Legit Domain Masking
-
I am working with a real estate client. They have one main site (ie. company.com) that contains all the info, then they have several name domains (ie. salesrepresentative.com) that are forwarding to the main site, but use domain masking to appear as if there is a separate site for each representative. My question is how can I make this legit in Google's eyes, or is this totally not advised?
-
You can have a page canonical to itself, so if you just add the canonical tags to all the pages, they'll appear on all of masked domains as well.
Thomas is right; if your goal is to get any of the vanity domains on search result pages, the canonical tags will prevent that. A better set up might be to have the home pages be different (with the reps name and information), and then have the rest of the pages on the site be duplicate content with canonical tags. To say the sites do not exist isn't really accurate... it just means you haven't set them up yet.
-
Thanks for the responses. Just to clarify, this isn't being done for SEO purposes. They want it this way so that each representative can have branded access to the site, and so that the content can be changed easily from one location (take for instance the listings, they change often).
As for the rel-canonical, it would be difficult to implement, because the sites do not exist. It is being redirected at the domain level.
-
I don't see any real SEO value out of doing domain masking. I do see SEM value but I think you'd be better off re-creating some of the content for your vanity domains. That way you can rank both of them. Otherwise, using a rel=canonical will only get the main domain ranked.
-
That's fine, just rel=canonical all the pages under each salesrepresentative.com to the corresponding company.com pages. That tells Google that it's duplicate content, and will consolidate all the rankings for those pages under the company.com domain.
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
-
Domain name in URL
Hi we are targeting local cities across the UK with landing pages for our website. We have built up a few links for https://www.caffeienmarketing.co.uk/bristol/ and recently advised that I should change the URL to https://www.caffeienmarketing.co.uk/marketing-agency-bristol/ and 301 directing the old one 2 questions really: 1. is there any benefit in doing this these days in that this is the main keyword target we have for this page? 2. Do I get 100% benefit for all the links built up on the old page
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Caffeine_Marketing0 -
Backlinks from old domain
Hi, We have gone through a change of company brand name including a new domain name.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Agguk
We followed google recommendations at: https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/83106?hl=en and it seems to have worked really well, the new domain has replaced the old in the google search results. My question: Still most of our backlinks, both anchor text and links use the old brand name and domain and it´s a slow process trying to update all references. Although they get redirected fine to the new domain (also following google recommendations), I wonder if the current scenario is doing any harm, SEO wise (other than the missed visual exposure of the new brand name) ? ...since the old brand name is not present at the new site I´m thinking of including "New brand name - previously old brand name" somewhere just to provide some sort of connection to all old backlinks, would that be unnecessary? I should mention that the old brand name actually includes our most important keyword but the new brand name does not. Thanks!0 -
Domain Change Before or After Site Revamp?
In the last year traffic to our site has dropped in half and ranking has dropped significantly. Very little no content has been added in that time. We would now like to improve ranking by adding new content. 2 domains effectively exist for the site. The existing domain is www.nyc-officespace-leader.com. But www.metro-manhattan.com redirects to www.nyc-officespace-leader.com. Our company is Metro Manhattan Office Space, Inc.. We registered www.metro-manhattan.com and created the redirect to www.nyc-officespace-leader.com in 2012. www.nyc-officespace-leader.com was registered in 2006. Many links to the site show www.metro-manhattan.com and I believe this may be a source of confusion for Google. Would it be best to make the domain consistent at this time by redirecting it once and for all and to do so before adding new content? If this is done correctly can we avoid taking a hit on ranking? Note: -www.nyc-officespace-leader.com is the old domain.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Kingalan1
-www.metro-manhattan is the new domain but has existed since 2012 and has been redirecting to the old domain since then
-The company name is Metro Manhattan Office Space (similar in branding to the new domain) Am I correct in assuming that having the 2 domains may be causing issues with Google involving domain authority? Change the domain before adding content or add content before?0 -
Domain.com/old-url to domain.com/new-url
HI, I have to change old url`s to new one, for the same domain and all landing pages will be the same: domain.com/old-url I have to change to: domain.com/new-url All together more than 70.000 url. What is best way to do that? should I use 301st redirect? is it possible to do in code or how? what could you please suggest? Thank you, Edgars
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Edzjus3330 -
What is better for web ranking? A domain or subdomain?
I realise that often it is better put content in a subfolder rather than a subdomain, but I have another question that I cannot seem to find the answer to. Is there any ranking benefit to having a site on a .co.uk or .com domain rather than on a subdomain? I'm guessing that the subdomain might benefit from other content on the domain it's hosted on, but are subdomains weighted down in any way in the search results?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | RG_SEO0 -
Domain Name Redirect Question
My agency just built a new website for a client who is a franchisee. It's not launched yet - it's currently under an IP address. I suggested to client that he buy a keyword-rich domain name for it, which he did. Then he found out that the franchisor will not allow it to be his main domain name. They want him to use a domain name with the franchisor name in it. But they WILL allow him to put a 301 redirect on that franchisor-approved domain name, and redirect it to his keyword-rich domain name. He is interested in having my agency perform an SEO Campaign for this new website. But would SEO and link marketing work for a website that has a new non-keyword domain name that 301 redirects to a new keyword-rich domain name?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | netsites0 -
Domain Forwarding
I have a client who previously registered 20 unique domain names that tied to their company name and services. They use all of these domains to forward to their main website to try and capture additional traffic. Would you suggest that we remove all of the domains by 301 redirecting them all the the main website? I am trying to find a good article that shows the implications on SEO by using many domains that forward to a main website. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Prager0 -
Multiple domains expiring that have 301 redirects to my primary domain. Am I in trouble?
I recently took on the SEO of a large website with http://example.com. My predecessor bought 40 plus domains for specific cities like Jacksonvilleexample.com, Miamiexample.com, etc. ZERO of the additional domains linked to our main website. The domains that were bought basically had our exact same website in terms of content, links etc that mirrored our main http://example.com. I added 301 redirects to help problems that may be a result of this type of structure. Some of the additional domains were indexed and some were not but all have 301's and as far as traffic is concerned I'm not worried about loosing short term traffic. My question: All the domains are set to expire in June and I don't want to continue to have them 301 redirected to my main domain (example.com). I'm not trying to avoid the additional cost of all the domains but I don't see an advantage to having them so CAN letting all these domains expire hurt me from a long term SEO position if I don't renew them?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | ballanrk0