Site Change of Address - best method?
-
When changing domains, there's the obvious anxiety about sacrificing the value of your old domain.
A client recently changed domains, immediately killed the old site (did everything properly with 301s, Webmaster Tools etc etc etc) and lost rankings completely for weeks. Turns out the site had been 'burnt' by the previous owner and it took a reconsideration request from Google before things recovered. Cost them rankings and cash with extra PPC spend.
My question is: In order to avoid this potential hazard, what are your thoughts on submitting a change of address in Webmaster tools, but then leaving old site live for a few weeks to see how things pan out?
I have never tried it and it seems to go against the grain, but interested to hear other people's experiences and how they have managed to change domain with minimal temporary damage.
Thanks.
-
Hi Marcus,
Yes I'm afraid so, the client in question removed a word from their company name and therefore they need to change the URL.
I'm pretty happy that we'll be able to do it with the minumum of damage, just wanted to put the question out here in case someone had an alternative method based on experience. I agree there's no perfect way to do it, however I think building some strength for the new site before killing the old one is as good a plan as any.
Thanks again.
-
Quick question, do you have to change domain? It really is best to avoid that if possible as there is no 100% perfect way to do it.
-
Hi Marcus,
Thanks for your response - I had read that post with interest just before I posted my question (and gave you a thumbs up, of course!).
The issue is the old site has a PR of 5, the new site has a PR of 0! So naturally I'm concerned that if we just kill the old site, we'll lose that considerable value and trust.
I've decided that I won't do the change of address in Webmaster Tools straight away, rather I think it's wise to get the on-site set up and do a month of off-site work to help build strength. Then we'll do the full 301 / change of address next month.
Thanks for your input!
-
There is always some temporary problems but it can be pretty quick, a few weeks even before things start picking up but that said, it's not something to take lightly.
I just covered this in some detail here:
http://www.seomoz.org/q/how-to-retain-link-juice-moving-to-new-site-cms-and-serversCheers
Marcus
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
-
Migration + Change of Address Tool used - previous site de-indexed!!
OMG disaster! Recently migrated my site womencycles.com to moonrise.health. Painstakingly went through each URL manually to map out redirects, notified Google via change of address tool. Bam. My old website has disappeared from Google and my new site has thus lost all it's organic (i.e. redirected) traffic. I don't get it. I think I have done everything by the book, but it seems my old site has disappeared and no authority or link juice has been passed to my new site by the 301s, as the new site isn't ranking either. Some examples: https://www.google.com/search?q=women+cycles&oq=women+cycles&aqs=chrome..69i57j69i65j69i61l2j69i60.1834j0j1&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8 'women cycles' previous position 1
Technical SEO | | tikitaka
https://www.google.com/search?q=chaffed+vagina&oq=chaffed+vagina&aqs=chrome..69i57.2370j0j1&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8 - chaffed vagina, previous position 1 https://www.google.com/search?q=how+long+does+it+take+turmeric+to+shrink+fibroids&oq=how+long+does+it+take+turmeric+to+shrink+fibroids&aqs=chrome..69i57.1355j0j1&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8 - how long does it take turmeric to shrink fibroids, previous position 1. Biggest traffic source pages were: https://womencycles.com/blog/top-10-home-remedies-that-claim-to-tighten-vagina-do-they-work/
https://womencycles.com/blog/sore-breasts-after-period-has-finished/
https://womencycles.com/blog/what-is-vaginal-gas-queefing/
https://womencycles.com/blog/tired-during-ovulation/
https://womencycles.com/blog/how-to-get-rid-of-saggy-vag-without-surgery/
https://womencycles.com/blog/vagina-chafing-causes-treatments-to-prevent-it-from-coming-back/
https://womencycles.com/blog/vaginal-dryness-during-pregnancy/ New blog articles on new site, with 301 redirect in place, but not ranking Screenshot shows my search traffic for my new site. Site migrated 13 June. Any ideas anyone??!Screenshot 2022-06-28 at 13.27.41.png0 -
Redirecting old html site to new wordpress site
Hi I'm currently updating an old (8 years old) html site to wordpress and about a month ago I redirected some url's to the new site (which is in a directory) like this... Redirect 301 /article1.htm http://mysite.net/wordpress/article1/
Technical SEO | | briandee
Redirect 301 /article2.htm http://mysite.net/wordpress/article2/
Redirect 301 /article3.htm http://mysite.net/wordpress/article3/ Google has indexed these new url's and they are showing in search results. I'm almost finished the new version of site and it is currently in a directory /wordpress I intend to move all the files from the directory to the root so new url when this is done will be http://mysite.net/article1/ etc My question is - what to I do about the redirects which are in place - do I delete them and replace with something like this? Redirect 301 /wordpress/article1/ http://mysite.net/article1/
Redirect 301 /wordpress/article2/ http://mysite.net/article2/
Redirect 301 /wordpress/article3/ http://mysite.net/article3/ Appreciate any help with this0 -
Changing URLs
As of right now we are using yahoo small business, when creating a product you have to declare an id, when we created the site we were not aware that you will not be able to change the id but also the ID is being used as the URL. we have a couple thousand products in which we will need to update the URLs. What would the best way to be to fix this without losing much juice from our current pages. Also I was thinking that if we did them all in a couple weeks it would hurt us a lot, and the best course of action would be to do a slow roll out of the URL changes. Any help is appreciated. Thank you!
Technical SEO | | TITOJAX0 -
Should we dump the https from a client site?
We inherited a site that has both http and https. No e-commerce or data transfer...just html. Should we dump the https certificate? I think it might be causing issues with indexing and possible duplicate content. The https site has a certificate warning message...not good. The URL is www.charlottemechanical.com
Technical SEO | | theideapeople0 -
WMT Change of address when moving to subdir
A client is moving their site that has had its own domain for years to their main domain under a subdir. So, product.com is going to brand.com/product with all pages and paths staying the same, no content is being removed. We have 301 the old domain to brand.com/product however, should we also submit a change of address in Google's WMT? The reason I ask is because the site wont be located at brand.com but at brand.com/product and do not want to confuse Google, as the 301 redirects will not match the change of address exactly.
Technical SEO | | piperis0 -
Changing the city of operation and trying to know the best way of informing Google
We are having a business operating out of three cities A, B and C with A being the primary address and the business provides its services in B and C as well. Business has decided to shut shop in C and instead add D as another city. Currently the URLs are like www.domainname.com/A/productswww.domainname.com/B/productswww.domainname.com/C/productsPlease help us in understanding the best way to inform google that City C is non operational now.Do we need to do the redirects, and if yes, should we do the redirects to Home Page?Or can we just remove the C city URLs from the webmaster tool and inform Google.
Technical SEO | | deep_irvin0 -
How many pages should my site have?
Right now I think I only have 36. What is a good amount of pages to have? Any ideas on ways to add relevant pages to my site? I was thinking about starting a message board. Also, I have a free tech support chat room, and was thinking about posting the logs somewhere on the site. Does that sound like a good idea? Thanks.
Technical SEO | | eugenecomputergeeks0 -
Replacing a site map
We are in the process of changing our folder/url structure. Currently we have about 5 sitemaps submitted to Google. How is it best to deal with these site maps in terms of either (a) replacing the old URLs with the new ones in the site map and (b) what affect should we have if we removed the site map submission from the Google Webmaster Tools console. Basically we have in the region of 20,000 urls to redirect to the new format, and to update in the site map.
Technical SEO | | NeilTompkins0