Having a new website build, what happens to my SEO work?
-
Hi,
We are in the process of having a new website developed by a web agency. New domain, new business name etc...
What is the best process to transfer from old domain to the new one?
What happens to all my ranked URLs?
What can re-directs do to help me?
Will I loose all my link juice on highly ranked keyword domains? I ranked 1st for a brand now, wil lthis go?
Any advice, help or hints would be great.
Thanks
Will
-
Here's a great post about migrating a website that you might find useful.
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/web-site-migration-guide-tips-for-seos
-
Sounds good mate. Thanks.
-
Hi Will,
In that case it doesn't really sound like you can stick with the original domain, so as Prasad suggested I would go with the 301 and the Google WMT Change of Address.
To avoid getting too many WMT errors you might also want to spider your existing site with something like screaming frog to ensure you catch all the existing URLs and point them to the right place on the new site.
You could also potentially contact people who have linked to your existing domain and ask them to change the link to your new domain.
All the best,
Stuart
-
Thanks for your replies.
We need a new website first and foremost. Current one too old, not good enough etc...
Then we are changing our business name to fit in with new stores etc...
We want to move away from our current brand name, hence the new name. The current URL structure is poor, so a short, more SEO friendly one is being devised into the new site.
I think the 301 is best option, as we need to get away from our current site, current name and current website provider.
The company we are using are e-commerce experts so no doubt they have best solution but was just looking to see what options are out there.
Thanks
-
Hi Will,
I guess my first question would be is why are you moving to a new domain? If at all possible if you are ranking on your existing domain I would try and keep your site on there, even if you are moving to a completely new CMS and server there are ways to ensure your URL structure maps over so each URL can be replaced 1-for-1 with a new page on the new site - if this is what you are doing?
Stuart
-
Hi Will,
First you must have a process to redirect all the current ulrs to new domain's urls, using 301 permanent redirection. It will pass about 95 % of link juice to your new urls.
And also set the new domain on Google Webmaster Tools and set the old domains settings as you have moved your site to new domain. Hope you know how you can do it.
But I have no idea about your new website. Because of the new contents on your new urls maybe different than the current contents on current urls and up to the on page optimization of the new pages can be affects to your ranking. It maybe higher or lower. Because this is not just url updating.
Regards
Prasad
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
-
Need suggestion: What is the best internal linking structure for our website to gain in SEO & UX too?
Hi all, We have 3 different editions of our product we are selling with 20 features. 1st edition & 2nd edition comes with 15 features in which 10 are common in each edition. 3rd edition comes with all 20 features. Now what's the best way to interlink and show the navigational menu to highlight 3 editions and features as well? Much appreciated if some one refer me a website with such structure. Thanks
Web Design | | vtmoz0 -
Does an age verification home page hurt SEO?
There's a microbrewery in our area that just launched its first website. It has the "verify your age" homepage (which is not really their homepage, but I don't know what it's called) before you can enter. It looks like this: http://angrychairbrewing.com/ Anyway, does this hurt them at all from a rankings standpoint? Also, assuming bots/spiders/ROGER can crawl sites like this, (which I think they would have to be able to do) how do they get around this verification? Thanks, Ruben
Web Design | | KempRugeLawGroup0 -
New Mobile Site Traffic Drop
With all the talk about how much mobile is important and how it is going to return its own search results, we finally decided to make a mobile site for one of our smaller websites to test the water. We put it up about two weeks ago and did Vary HTTP header method to serve the site. Before the change, on the average week we would get 270-300 mobile visitors from organic search results and we converted 0.78% to sales. Since the change, we are now getting about 70 mobile organic visitors per week but converting 2.47% So what can I say but WOW. We are converting way way better but our organic mobile search traffic has dropped off a ton. Luckily our desktop and tablet traffic(we serve the desktop version of the site to tablets) has stayed the same and has not dipped. Do any of you guys have experience or gone through launching a mobile site before? Did you see the immediate drop in organic mobile traffic and did you recover your traffic back to previous levels? If so, do you know how long it takes to recover? I am thinking it is a big change and will take time for Google to adjust but I am not sure since the mobile version has so much less text now on the home page and on category or product list pages or whatever you guys want to call them.
