Is it worth redirecting an old domain name which was hacked to my new website?
-
I had a website which got hacked and malware added to it.
I have since closed that website down but I still have the domain name.
That domain name prior to the malware was incredibly well ranking for its niche and had a good range of high quality links to it and a domain age of 6 years.
I'm now creating a new website which is similar to the old one (the same but with a different platform and layout).
Is it a good or bad idea to redirect the old domain name to the new website?
-
Thanks mate.
I suppose given my new site hasn't even been indexed as yet I was more thinking how much penalty there could be...
I thought maybe I could redirect and then somehow let google know that the malware isn't present on the domain any more is all.
I'll leave it alone as it doesn't sound like its worth the risk.
-
Its not about google being "smart enough." Its the fact that your old domain carries a penalty and if you 301 it, the penalty will be passed on.
I have tested this in the past and the penalty ALWAYS gets passed on to the new domain.
As a pre-caution, either test it on another domain or just forget about it and start fresh.
-
So google won't be smart enough to check the new site?
I would assume my page was penalized as it had that warning this site may contain malware message..
-
If the previous domain was penalized and its still penalized, then it is a good idea to not re-direct. The penalty will carry over.
You can simply grab a fresh domain, re-direct the domain in question and see the results. If its positivie, then go ahead and redirect to your new site.
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
-
Old content with trailing `/` - What should be my new approach?
Dear team Moz, I'm investigating SEO issues for the site that dropped rankings over a period of 4-6 months; after conversion from old platform (xenForo) to new custom developed platform. The old version of the site was a simple xenForo based forum; with threads having standard url structure as like www.domain.com/threads/thread-title.{thread_id}/. Notice the trailing slash. We chose to keep the URLs intact during conversion to new platform; however the site still lost rankings. I'm sure there could be multiple reasons for it - but I wish to know if I should adjust the URLs - 1. By 301 redirecting all the URLs with trailing / to the URLs without /. 2. Leave the URLs as they were. I must also mention that the new site has several new sections; and the old forum is just one part of it. The rest of the site follows URLs without trailing / - as it's the recommended URL structure by Google. I'd really appreciate your suggestions on this.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | KaustubhKatdare0 -
301 Redirect from Authoritative but Loosely-Related Domain
We acquired a health-related blog about a year ago with good domain authority and a pretty strong link profile (TF ~40). We have been publishing good relevant content in it but it's not really paying dividends and we are considering doing a 301 to our money site, which is focused primarily on senior issues but has a lot of health-related content. The question is - with the two domains only being loosely related in subject matter, do we stand to harm our main site by redirecting from the other domain?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | sa_787040 -
Pages that did NOT 301 redirect to the new site
Hi, Is there a tool out there that can tell me what pages did NOT 301 redirect to the new sites? I need something rather than going into google.com and typing in site:oldsite.com to see if it's still indexed and if it's not 301 redirecting.. I'm not sure if screaming frog can do that. Thanks.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | ggpaul5620 -
Redirecting old mobile site
Hi All, Trying to figure out the best option here. I have a website that used to utilize a separate mobile site (m.xyz.com) but now utilizes responsive design. What is the best way to deal with that old mobile site? De-index? 301 redirect back to the main site in the rare case someone finds the m. site somewhere? THanks! Ricky
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | RickyShockley0 -
Should I start new domain and redirect site?
I recently my rankings for http://www.top-10-dating-reviews.com (some adult content) drop off a cliff. Google tells me there's no manual penalty therefore it might be algorithmic. I don't know why my rankings went but I think it could be that I added A LOT of category pages pulling the same content from posts and this could have caused both duplicate content issues and too many on page links causing an algo penalty. Ive deleted the categories and therefore fixed duplicate content issue (perhaps you guys could check out the site and see that you agree with me) but rankings have not improved even thougo most of the pages have been recrawled. I read somewhere its extremely hard to recover from such a penalty so should I move my site to a and domain and redirect all urls? I can't think of another solution. Any help appreciated!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | SamCUK0 -
Aged domain and 301 redirect? (11 year old domain)
Hey everyone, I'm about to launch a new website for an accounting firm. They currently have a website, which has an 11 year old domain. They are doing very well locally for SEO, and i'm guessing it's because of the aged domain, as their website is very badly built, and contains almost no content. They would like to launch the new site with a simpler, easier to remember domain. If i launch the new site, point the aged domain using a 301 redirect, and do redirects for all of the old pages to the newer versions of them, is there a chance the company will lose their current SEO rankings? Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | RCDesign740 -
Pros and Cons of new subdomain and redirecting old subdomain?
Hi guys, I am thinking about redirecting the ranking subdoman to a new subdomain which has my main keyword within it. I am trying to outrank an exact match competitor and don't seem to be able to do so. For example: page.example.com would be my existing ranking URL which is very powerful, and I am thinking about redirecting this to a new URL being keywordpage.example.com What are your thoughts on do this? Thanks B
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | HaymarketMediaGroupLtd0 -
Keyword-Rich Domains - Redirect?
Hi, Mozzers- I have a client that has a bunch of pretty nice keyword-rich domain names. Their traffic and rankings are good. They provide legal services in the Chicago area. I have lots of good content that I could use to start a blog using a domain like keyword,keyword-blog.com. Good idea? Currently I have a resources area on their website but feel like this area could be getting a little bloated and some news-related stuff isn't really appropriate. 2 Questions: Should I use one of the decent domains for a blog and build up the rankings, traffic, and link to the main site? Or is this lots of work for little payout? Both sites would be hosted in the cloud. Some of the domain names are related to their name, others are keyword or geo-targeted. Would it be wise to setup 301 redirects going to their website? Pros/cons? If you need additional info, please PM me for details. Thank you, friends! LHC
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | lhc670