Domain Change -- Drop in Rank
-
So I had a client that recently decided to change their URL to make it more "searchable"/shorter. Since doing so, I have noticed a significant drop in rankings for a number of the keyword terms we were previously ranking for.
Is there a way to push the links to the new URL or is the only solution to revert back to the old URL?
-
If you have change the domain, the only thing you can do is to 301 redirects the old domain to the new one and start promoting it and getting quality links on it. There will be a drop in traffic and rankings but it will be for a short span of time and it will come back again.
Don’t revert to old again because it will not do much help as far as the rakings and traffic is concern, my idea is to create campaigns that actually work for you.
Hope this helps!!
-
Hi,
Please check the following -
- 301 redirects - Once the domain name was changed have you placed 301 redirects. Domain A >> 301 redirect >> Domain B.
- Page level redirects also need to be in place. For example - domainA.com/Page1 >> 301 Redirect >> domainB.com/Page2
- Check for robots.txt file. You might be blocking the search engines.
- Check for SEO elements such as Page Title, Metas etc. If you have not retained these elements, you might see a drop in rankings.
- Check for no index and no follow. Maybe you have placed these tags on all the pages and hence the drop
- Check the XML sitemap, ensure that you have submitted the new URLs via the XML sitemap
- Check if you have made major modifications to the content. If you have changed the content by a great extent, then it's a possibility that the old pages had better content from an SEO perspective as opposed to the existing content.
- Check if you specified the correct GEO in Google WMT
- If you have done all of the above, then check your backlinks, maybe your domain transition coincided with an algorithmic penalty (either manual or automated). Check WMT messages for details.
Hope this helps.
Regards,
Sajeet
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
-
Frustrating Drop in Rankings Despite Good DA
The page below
Technical SEO | | Jayblue
http://www.carefundraisingsupplies.co.uk/fundraising-products/Charity-Collection-Buckets seems unable to budge from a position of near 100 despite previously been around 16 and moving up. We cannot seem to find any issues that are obvious and even some quality link building has moved it down further. Any idease from anyone? The search phrase we are targetting is Charity Collection Buckets0 -
I've consolidated other domains to a single one with 301 redirects, yet the new domain authority in MOZ is much less that the redirected ones. Is that right?
I'm trying to increase the domain authority of my main site, so decided to consolidate other sites. One of the other sites has a much higher domain authority, but I don't know why after a 301 redirect, the new site's domain authority hasn't changed on over a month. Does MOZ take account of thes types of things?
Technical SEO | | bytecgroup2 -
Domains and subdomains
When I started a campaign for my message, I got the message: "We have detected that the domain www.vamospaella.com and the domain vamospaella.com both respond to web requests and do not redirect. Having two "twin" domains that both resolve forces them to battle for SERP positions, making your SEO efforts less effective. We suggest redirecting one, then entering the other here." I wasn't sure whether I had said it was a subdomain when in fact it was a domain (or the other way round), so I started another campaign for the same website using the other option and the message didn't come up. However, I still don't understand what you meant by this and whether it's an issue. When I search for my website in Google, it shows as vamospaella.com when other websites come up as www. and then their domain name. If it is a problem, is it to do with my hosting package and how it's set up or is it to do with my local site on my computer? I did ring my web host, 1&1, but they said they couldn't see a problem. Please can you let me know how I can resolve this as my ranking is still quite low in Google and I'm not sure why. If it is because of "twin domains", then will Google see my content as duplicated and keep me low in their rankings? I'm new to SEO and not a website novice, so please answer in lay terms! Thanks Melissa
Technical SEO | | melissa10 -
Checkout on different domain
Is it a bad SEO move to have a your checkout process on a separate domain instead of the main domain for a ecommerce site. There is no real content on the checkout pages and they are completely new pages that are not indexed in the search engines. Do to the backend architecture it is impossibe for us to have them on the same domain. An example is this page: http://www.printingforless.com/2/Brochure-Printing.html One option we've discussed to not pass page rank on to the checkout domain by iFraming all of the links to the checkout domain. We could also move the checkout process to a subdomain instead of a new domain. Please ignore the concerns with visitors security and conversion rate. Thanks!
Technical SEO | | PrintingForLess.com0 -
Traffic has dropped from my site.
Hello, I never had amazing traffic, but during the last week my site seems to have almost dropped of search engines. Nothing drastic has changed during this time that I can see would have caused this. The site is http://www.comparebestodds.com Does any one have any ideas that can help? Thanks
Technical SEO | | jwdesign0 -
Domain Relocation
My client is running a online news website, which is running for 4 years. He's now looking to change the site into a new domain. I would like to know what are the factors to look out for when changing the site into new domain (In SEO point of view)
Technical SEO | | augmoz110 -
URLs: To Change or Not to Change
Hello, We recently launched a redesigned site in Drupal in December of last year. We are an eco-travel company. My current URL's look like this: /africa-and-middle-east/kenya-tanzania /central-south-america/galapagos-islands My pages have good term targeting grades, and the rankings for the terms we are targeting - "kenya and tanzania safaris" and "galapagos islands cruises" are decent, but not great - most are on page 2 or 3. The one URL where I targeted our most important term, "amazon river cruises," I am still on page 2. /central-south-america/amazon-river-cruises My questions are: Did I miss an opportunity with the rest of the URL's, and should I consider changing the rest to more targeted terms with 301s? Since the new site launched in January, perhaps I have not given enough time for my new URL's to index and mature. Would it be easier to set up landing pages with unique article content that targets terms such as "galapagos islands cruises" and "kenya and tanzania safaris"? If so, how can I do it in such a way as to not "compete" with the pages I want to drive them to? This also raises the question of redirecting the same URL twice i.e. I would have 2 redirects in place for the same url e.g. from the former site to the new site, and yet another redirect to the most-recent URL. Is that a problem? Sorry if I've asked too many questions in one post. 😉 Any advice appreciated.
Technical SEO | | csmithal0