Client has 2 websites... won't do away with old site.
-
Ok my situation is: We have built a new site for a client and they would like to keep both sites working. Should I just attempt to optimize both sites to rank well in their area? Or should I be suggesting a 301 redirect from the old domain to the new? Other options?
Thanks in advance
-
My husband has two real estate sites. My plan, when I made the new one was to take the old one down. But for some reason it mysteriously ranks well for several terms and continues to bring us business.
With that being said, if there is duplicate content across the two sites then one is going to suffer.
If the old site is ranking well, it may be ok to keep it. But, it will be a challenge to optimize both sites. It's much better to work on one site. In most cases, I would redirect the old to the new site. The only reason I would personally keep the old one is if it was ranking well already for them.
-
Google isn't a fan of duplication. I've been watching more and more companies who had multiple sites realize it's going to bite them, and they have been merging (or, redirecting) into one.
I'd never advocate for two sites, mostly because of the same reasons others mentioned.
-
I think it comes down to whether you have the resources to keep both sites at the top of their games. Having two sites is pretty much twice the work of having one (see, I'm a maths genuis me!) if they are both to rank well. You "should" be able to grab a larger slice of the top ranking spots with two sites but it is hard work.
-
I had contemplated this a couple of years ago. We had an old site and just created a new one. The old site was performing well in the search results for popular keywords. We didn't want to risk losing any ranking doing a 301 redirect and we wanted to attempt having multiple listings on search results - so, we kept both!
We stopped updating the old site and let it coast then started working on SEO for the new site and eventually had two well performing sites on the SERPs.
And with google merging organic and place pages, you could use the new site as the URL for a place page if the company you are working with is a local business. So you'll have a organic listing and place listing.
I thought I would share my experience with you to consider what is possible with keeping both sites. However, there is nothing wrong with 301 redirecting to the new site.
-
Good question
It's a new site with new content... I believe their thinking is "2 sites is better than 1". I'm going to continue to fight the uphill climb and get them to ditch the old one.
-
Why do they want to keep it? Implementing 301 redirects is essential and is the best-practice as you want to have only unique content out there.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
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
-
I still don't understand how rel=canonical works. Help?
So here's the deal. I write for many different outlets. I also have many different pages on my blog that have duplicates (authorized, of course). On my blog, I have many different pages that redirect to "the original" content. I've only recently discovered the existence of rel=canonical. However I don't understand how it works. I have very specific questions. Can anyone help? If, on my blog, I have a blog post that's the original. And another website has the same content, used with authorization. If I want to tell search engines that the original content is on MY blog, what can I do? Is the only solution to ask the owner of the other blog to add a rel=canonical in the header of the specific post? If, on my blog, I have a blog post that's NOT the original. Do I simply add rel=canonical to the header, then add a link to the original in the body? If, on my blog, I have THE FIRST 300 WORDS of a blog post, then add a link saying "to read the whole article, click here" with a link pointing to the original, do I need to have a rel=canonical tag somewhere? Does it HAVE to be in the header? Can rel=canonical be used in the - What penalties are included with having duplicate content of my work everywhere on the web? I've been trying to find specifics, but can't. Thanks for the help. I'm quite confused, as you can see.
On-Page Optimization | | cedriklizotte0 -
Can the Lightboxes on My Site be Crawled?
I'm trying to optimize my site, but I have lightboxes and I don't know if they are visible to the search engines. If they aren't, could you suggest something that I could do? THANK YOU so much!!!!! My site is lymphexpo.com
On-Page Optimization | | bosleypalmer0 -
Understanding why our new page doesn't rank. Internal link structure to blame? + understand canonical pages more.
