Does google will see this has a 301 permanent redirect and will penalized my website?

[bigrat95]

Hi,

I got a website that have a lot of information on job posting. The domain name will be new but i just want to redirect all of the old single job pages (around 300 pages). To the new domain pages but keep the old domain because it's already been indexed by google. The design will change but the content will kinda be the same.

Is this a good approach? Does google will see this has a 301 permanent redirect and will penalized my website?

Thanks alot

[Ray-pp]

No, a 301 redirect is a permanent redirect. So, if you went to /old-page it would auto-redirect you to the new domain's page. This prevents duplicate content across the domains.

[bigrat95]

That's what i tougth...

But The problem is that if i rewright domain1.com/job to domain2.com/job With the same content on both webpage with 301, does Google will see this has duplicate content and penalysed m'y web page?

[Ray-pp]

You're correct, you cannot 301 only the domain and expect the authority of the old domain's other pages to seamlessly transfer.

If your new domain has a similar URL structure to the old domain, then it will be relatively easy (not a lot of rules) to use the .htaccess to redirect all old urls to the new urls. e.g. www.olddomain.com/page to www.newdomain.com/page

If the text of the URL, after the domain name, will change then you'll have to create custom redirects for all pages.

Example: www.olddomain.com**/page** to www.newdomain.com**/this-is-a-new-url**

[max.favilli]

Ray, my understanding on this is, one way or another, you have to redirect every single url, you can do it with “url rewriting’ (either htaccess on apache or web.config on iis) or some other technique but just redirecting the domain won't work. Unless the site url structure stay exactly the same.

Just to clarify any confusion, if an existing url is http://old-domain/foo and the new projected url is http://new-domain/bar just redirecting the domain won't work (meaning google will not transfer any juice).

[Ray-pp]

You can 301 each URL individually, or if your site has a clear structure you can use rules in the .htaccess to catch all the pages needing 301.

If you're going to move forward with a new brand and expect to keep it long-term then I would just 301 the entire old domain to the new domain. If you do not have a lot of users/customers at this time, then doing that won't be confusing to the current visitors. But, if your brand is large enough, you may want to keep the old domain's home page with content explaining the rebranding. Eventually, you'd want to 301 that old domain as well, since it has a lot of authority you'd like to transfer to the new domain, at some point.

[bigrat95]

Thanks a lot for your answer,

but if we check at this link from search engine land, they recommend to do a list of all of the urls and 301 each of them individually so that we will not loose authority.

I am kinda lost

This is what they said:

Don’t Lose Your Authority

"As you develop the new website, don’t lose all of the great authority it has gained with search engines over the years! Before relaunching the new site, make a list of your old URLs and map them to the same (or similar) content on the new site.

I like to use a spreadsheet with two columns: Column A contains the old URL and Column B contains the associated new URL. By entering the URLs this way, you can quickly create a set of 301 redirects for these URLs in Microsoft Word by simply changing the table to text and doing a few search/replace functions. This is especially handy if you have a long list of URLs to enter.

Be sure to add the redirects to your .htaccess file. Test your 301s after the launch to ensure they are working properly."

[Ray-pp]

Hi bigrat95,

If you'd like to use a new domain with the same content as the old domain then you need to 301 the old domain to the new domain. Leaving content up on the old domain and using the same content on the new domain will cause duplicate content to be recognized, so you want to 301 the old domain to new domain.

You can keep the old domain's home page up and write some unique content for it, without redirecting the home page of the old domain. I suggest writing unique content for that home page and explain your new brand/domain, the value the new site brings to your users, and suggest them to bookmark the new site.

Eventually, your new domain will outrank your old domain and you won't be as worried about keeping it around in the long-term.