Issues with Google Search Console and rekeyed SSL certificate

[Veevlimike]

Hi,

Another newbie question please. I've recently changed the name of my business so bought a new domain and rekeyed the SSL certificate to the new domain.

Let's say the old domain was called https://123.com and the new one is https://abc.com.

I've set up a 301 redirect on 123.com to forward to abc.com and I've added the new domain to Google Search Console and verified it, however can't seem to use the Change of Address tool to move from the old domain to the new domain.

I think its because my preferred property (https://123.com) technically no longer exists since I rekeyed the SSL certificate from the old site to the new one so the old site no longer has an SSL certificate. When I go to the old https domain it doesn't load, nor does it seem to forward to the new site. It just times out.

Am I correct in assuming that since I rekeyed the SSL certificate, that my original preferred property on Google (https://123.com) no longer exists?

And if so, is there a way to use the Change of Address tool or do I simply need to remove the old site from Google and go through a period where my (new) site builds it's ranking from scratch?

Thanks in advance folks!

[R0bin_L0rd]

Good luck! Happy to help

[Veevlimike]

Thanks Robin,

That's as I suspected. I'll see if I can grab a cheap SSL for the old site somewhere to see if I can rectify the situation.

Thanks for your help!

Mike.

[R0bin_L0rd]

HI resourcerep, it's great that you're asking questions on the community.

Have you been using this help article? I'm just going to check some assumptions here:

• Have you set up a search console property for the new site so you can select it during the site move operation?
• What errors (if any) do you get from search console?
• What happens when you try to access the old pages, do you just get a warning?

It sounds like the SSL cert is the issue. Unfortunately due to the way HTTPS works it needs a SSL certificate before you can send and receive data.

However, you could find the cheapest SSL cert you can buy, and put that on the old page to allow the redirect to work. To be honest that'll be valuable for more than just this, as having working 301s will help both searcg crawlers and users trying to access the old site.

Hope that helps!