We've just bought a new domain - need advice on the exact procedure to follow...
-
Hi guys,
We've just bought a 3 letter .co.uk domain to replace our current 20 character old domain.
Our existing domain is PR5 with quite a few links (that we can modify no problem) We're currently .301 redirecting the new domain to the old domain.
I was looking at the procedure in one of the guides but as it's slightly different - is this the correct procedure?
1. prep the duplicate site on new domain and prep the individual htaccess .301 redirects
2. Add new the domain to google webmaster tools bing Webmaster centre
2. On the switchover date - modify all possible incoming links from external sites
3. On the switchover date - apply the .301 redirects and make the new site live
4. On the switchover date - apply the new sitemaps to google & bing
5. on the switchover date - fill out the change of address form in webmaster tools
6. Do the happy dance?
many thanks in advance,
Tony.
-
Simply, yes that just about covers it.
The things to bear in mind are that there is often a delay in recognising the new domain so there may be a short amount of time where your domain is not apearing on the SERPS.
My personal advice is as follows:
Pre-move: Buy the new domain as early as possible and put some simple content on it. Submit/register your domain with the major search engines and get a few links to ensure it is listed and the search engines recognise it (this helps to reduce or avoid sandboxing).
1. Create all necessary 301 Redirects.
2. Use analytics and site explorer to find the top 200 or so domains sending traffic to your old domain and contact their webmasters to change the links.
3. Make sure both the old and new sites have been verified and have site maps submitted.
4. Launch your new site with a media and online marketing campaign. The goal is to get as many new inbound links as possible as quickly as possible and to attract a large number of branded searches for the new site.
5. Monitor your Webmaster Central account for 404 errors and to check how Google is dealing with your 301's. Whenever a 404 is produced, place a 301 in place.
6. Monitor the spiders on your new domain. Search engines spend more time crawling sites they trust so when your crawl level is close to your old sites level you are probably close to that trust level (this is a crude measurement).
7. Monitor your search engine traffic referrals to help determine how your new site is developing on the internet.
8. You can also check your server logs for 404 and 500 errors.
For more information Matt Cutts published the following:
http://blog.milestoneinternet.com/web-development/faq-on-duplicate-content-and-moving-your-site-by-matt-cutts-at-pubcon-2009/
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
How to Evaluate Original Domain Authority vs. Recent 'HTTPS' Duplicate for Potential Domain Migration?
Hello Everyone, So our site has used ‘http’ for the domain since the start. Everything has been set up for this structure and Google is only indexing these pages. Just recently a second version was created on ‘httpS’. We know having both up is the worst case scenario but now that both are up is it worth just switching over or would the original domain authority warrant just keeping it on ‘http’ and redirecting the ‘httpS’ version? Assuming speed and other elements wouldn’t be an issue and it's done correctly. Our thought was if we could do this quickly it would be easier to just redirect the ‘httpS’ version but was not sure if the Pros of ‘httpS’ would be worth the resources. Any help or insight would be appreciated. Please let us know if there are any further details we could provide that might help. Looking forward to hearing from all of you! Thank you in advance for the help. Best,
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Ben-R1 -
Building a product clients will integrate into their sites: What is the best way to utilize my clients' unique domain names?
I'm designing a hosted product my clients will integrate into their websites, their end users would access it via my clients' customer-facing websites. It is a product my clients pay for which provides a service to their end users, who would have to login to my product via a link provided by my clients. Most clients would choose to incorporate this link prominently on their home page and site nav.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | emzeegee
All clients will be in the same vertical market, so their sites will be keyword rich and related to my site.
Many may even be .org and ,edus The way I see it, there are three main ways I could set this up within the product.
I want to know which is most beneficial, or if I'm missing anything. 1: They set up a subdomain at their domain that serves content from my domain product.theirdomain.com would render content from mydomain.com's database.
product.theirdomain.com could have footer and/or other no-follow links to mydomain.com with target keywords The risk I see here is having hundreds of sites with the same target keyword linking back to my domain.
This may be the worst option, as I'm not sure about if the nofollow will help, because I know Google considers this kind of link to be a link scheme: https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/66356?hl=en 2: They link to a subdomain on mydomain.com from their nav/site
Their nav would include an actual link to product.mydomain.com/theircompanyname
Each client would have a different "theircompanyname" link.
