Engines (whether temporarily or permanently) would be to go to the Page's settings (gear icon next to the page name in the list of Pages & Popups) - click on SEO Info at the top of the Page Settings Window and "Un-check" the "Add to Sitemap" button. This "hides" the page from Google. 

You can apply this to all of your pages including Blog and Store pages.

Remembering to "Check" the "Add to Sitemap when and if you want to show your page again.

Alternative Option: Hide all the blocks on the page

When a page is "hidden" by having all links removed to it - it is still a "live" and active page on your site. And while the odds are great that no one will ever visit that page as there are no links to get there, it is still visible by going directly to the Page URL for that page. (In addition, it may be "discovered" by Google as well. See step 2 above for info about how to hide from Google).

In other words - if there were no links to your "New Services" page (Page URL = /new-services) from your menu (or from any buttons on your site, hyperlinked text, etc.) - people could still get directly to that page and see it if they knew to type in: yourdomainname.com/new-services

Therefore, if you want to take one step further to "hide" the contents of that page - just in case you think anyone would have or guess a direct link to that page - you can "Hide" all the Blocks on the page temporarily by clicking the "eyeball with a line thru it" icon that is in the upper right-hand corner of every block on your page when you hover over.

This will temporarily "hide" the contents of that block from public view. They can be "turned back on" by clicking the link that says "This block is hidden, click here to reveal" when you are ready. 

IMPORTANT NOTE:

If you think you may want to use those unwanted pages later (or any pages later!) We recommend making a backup copy of your entire website. See this article: How to duplicate or clone a website or funnel to create a backup copy

If you want to permanently DELETE your page - please see this article: How to delete a page you no longer need