Move established site from .co.uk to .org - good or bad idea?
-
I am currently considering moving our site from the current .co.uk domain to the .org version which we also own.
The site is established and indexed for 7 years, ranks well and has circa 10k traffic per month which is mainly UK & US traffic.
The reason for the change to the .org domain is to make the site more global facing and give us the opportunity to develop the site into multi language within directories (.org/es/ etc.) and then target those to the local search engines. For the kind of site it is (community based) it wouldn’t really work to split this into lots of separate country targeted domains.
So the choice is to either stick with the .co.uk and add the other foreign language specific content in directories within the .co.uk or move to the .org and do the same (there is also a potential third option of purchasing the .com which is currently unused but that could be pricey!)
We are also planning a big overhaul of the site with redesign, lots of added content and reorganisation of the site – but are thinking that it would be better to move the domain on a 1:1 basis first with the current design, content and URL structure in place and then do the other changes 2 or 3 months down the line.
I have read up on SEOmoz, google guidelines etc on moving a site to a new domain and understand the theoretical approach of moving the site and the steps to take (1to1 301 redirects, sitemaps on old and new etc) and I will retain ownership of the .co.uk so the redirects can remain in place indefinitely.
However having worked so hard to get the site to where it is in the search engines and traffic levels I am very worried about whether the domain change is a good move. I am more than happy to accept a temporary fluctuation in rankings & traffic for 1 – 4 weeks as reported may happen as long as I can be sure it will return after a temporary period and be as strong (or almost as strong) as the previous rankings / traffic.
Looking for peoples experiences to give me the confidence / reassurance to go ahead with this or any info on why I shouldn’t
Thanks in advance for your advice.
Adrian.
-
If you are going to make this site enormously popular then owning the .com will allow you stop the loss of type-in traffic to the .com domain.
For popular .org .gov .net and other domain extensions, lots of visitors instinctively type .com as the domain. I do it often myself when attempting to visit some .gov and .org sites. I am usually surprised at what I find there.
I know of a couple .com domains that get thousands of visitors per day because visitors don't type .gov as the extension.
-
Thanks both for your responses.
Although we enjoy good rankings and good traffic levels we are in one of the most competitive (SEO wise) sector (Gambling Affiliate) so we are no where near the dominant player for our key terms which I guess makes this sort of move even more risky.
EGOL – when you say you would go after the .com – do you mean for the purpose of blocking competition using it (ie: buy it to redirect to .co.uk) or would it make a difference to the argument for moving to a different domain if it was the .com instead of the .org?
So I guess the other question is if you guys think it is too risky to move the domain – do you think it is ok to build a multi language site on the .co.uk in directories or would it be better to try and buy all the country specific domains .es .de .fr etc.. (ideally wanted to keep it all under one domain as there will be shared forums and shared member backend and tracking all happening but will consider all options.)
-
I agree that there is more risk moving an older site than a newer site.
If you lost 10% of a little it would not be much... but if you lost 10% of a lot then that would be disappointing.
-
Hi Adrian,
Since your site is an established and indexed for 7 years property, I would not move it since
1- The links are actually pointing at your .co.uk domain and that won't change even with proper redirection.
2- People must probably knows this URL in some proportion
3- Your domain has build a trust from search engines that I would not play with to start from a new one.
Maybe someone would think different, but I prefer building a new site with new content or new content to my site then to risk it's futur.
-
If you redirect you will probably lose a small amount of linkjuice and possibly some anchor text value.
Do you have your closest competitors soundly beaten?
If you are clearly the dominant site in your niche then your risk of loss is lower but still possible.
(I would go after that .com.... I would be willing to pay quite a bit for it)
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
-
Why is Google not indexing my site?
