Hot to move 3 websites into 1 SEO wise and recover from penaltys in the process?
-
I decided to migrate 3 EMDs and all of its content into 1 big new website.
1.) I will manually move each page/post to the new website, on new hosting.
2.) Redirect each old url to new via htaccess (how long do I have to wait before I simply change DNS records on my old domains, and just point it to the new domain - want to drop one hosting plan in the process)
3.) Tell Google via Webmaster tools, that my site has moved to the new domain.
Website A suffered from Penguin update, Website B suffered from EMD update and Website C is OK. I removed most of "bad" and "exect anchor text" links from websites.
Could I just move the content, change DNS records and tell Google that my website moved.
Any thoughts, advices and pointers are appreciated.
Tnx
Marko Strbac
-
Thanks Marko, and I am so with you on the impatience part. I have two sites I manage still being outranked by a competitor using black hat tachniques. I know, not only because their backlink profile makes it obvious, but also because I used to work for them.
I have been tempted, and even mildly pressured by my current CEO to do what they are doing. I keep saying "Stay the course. Do what's right. Time will take care of this problem."
But in the business world, one only has so much time (and patience). I mean, if your competitor can hold on with the black hat tachniques long enough, and still enough of your traffic to adversely effect your business...to the point of not having a business...what would you do?
So yousee, I totally understand your impatience. I think you are doing the right thing now. Consolidating those sites is probably your best shot at getting back on track.
While the blog post might be very interesting, I sincerely hope you don't have to write it!
Cheers,
Dana
-
Hi Dana,
Tnx for your kind words Dana, I really appreciated your opinions,.
I admit, this was more of a test project when it started, but soon some passion and love developed. I used only white hat SEO techniques at the beginning, even got a mention on imdb related articles, Over 400 visitors in a day from 1 natural referral, etc... Got a little bit of taste of a small snow ball effect.
Even with the great thing going on, somewhere along the way a "black hat" competitor, made me frustrated and impatient - I know... Rookie mistake
He copied some of my article ideas, targeted same keywords, and outranked me with obvious BS "black hat" SEO (a couple hundred profile backlinks, 10-20 high PR spammy comments, some .edu and .gov in there, etc...).
Watching his website top the SERPs and mine struggling on the bottom of 1 and top of 2 page, made me loose my focus.
I admit, I went "Grey Hat", I pushed the limits with some manual backlinks from his shady backlink profile(IMO around 10% of his backlinks), and it fired back on me. Great lesson learned
The best way to describe my situation:
If you had 4 seo related websites, would it make sense to join them?
example sites: seoreviews.com, seoaudiobooks.com, seobooks.org, seovideos.com
I know my decision to merge them and create 1 "brandable" website is the right one for users and SEO.
I hope that the quality of the new site will outrank the possible transfer of penalties from the old sites.
Hope it works, of not I have a great resource for a quality blog post: "What not to do...!"
Regards,.
Marko
-
Hi Marko,
I want to start by saying I realize how frustrated you must be to have your sites suffering due to one of several algorithms updates. Everything I am about to say is strictly my opinion and is based, of course, on not knowing all the specifics about these three websites.
This move you are suggesting, to me, doesn't address the real root of the problem. I think the EMD algorithm change was intended to effect EMDs that weren't providing great value to users/visitors. If you've already decided that this is absolutely the best course, I would encourage to continue to ask yourself: "How is consolidating these three domains into one providing improved value, content and experience for my users?"
IMHO, if you consolidate all your content into one domain, it may not necessarily have the panacea effect that you desire.Also, even if it does work, I would be prepared to ride out a big dip in rankings and traffic until Google gets it all sorted out. The domain to which you are moving everything to may suffer because it will immediately be getting a big change in its link profile. I know from experience that this can cause Google to sandbox a site (not de-indexed or even a manual penalty - just suffering from a bit in the algorithm that looks at link profile and history).
It just seems that you are making a pretty bold drastic move in order to get bold and drastic (better) results. I just want to be the voice of caution in that this move, and all of the work involved in moving content and writing redirects may not produce any positive results at all.
I'm sure you've probably already considered that possibility and most likely you've decided that the potential rewards outweigh the risks. I certainly hope it goes well and that your sites recover and flourish going forward.
