Is the www and non www isue realy seen by Google as duplicate content?
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I realy don't understand how Google could posibly devaluate a link because the site displays the same content with www and without www. I mean did somebody recently saw a devaluation of a domain because of this isue? I somehow can not belive this because it is the standard when geting a new webspace that the new website display the same content with and without www.
Is a redirect realy necessary?
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Google maay be able to work out what version you want to go with, but is it the same one that bing and other SE's will go with, and then you have the problem with www and non www links, one will be redirect to the other somehow and will leak a bit of link juice. its better that when some one copies your url its always the same.
I prefer the non www. because www is unessasry, i believe its an old unix thing, not needed today. If you have a long domain name www makes it just that much more confusing
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Google is very good at figuring out that www and non www versions are the same site - so content duplication will not be an issue (this happens too often for them not to handle properly). One advantage you do have is consolidation of yoru link juice towards the same canonical version and therefore achieving better results. Set your preference in Google Webmaster Tools to a choice and stick to it - everywhere - even in your email signatures and printed material.
As far as www goes we've purposely dropped it and went with non-www, I personally think www is silly and meaningless however this means we have to from time to time police and correct how webmasters write down and link our URL and ask for www removal if found. Not too hard if you monitor yoru brand via Google Alerts.
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Better have www. instead of without. Uniformity has always been an issue
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Hi Michael,
Now a days Google is really Google at figuring out what version of the website you want to go with but with that said, isn't really that hard of a thing to fix. I'd say that as long as all your internal links are consistent in pointing to the same version, then you shouldn't have anything to worry about. In the long run of things, by making the redirect you won't see this huge bump in rankings but it is a standard practice that is done.
Casey
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better safe then sorry.
I did look around for some time to get the answer to the same question and since no one could get a straight answer and even google webmaster tool has the option for ww or non www I think is better to get the 301 redirect.
Anyway - is just an opinion.
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