I'm a bit confused as to why my site just isn't indexing on Google. Even if I type in my brand name, my social channels rank and there's no evidence of my website. I've followed all of the advice I've read and gone into webmaster tools and got the Wordpress yoast plug-in but nothing seems to be making a difference!One thing I've noticed, in Google Webmaster Tools it says "Couldn’t communicate with the DNS server." in site errors. I've called GoDaddy and they said that everything is fine. A bit frustrating. Trying to work out what my next steps should be but feeling a bit lost to be honest! Any help GREATLY appreciated!
Technical SEO | | j1066s0 -
Want to move site to wordpress and keep links without using redicrects
I have an old cluny site that has been around for about 56 years. It is on the homestead platform. I want to move the site to a thesis theme 2.1 wordpress platform without losing my links. I would prefer not to do 301 redicrects. With thesis I can specify the URL for each page of the wordpress site, however the wordpress site is hosted on hostgator as a subdomain of another site and the other problem is that wordpress adds a back slash that is not present on the old site. I can, however add .html to the URL's for pages on the wordpress site to conform to the URL's on the old html site. Will this work? thx Paul p.s. the URL for my old site is www.affordable-uncontested-divorce.com
Technical SEO | | diogenes0 -
Why does my site rank so badly
its my turn to ask the interminable question why does my site rank so badly? site is: marriagerecords.org.uk. it was #1 for 'marriage records' on google for about 6 months. then it was 5th to 10th for about 2 months. now it is nowhere for this phrase and anything else, none of the pages I have written rank for anything. I have spent hours upon hours researching original content and I have got some great backlinks from sites like wrexham.gov.uk and somerset.gov.uk (some dont show in opensiteexplorer yet). im guessing im over-optimizing something but i'd love some concrete fixes if anyone could suggest any. thanks, tom
Technical SEO | | lethal0r0 -
301 redirecting old content from one site to updated content on a different site
I have a client with two websites. Here are some details, sorry I can't be more specific! Their older site -- specific to one product -- has a very high DA and about 75K visits per month, 80% of which comes from search engines. Their newer site -- focused generally on the brand -- is their top priority. The content here is much better. The vast majority of visits are from referrals (mainly social channels and an email newsletter) and direct traffic. Search traffic is relatively low though. I really want to boost search traffic to site #2. And I'd like to piggy back off some of the search traffic from site #1. Here's my question: If a particular article on site #1 (that ranks very well) needs to be updated, what's the risk/reward of updating the content on site #2 instead and 301 redirecting the original post to the newer post on site #2? Part 2: There are dozens of posts on site #1 that can be improved and updated. Is there an extra risk (or diminishing returns) associated with doing this across many posts? Hope this makes sense. Thanks for your help!
Technical SEO | | djreich0 -
SEO Disasters - Links to Stories of Site Moves/Rebuilds Gone Bad?
Hello, everyone.. I am looking for some links to stories, articles, what have you describing medium to large complex sites that have moved, changed CMS, changed domains, etc, and ended up in a total SEO disaster. Really appreciate anything the community here has or can find! Thanks!
Technical SEO | | DuPont0 -
Site being indexed by Google before it has launched
We are currently coming towards the end of migrating one of our retail sites over to magento. To our horror, we find out today that some pages are already being indexed by Google, and we have started receiving orders through new site. Do you have any suggestions for what may have caused this? Or similarly, what the best solution would be to de-index ourselves? We most recently excluded anything with a certain parameter from robots.txt - could this being implemented incorrectly have caused this issue? Thanks
Technical SEO | | Sayers0 -
Moving a site from one server to another
Does moving a site's files from one server to another, with all URL's remaining the same, affect page rank? I am moving a site from one server to another. Everything will stay exactly the same, including URL's, file structure, etc. Will this affect page rank, domain importance, etc?
Technical SEO | | Bandicoot0 -
Google and QnA sites
My website has a QnA site - a bit like this one except it's not private to premium members. It is a page with a left colomn for category links and it has a list of recently asked questions, each question is a link to view the full question and answers etc. Does google know this is a QnA ? Or will it say - hey, there are far too many links on this page, tut tut. Is there anything I can do to help it understand what the page is.
Technical SEO | | borderbound0