Best of luck to you Marko,
Dana
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
-
Worldpress multisite for SEO
hello, guys, at the moment we have 3 websites, basically, the websites have the same content and appearance. we got UK website, New Zealand web site and USA website for the different business purpose. I have some questions about multisite for SEO, with similar content, will it harm website ranking? if it is bad, what should we do to deal with multisite? thank you
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | kelvinbongcn850 -
Merging Pages and SEO
Hi, We are redesigning our website the following way: Before: Page A with Content A, Page B with Content B, Page C with Content C, etc
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | viatrading1
e.g. one page for each Customer Returns, Overstocks, Master Case, etc
Now: Page D with content A + B + C etc.
e.g. one long page containing all Product Conditions, one after the other So we are merging multiples pages into one.
What is the best way to do so, so we don't lose traffic? (or we lose the minimum possible) e.g. should we 301 Redirect A/B/C to D...?
Is it likely that we lose significant traffic with this change? Thank you,0 -
WhoIs penalty
Does anyone know if it's possible to get a penalty on WHOIS data and a shared IP address? We had some bad SEO done (And at ranking demolished) on one of our company websites which has the same WHOIS data and is on the same IP address as another side which is just seems to have taken a knock. Is it possible Google could have associated both and penalised accordingly?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | seoman100 -
Best way to move the content to a different domain without inviting any SERP penalty?
Hi all, We are in a bit of a fix right now. We have around 60-70 articles (Wordpress pages / posts) that we intend to move to another domain of ours. What's the best way to do so such that we do not invite any Google penalty. Here's a detailed information about our case:
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | stj
Let's say, our site example.com has more 2000 articles. To help us better position our content for one of the sections on example.com, we have started another website, example2.com and want to move those 60-70 articles from example.com to example2.com. What is the best way to do it such that we are not penalised by Google? Is it (a) Move all the said content (60-70 articles) from example.com to example2.com and (b) do a permanent redirect (301) of each of the older article URLs to newer article URLs. What are the other options?0 -
Question on Moving Content
I just moved my site from a Wordpress hosted site to Squarespace. We have the same domain, however, the content is now located on a different URL (again, same base domain). I'm unable to easily set up 301 redirects for the old content to be mapped to the new content so I was wondering if anyone had any recommendations for a workaround. Basically, I want to make sure google knows that Product A's page is now located at this new URL. (www.domain.com/11245 > www.domain.com/product-a). Maybe it's something that I don't have to worry about anymore because the old content is gone? I mean, I have a global redirect set up that no matter what you enter after the base domain, it now goes to the homepage but I just want to make sure I'm not missing something here. Really appreciate your help!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | TheBatesMillStore1 -
Mobile SEO
Hey, In the following article, Google recommended using a 301 redirect but doesn't specify why. http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.co.uk/2011/02/making-websites-mobile-friendly.html I assume this is to pass over link equity to the relevant mobile/desktop variation. Can anyone confirm this? Also is there any other reason? Again assuming this would keep the correct URLs in the correct index? Anything else anyone can chip in would be great. Thanks
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | CraigAddyman0 -
Social Media and SEO
What is best? Increasing DA and PA on a specific social media profile such as twitter or spreading out the DA and PA on a variety of different profiles?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | casper4340 -
Website Restructure - Good or Bad for SEO?
Due to the fact that we aren't in the #1 position, (dropped from #5 to page 2 - You have to love Devs and IT), our heads have hired a SEO Audit/Consultant company to review everything we are doing. I would like to post some of the things they are telling us to do, in which I don't 100% agree with and would like some other professional feedback. Especially since their site isn't marketed very well. http://www.trupanionpetinsurance.com Disclaimer: (this site was a complete nightmare when I started a year and a half ago. Yes, there are many issues that still need to be addressed.) Website Restructure I agree we totally need to restructure our website. I have no idea what the previous SEO guy was thinking. The new SEO company is telling us that the structure is a big part of SEO. I don't believe so, but besides a little loss in 301 juice, is there any other downfalls? Are there any real benefits? Similar question asked the other day (and answered by me): http://www.seomoz.org/q/don-t-want-to-lose-page-rank-what-s-the-best-way-to-restructure-a-url-other-than-a-301-redirect
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Trupanion1