Move established site from .co.uk to .org - good or bad idea?
-
I am currently considering moving our site from the current .co.uk domain to the .org version which we also own.
The site is established and indexed for 7 years, ranks well and has circa 10k traffic per month which is mainly UK & US traffic.
The reason for the change to the .org domain is to make the site more global facing and give us the opportunity to develop the site into multi language within directories (.org/es/ etc.) and then target those to the local search engines. For the kind of site it is (community based) it wouldn’t really work to split this into lots of separate country targeted domains.
So the choice is to either stick with the .co.uk and add the other foreign language specific content in directories within the .co.uk or move to the .org and do the same (there is also a potential third option of purchasing the .com which is currently unused but that could be pricey!)
We are also planning a big overhaul of the site with redesign, lots of added content and reorganisation of the site – but are thinking that it would be better to move the domain on a 1:1 basis first with the current design, content and URL structure in place and then do the other changes 2 or 3 months down the line.
I have read up on SEOmoz, google guidelines etc on moving a site to a new domain and understand the theoretical approach of moving the site and the steps to take (1to1 301 redirects, sitemaps on old and new etc) and I will retain ownership of the .co.uk so the redirects can remain in place indefinitely.
However having worked so hard to get the site to where it is in the search engines and traffic levels I am very worried about whether the domain change is a good move. I am more than happy to accept a temporary fluctuation in rankings & traffic for 1 – 4 weeks as reported may happen as long as I can be sure it will return after a temporary period and be as strong (or almost as strong) as the previous rankings / traffic.
Looking for peoples experiences to give me the confidence / reassurance to go ahead with this or any info on why I shouldn’t
Thanks in advance for your advice.
Adrian.
-
If you are going to make this site enormously popular then owning the .com will allow you stop the loss of type-in traffic to the .com domain.
For popular .org .gov .net and other domain extensions, lots of visitors instinctively type .com as the domain. I do it often myself when attempting to visit some .gov and .org sites. I am usually surprised at what I find there.
I know of a couple .com domains that get thousands of visitors per day because visitors don't type .gov as the extension.
-
Thanks both for your responses.
Although we enjoy good rankings and good traffic levels we are in one of the most competitive (SEO wise) sector (Gambling Affiliate) so we are no where near the dominant player for our key terms which I guess makes this sort of move even more risky.
EGOL – when you say you would go after the .com – do you mean for the purpose of blocking competition using it (ie: buy it to redirect to .co.uk) or would it make a difference to the argument for moving to a different domain if it was the .com instead of the .org?
So I guess the other question is if you guys think it is too risky to move the domain – do you think it is ok to build a multi language site on the .co.uk in directories or would it be better to try and buy all the country specific domains .es .de .fr etc.. (ideally wanted to keep it all under one domain as there will be shared forums and shared member backend and tracking all happening but will consider all options.)
-
I agree that there is more risk moving an older site than a newer site.
If you lost 10% of a little it would not be much... but if you lost 10% of a lot then that would be disappointing.
-
Hi Adrian,
Since your site is an established and indexed for 7 years property, I would not move it since
1- The links are actually pointing at your .co.uk domain and that won't change even with proper redirection.
2- People must probably knows this URL in some proportion
3- Your domain has build a trust from search engines that I would not play with to start from a new one.
Maybe someone would think different, but I prefer building a new site with new content or new content to my site then to risk it's futur.
-
If you redirect you will probably lose a small amount of linkjuice and possibly some anchor text value.
Do you have your closest competitors soundly beaten?
If you are clearly the dominant site in your niche then your risk of loss is lower but still possible.
(I would go after that .com.... I would be willing to pay quite a bit for it)
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
-
.co who is details
Hi how do you find whois type ownerhsip details etc etc for a .co domain ? are they on who is etc or a different system ? All Best Dan
Technical SEO | | Dan-Lawrence0 -
What Can I Do To Improve The SEO of My Site?
We have a website that is ranking okay but we can't seem to get past #6 or #7 for a specific national keyword, "self storage software". We are working on a more effective back-linking strategy right now, but we really are having a hard time identifying steps to take besides that. If anyone can help me out and give me some suggestions I would be very appreciative. Maybe even seeing a competitive analysis from someone else would help catch something that I am not seeing. Website is www.storageunitsoftware.com Thanks in advance.
Technical SEO | | kenturley0 -
SEMRush's Site Audit Tool "SEO Ideas"
Recently SEMRush added a feature to its site audit tool called "SEO Ideas." In the case of specific the site I'm looking at it with, it's ideas consist mostly of suggesting words to add to the page for the page/my phrase(s) to perform better. It suggests this even when the term(s) or phrases(s) it's looking at are #1. Has anybody used this tool for this or something similar and found it to be valuable and if so how valuable? The reason I ask is that it would be a fair amount of work to go through these pages and find ways to add the select words and phrases and, frankly, it feels kind of 2005 to me. Your thoughts? Thanks... Darcy
Technical SEO | | 945010 -
Picking a URL co.uk vs .net vs .biz which is best for SEO?
Hi I was always told that you only want a .co.uk or a .com is this still true? I am setting up an ecommerce site and the ideal .co.uk is gone! Am I better to have a longer ulr with maybe a hifen or a uk in it or is it ok to have a .biz or a .net these days? You help would be greatly appreciated! Thanks James
Technical SEO | | JamesBryant0 -
Ranking Multi-Language Site
Recently we updated our website to a new version. Our website has a structure in which the English page is our main page with about 50 subpages. All these pages are translated in 5 different languages. The different languages are divided into folders. For example www.ourdomain.com/de containts all german pages. The pages with products would be for example: www.ourdomain.com/products for english and www.ourdomain.com/de/produkte for the german page. On our previous website this used to be simililar. After the website update the SEOMoz crawls are showning duplicated page content/title errors for the pages saying that the pages in other languages have the same content/title as the basis English webpage. Any idea how I can solve these errors?
Technical SEO | | Exp0 -
My site cannot be found by google at all
I don't know why but our company site can not be found by google at all. I have submitted to google webmaster, have social media point to, etc, Is there any reason for this? url for our website is www.bistosamerica.com Thank you
Technical SEO | | BistosAmerica0 -
How to turn WP site into Ecom site?
I have a couple of old wordpress sites that are old affiliate blogs. I currently sell products that are on amazon on these sites and sell quite a bit of volume. I have found a source and can afford the inventory to replace Amazon with my own product. So the dilema is how to turn these wordpress sites into ecommerce sites. The thing I am worried most about is that each site gets about 100-200 visitors a day for great buying keywords. I obviously don't want to lose my rankings. What are the options of turning a wordpress site into a store. I am not interested in plugins or some of the other solutions that make the store look very cheap and I would assume horribly convert. If you have inner pages ranking for keywords how does that work? Do the post pages become product pages? So to sum up I guess I am asking, what are the options that are of the higher quality that will also help me keep my rankings? Thanks
Technical SEO | | PEnterprises0 -
If I redirect my WordPress blog to my main site, will it help my main site's SEO?
I have separate sites for my blog and main website. I'd like to link them in a way that enables the blog to boost my main site's SEO. Is there an easy way to do this? Thanks in advance for any advice...
Technical SEO | | matt-145670