Dropped ranking - new domain same IP????
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We dropped ranking late last year for our site, so decided to start over with a new domain. However we didn't change IP address. Would this cause any issues???
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I think many of the commenters have good points here. It's really tough to make a call like this without a deep knowledge of the situation, and for any of us to tell you what to do would probably be irresponsible. Generally, I don't think Google transfers penalties across IPs like they used to occasionally do. With IPv4 space running out, sharing IPs is just a lot more common than it used to be. Google also has other cues, like domain ownership (they're technically a registrar, so they have access to a lot of data) to go by.
To be safe, you could isolate it and get a new IP. I'm not sure it's necessary, but if you're going to go so far as to start over, you might as well do it as cleanly as possible.
The question is whether starting over with a new domain will solve the problem. If you want to avoid the penalty transferring, you can't 301-redirect the old site, which means that you'll lose all of your link equity and leave past visitors stranded. That's a huge loss to take, and it's going to take time to rebuild (as Michael B. said). Will the content be the same? There may be other aspects of the site that caused you problems, and if they're related to the content or site structure, they could just come back.
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This does sound like a drastic move, likely unnecessary in the first place. I recently had to take a site through a reconsideration request following a manual action penalty and found this article very informative: http://moz.com/ugc/the-anatomy-of-a-successful-reconsideration-request
If you are already down the path with a new site, you may want to consider switching the IP (or host) as a safeguard. I would also be cautious of the content, site structure, 301s, etc. If all you did was port the site, redesign it and plug it into a new domain, you probably have the same challenges (and infractions) that caused deteriorated rankings in the first place.
If the old site and domain is still active, I would go back there and see if you can clean up and disavow bad links and run a reconsideration path. That could even aid in the success of the new site on the same IP.
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Jason,
One thought: if your last sight was penalized, do you not just want to disavow links / clean up your link profile and content, and then ask for reconsideration by Google?
If you do continue to move to a new domain, and you stay on the same IP (without disavowing / cleaning link profile) you may end up bringing down your new site based on association... Plus, with the site being completely new, it will take a while to gain traction.
Eli
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we think over doing anchor text.....
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Seems drastic. What caused the drop in rankings - penalty, algorithmic penalty, competition, content, poor link profile...?
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