They would decide and/or create their link method (graphic, presence of alt tag, text, what text, etc).
I would have no control aside from requiring them to link to that url on my server. 3: They link to a subdirectory on mydomain.com from their nav/site
Their nav would include an actual link to mydomain.com/product/theircompanyname
Each client would have a different "theircompanyname" link.
They would decide and/or create their link method (graphic, presence of alt tag, text, what text, etc).
I would have no control aside from requiring them to link to that url on my server. In all scenarios, my marketing content would be set up around mydomain.com both as static content and a blog directory, all with SEO attractive url slugs. I'm leaning towards option 3, but would like input!0 -
What sort of content for 'non-niche' website?
Hey guys, had a question with regards to content production. We run an store called Yellow Octopus in Australia and we've literally got thousands of products (4500 skus last count). We've got everything from novelty mugs to kitchen accessories to gag gifts, t-shirts and tech gadgets. I've read a lot of material on creating awesome content to attract backlinks and we are ready to craft our content strategy. We've got a team in place - graphic designer, illustrator and writers to execute that strategy. It's just a matter of formulating the strategy! Largely speaking I have an idea of the quality of content required because I look at a lot of it. The real issue is what type of content is right for us? Most of the articles I have read focus on niche industries i.e. SEO, Piano sales or health foods. Right off the bat I can come up with hundreds of content pieces that work around those niches. However, with such a diverse range of products I'm unsure of what our niche really is, in fact not having a niche is almost our niche. Of course we could do gift guides like '30 Unbelievable Gifts for Foodies' (and we do, do those). However they aren't really the type of posts that are likely to attract back-links. Is the best strategy to split the content into categories? What sort of content pieces would you suggest for a company such as ours? Many thanks in advance!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | TheGreatestGoat0 -
301 redirecting staff Domain to Company Domain
My colleague owns a domain (A) for about 10 years that he does not use. The domain's content is the same as my company's website (B) content.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | khi5
Question: Can I 301 redirect domain A to domain B's homepage or is it better he just closes down his website since this would not be SEO best practices? thank you0 -
Value in creating an 'All listings' sitemap?
Hello, I work for the Theater discovery website, theatermania.com. Users can browse current shows on a city-by-city basis, such as New York: http://www.theatermania.com/new-york-city-theater/shows/ My question is, is there any SEO benefit in us creating a single page that lists all shows (both current and non-current) across the US? My boss mentioned that this could help our long tail results, but I'm not so sure.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | TheaterMania0 -
Experience of moving to a new domain
Hi all just wondering if anyone has ever had any experience / tips / advice. moving from domain name a to b is well published all over the web and the practice is often discussed on here. but my question is has anyone ever done moving the domain from a to b and then after x time move back to domain a. i can't find any examples, notes anywhere on Google. thanks in advance
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Andy-Halliday0 -
New my domain.com/blog option vs. my blog.mydomain.com option
Our e-commerce site has been on Big Commerce for about a year now. One thing many SEO folks had told us is that having a blog located at /blog was going to help more than a subdomain blog. option. BC has never had the option to have a blog hosted on their platform (/blog) until now. I am now wondering, since we have lost traffic in the past and are trying everything we can to regain it, if we should purchase the Wordpress Site Redirect upgrade and move the subdomain blog (blog.) to the new site option /blog. Any help or feedback from you is very much appreciated. I have attached a screenshot of our main website vs. our blog from Open Site Explorer in case it helps anything. I29Tw5P
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | josh3300 -
A Begginer. Learning Lots. Need Advice.
About a month ago I took over a SEO for a small RV company here in Florida. My responsibilities include: SEO, Adwords, Video Production, Inventory Update, Newsletters, Social Media, Etc. I feel a little overwhelmed, but we are a small company and we probably won't be hiring more people. I'm weak in some areas and strong in others. In the SEO area I'm weak. My question is, in the SEO area, where should I be focusing most? I break my SEO responsibilities into a couple areas: Keyword Research (A lot of competition) Back-linking Social Media I know there are more. But where should be my main focus, and how should I go about doing it? Website is http://www.floridaoutdoorsrv.com I would kind of like some one to give me an idea of where I am, and what should I do next. SEOMoz has given me a lot of errors and it's little overwhelming. Thanks in advance for the advice!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | floridaoutdoorsrv0