BIG CHANGE - 301 Main site to new domain
-
Hi Guys,
Were wondering what to do about our main domain name, we were ranking quite high for our main keyword and before Christmas our site dropped to 10th and we have been there for a while - last week our site dropped again onto the second page.
The worrying thing is now our main domain name is now ranking 1 place above another domain name that we don't really use but its an exact match domain name for our target keyword. This exact match domain has hardly any links pointing to it and it currently has a 22 domain authority.
We are wondering if we 301 our main site to this exact match domain would it rank higher than the top of the 2nd page where we are now for our main domain.
Cheers.
-
hey no problem. Sounds like it's just gonna be a matter of beating those guys then.
They may have lots of rubbish links, but, chances are, these links are not the reason they are beating you. Even blog comment-spammers will occasionally stumble across a gold mine. Under all the messy links they probably have a handful of good ones that are doing all the work. 80/20 and all that.
-
Hey man, thanks for the response.
I'd say its quite competitive and yes there are some new people that have suddenly popped up on the first page.
The annoying thing is a lot of the websites that are ranking on the first page have very bad links a lot of them are blog comments and other rubbish.
We have changed some of the content but only to make it more SEO friendly...
-
It depends on how competitive your SERP is. If it isn't very competitive then a 301 from an exact match domain might be enough to skootch you up a few places.
If you're gonna do the 301, you'd probably be better off 301'ing the site you don't use onto your main one.
Something else to think about is why your rankings may have been dropping. Have you been making any changes to your site? Have your competitors made changes? Have any new competitors arisen? If you made any changes yourself then correcting that should be your first priority. If it's competitors, then it's back to linkbuilding with you!
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
-
Big problems with site traffic
Hello! I have big problems with website promotion. It's been 7 months and the attendance on the site is 1-5 people a day. I do not understand the reason. Can you tell me what I'm doing wrong? Site: www.azartlist.com Many thanks.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Bobic1 -
Moving content to a newer domain - 301 re-direct not possible
I had a website that was getting decent traffic. Around 2k visits a day. Owing to some issues, the domain was suspended my the domain provider and they won't be releasing it anytime soon. Now, I'm in talks with my domain provider and it might take some good time to get back the domain live (weeks if not months). So, I have decided to migrate all my content to a new domain. Also, Google has stopped displaying my earlier domain (the suspended domain) in the search results now and I have removed the property from webmaster tools/search console. And since my earlier domain is suspended, redirection is not possible. So, I had a couple query in regards to this: I'm in the process of moving the content from the older suspended domain to the newer domain. What should I do that Google does not penalise my new site on the grounds of duplicate content, etc. What other things I should do while I'm in the process of this migration.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Evaway0 -
Have You 301 Redirected Domain A to Domain B ?
I only have two questions.... Approximately when did you do it (year is close enough)? Did the rankings of Domain B go up? Any other information that you care to share will be appreciated. Thank you!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | EGOL0 -
Domain remains the same IP address is changing on same server only last 3 digits changing. Will this effect rankings
Dear All, We have taken and a product called webacelator from our hosting UKfast and our ip address is changing. UKFasts asked to point DNS to different IP in order to route the traffic through webacelator, which will enhance browsing speed. I am concerned, will this change effect our rankings. Your responses highly appreciated.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | tigersohelll0 -
Odd Results Moving Subdomain Content onto Main Domain
Hi forum! On Thursday night (12/6/12) we moved a page (and all the linking product pages) from our subdomain, mailing-list.consumerbase.com, to our main domain, www.consumerbase.com/mailing-lists.html Shockingly, today I search for "mailing lists" (our #1 target keyword) and we're on the first page! This page never has not ranked well for this keyword in the past. The problem is, the link displaying on Google is our old mailing-list.consumerbase.com subdomain URL. Did moving this content from the new subdomain to our old, well-established domain cause it to appear better in search? Or, since the URL is on the subdomain, did Google just finally get around to indexing that page? Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Travis-W0 -
New Domain name vs Low Ranked Existing Site
I am going to build a new site. I could hang it off an existing site with similar content or buy a new keyword rich domain and start over. The existing site does not have much trust or authority beyond the domain being registered for 5 plus years. I would prefer to start over and build linksfrom scratch but I realize we are starting at the bottom. The keywords we will be competing against are not super competetive so I think we can get ranking within 6 months or so. These post Panda days I am rethinking everything so any input is appreciated. I did a similar niche site a few years ago and found the site ranked well fairly quickly for its little nice. Today though it may be different. I have no experience in buying domains and would have no idea where to start there. New or existing? Thanks for any input.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Reportcard0 -
New web site - 404 and 301
Hello, I have spent a lot of times on the forum trying to make sure how to deal with my client situation. I will tell you my understanding of the strategy to apply and I would appreciate if you could tell me if the strategy will be okay. CONTEXT I am working on a project where our client wants to replace its current web site with a new one. The current web site has at least 100 000 pages. The new web site will replace all the existing pages of the current site. What I have heard for the strategy the client wants to adopt is to 404 each pages and to 301 redirect each page. Every page would be redirect to a page that make sense in the new web site. But after reading other answers and reading the following comment, I am starting to be concerned: '(4) Be careful with a massive number of 301s. I would not 301 100s of pages at once. There's some evidence Google may view this as aggressive PR sculpting and devalue those 301s. In that case, I'd 301 selectively (based on page authority and back-links) and 404 the rest.' I have also read about performance issue ... QUESTION So, if we suppose that we can manage to map each of the old site pages to a page in the new web site, is a problem to do it? Do you see a performance issue or devaluation potential issue? If it is a problem, please comment the strategy I might considere to suggest: Identify the pages for which I gain links From that group, identify the pages, that gives me most of my juice 301 redirect them and for the other, create a real great 404 ... Thanks ! Nancy
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | EnigmaSolution0 -
Any Tips For putting up a new site and not loosing rankings?
We are switching one of our sites to a magento site and dont want to loose current rankings what are the best practices for this? Same Domain but the deep url pages will change urls
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | DavidKonigsberg0