Hi guys. Sorry it's an essay...BUT, i think a lot of you will find this an interesting question. This question is in 2 (related) parts, and I imagine it would be an 'advanced' SEO question. Hoping you guys can help bring some real insight 🙂 Always amazed at the quality for this forum/ community. **Context... ** We had a duplicate content issue caused by this page and it's product permutations, so we placed canonical tags on all the product permutations to solve it. Worked a treat. However, we now have more **product ranges. **We now sell Diaries, Notebooks & Music books, which are clearly different from one another. So...we've placed canonical tags on all the product permutations leading back to the 'parent' theme. In other words, all the diary permutations 'lead back' to the diary page. All the notebooks permutations 'lead back' to the main notebook page. So on and so forth. Make sense so far? Context end..... Issue. Amazingly our Diary page outranks our notebook pagefor the search term 'Design your own Notebook'. The notebook page is well optimised for this search term, and the diary page avoids the word 'notebook' altogether (so no keyword cannibalisation going on). Possible reason? Our Diary page has a vast amount of internal links to it throughout our site. The notebook page has only a few. Could this be the issue? If so, what reading/ blogs/ content/ tools would you recommend to help understand and solve this problem? i.e) Better understanding internal link structure for SEO. 2nd part of the question (in the context of internal linking for SEO). When there are internal links to a page with a conical tag does that 'count' towards the 'parent page', or simply towards that specific page? I really hope that makes sense. If it's clear as mud just shout. Isaac. EDIT: All pages in question have been indexed since we added these changes to the site.
On-Page Optimization | | isaac6630 -
Strange error on my website
Hi Wondering if anyone could help out here please. I tried to crawl my website using screaming frog and got a 500 error warning (odd considering it worked yesterday). I tried google speed test and got the following message - PageSpeed Insights received a 500 response from the server. To analyze pages behind firewalls or that require authentication. However, it also crawled the site and gave me a score of 70/100. It showed the site thumbnail, as normal. This was updated this morning and it showed the latest one so must have crawled. I can access the site, as can my 'people', the site is getting hits from real users in Google Analytics so must be working. Am very puzzled how the site can be working and not be working at the same time! If possible i would rather not share the url. The site is a test of concept and is very messy looking. it is more a test to see what happens if i do x... Many thanks Carl
On-Page Optimization | | daedriccarl0 -
SEO For Replacement Site
I have a client with a website that has gotten a bit outdated. We've already built his new website and optimized it, but I'm trying to figure out the best way to replace the site while doing the least amount of damage to his current Google rankings. He's ranking #1 for some very competitive keywords that are responsible for the bulk of his revenue, so we want to jeopardize that. We've already built a new site and written all new content, although the homepage page title, h1 header and meta descriptions will all remain what they currently are. I'm also trying to keep the keyword density as close to the current site as possible. I am aware of transferring all existing site URLS using 301 redirects. Can anyone provide any tips that I should use when replacing the site? Should I expect a slight rankings drop or am I worrying about nothing?
On-Page Optimization | | atstickel0 -
Google Doesn't Display A Right Page Title
For some reason Google Displays a wrong page title of some of my pages. E.g. page http://www.imoney.my/home-loan The title in the search reach results says "Home Loan - iMoney", but the one I've set up is <title></span><span class="webkit-html-tag">Housing Loan: Compare Mortgages of All Malaysian Banks @iMoney.my</span><span class="webkit-html-tag"></title> Even when I preview it on the preview tool, it shows the full title, but when I google - again the short one. Does anyone know what the reason for that is?
On-Page Optimization | | imoney0 -
Working on this site...
and wondering what is wrong in terms of on page SEO (basically just want some feedback on tips/changes to make) http://www.stevenholmesstudio.com/ I'm assuming that the title shouldn't be just the img file name..any suggestions for what it should be?
On-Page Optimization | | callmeed0 -
How do I do a 301 Redirect in IIS 7 from http://www.freightmonster.com/index.html to http://freightmonster.com/index.html when I don't have a physical page to redirect?
I'm trying to get rid of my Rel Canonical links and use the 301 Redirect instead.
On-Page Optimization | | FreightBoy0