Web Design | | KurtL0 -
Switching from HTML Static to WordPress Platform - SEO
Hi All, Hope everyone is doing well. I am currentyl in the process of having a re-design to myu HTML Static Site, I am switching to WordPress. My site is still running now until the new one is prepared. My question is: I do rank pretty well for some of our strong local keywords, we also have a FEW links pointing to inner pages with an extension of .HTML, should I set the the WordPress URL's to reflect .HTML or will the Search Enginesfigure out that http://www.domain/innerpage.html is the same as http://www.domain/innerpage/ or is it NOT the same. Should I switch or not? Thanks for your input Jimmy
Web Design | | jimmy02250 -
3 Brands, 3 Services, 3 Different Websites Right?
My client was told that having 1 website for 3 different brands/services is better than having 3 websites. I need your help to prove my value to a new client. This client has worked with Reach Local on PPC for some time and when they first got started the Reach Local Markering Consultant told this cleint that they needed to have one site for better SEO purposes. The client was told that Google ranks websites higher if they have more paid traffic going to them. I've been doing this for long enough to realize this does not help ranking, at least not enough to make a difference. Keep in mind this is for 3 different companies. One company does plumbing, another electrical and the last one does air conditioning. They also have 4 locations but only two locations have mutliple services opperating out of them. I understand these 2 location will not have there own Google+ Local / Places listing. Using the same address for 2 different business and expecting a first page ranking is just not possible. Right now when you visit the clients website you see a logo that rotates with a banner section that follows the logo rotation. First you see the AC Company and then the Plumbing etc. I see this as confusing to the end user and it is more work to get it ranked for SEO. I recommended that we build 3 speerate websites for each service and just list out all the addresses that the company services on the contact page. I would also design inside the footer links to the other services for branding purposes. Please share your thoughts on how you would handle this if you were doing the SEO for your own 3 different business services. I really appreicate any input/insight to this. Thank you so much in advance!!!!
Web Design | | 1SMG0 -
Word Press Seo Errors/ Questions
Hi my name is Tina I am new here I hope you guys can help me out. I thought building my new site with Word Press was going to simplify things, however I have a ton of errors, and I am not sure what they are, or how to fix them. I am hoping someone could share with me a solution for these errors. I have 28 rel=canonical errors, I am not sure what this means, I understand it to mean my pages are similar, and this is to set a heirarchy between my pages. Please correct me if I am wrong. If I am correct would this be necessary to add if my main keyword was "widgets" and my home page was optimized for "widgets" and my next page was "blue widgets" and so on. While my pages are similar they are all optimized for different versions of my main keyword some using long tail keywords. Do you know of a plugin that can help solve this problem? Also does anyone have a plugin they recommend for G+ my G+ authorship verification is causing an error as well? I am using Head Space 2 I have used this seo plugin numerous times with great success it has been my favorite seo plugin. However, we have a portfolio that shows our clients websites, and on those pages Head Space will not let me enter a description tag. What plug in do you guys recommend with more control over each page? Another interesting issue is on one of our pages I optimized it for our Canadian clients, and now every page has been listed in Google.ca for the keywords it should have on Google.com. We are listed on Google maps, verified in Google places, and our address is on the site so they know we're from the USA however, the majority of our keywords are only listed in Google.ca. We're on page one for all of them, we are in the top three on most of them so that's not bad, but we want to be listed in Google.com as well. Any suggestions on this?
Web Design | | TinaGammon1 -
Map Search Tools to integrate on Accommodation Website
Hello all, Can any recommend a Map Search tool that i can integrate into my accommodation website. Ideally I want to be able to pin my clients on the map search with links back to their listing page on my website and provide an alternative search facility for clients looking for accommodation. Am covering the South Africa region specifically. Am assuming that i could go down the Google Maps route but would really like to know what alternatives there are on offer. Also what SEO considerations do i need to think about when adding this to my website. Thanks in advance for any help.
Web Design | | SamanthaRiggien0 -
Website platform
I read through this 2008 Moz post and comments: http://www.seomoz.org/blog/choosing-the-right-cms-platform-for-your-website-from-an-seo-perspective but a few years have passed since the discussion. I am looking to completely revamp my site which is primarily static and built on WordPress, and create a rich community environment that is highly interactive and serves the visitor well. The question continues to come up why I'm using WP vs DotNet vs Drupal vs Juumla. The honest answer is: 1) it's easy for a non-tech like me to update, 2) seems like a lot of plugins are available for use, 3) has a high adoption rate (stable) But also, I kind of don't know what I don't know. I wanted to open up the conversation to see why others favor a specific platform as it relates to the following needs: Must be non-tech EASY to use (no high learning curve Lots of plugins and interoperability - can add and remove as needed/times change Must support forum/community needs and conversations Must be able to create granular authentication / permissions for different audiences to see "permissioned" content BONUS if it can interoperate with MS Dynamics CRM (unfortunately, sigh) I've been burned in the past by using teams that had a predilection for a platform simply because they were comfortable with it - not because it was right for my needs. I have a hard time understanding pro/con conversations if the technologies are too focused on the tech and not enough of what the technology delivers, and I'm naturally resistant to technologies that require a techie, rather than a marketing expert to use them.Thoughts anyone? Would love to hear Mozer opinions - thanks in advance 🙂
Web Design | | JeanieWalker0