Will 301 redirect affect ranking?

[LynnInfinity]

A customer of mine has 2 websites that are virtually identical except the URL's are each different (they both stand alone and don't point to each others site).

The one domain has a city reference in it and has the better organic ranking. The client doesn't want to keep up both sites so would a 301 redirect work on the higher ranking site with the "city" URL or is there a better alternative? We don't want them to have traffic drop off so we're looking for a sound solution.

Thanks! I appreciate the feedback.

 

[Kate V]

ReDirects in general.... are BAD Policy.

Many people argue that 301 redirects are fine and they have been using them for years. But I would say most of those people have small websites with low traffic to where they don't sense a change anyway.

Of course they will claim the opposite... but just take a look at what makes sense for the End User. Users don't like chasing around or being pushed around the net... so don't do that to them.

I know you said the client does not want to keep both domains up. They should reconsider because the goal is to grow... and your better off with more established domains.

 

[LynnInfinity]

ReDirects in general.... are BAD Policy.

Many people argue that 301 redirects are fine and they have been using them for years. But I would say most of those people have small websites with low traffic to where they don't sense a change anyway.

Of course they will claim the opposite... but just take a look at what makes sense for the End User. Users don't like chasing around or being pushed around the net... so don't do that to them.

I know you said the client does not want to keep both domains up. They should reconsider because the goal is to grow... and your better off with more established domains.

Thanks for responding Kate. This client actually has 4 domains but each website it built in frames so there hasn't been any updating happening. They don't want to update 4 sites so what's the solution? I agree with you about not wanting to make people chase your links around to see the information they are searching for but I can't think of any other solutions besides building landing pages on 2 of the sites with the best ranking so they can keep it and perhaps have some simple content and lead capture or having to provide links to the other main pages and hoping they "click thru" to the main sites... Any feedback would be appreciated! Cheers! Lynn

 

[BMA]

I'm not sure what Kate V is talking about. The 301 redirect is built for exactly what you are talking about. It tells the search engines that the site or page has permanently moved. Google transfers a lot of its ranking information to the new site. Done correctly, it is seamless to the end user, so no bad experience at all. For instance, this domain www.pulsehomehealth.com does a 301 redirect to this domain www.pulsehomehealthcare.com . Unless you were staring at the address bar, most users would never notice they've been redirected.

 

[Kate V]

. Done correctly, it is seamless to the end user, so no bad experience at all. For instance, this domain www.pulsehomehealth.com does a 301 redirect to this domain www.pulsehomehealthcare.com . Unless you were staring at the address bar, most users would never notice they've been redirected.

I agree that to the user it doesn't seem like much difference except when they see their address bar change... I noticed that all the time.

the main problem with moving websites like that is you are destroying any inbound link structures. For example if you have a domain apples.com and.net domain 301s to oranges.com you are breaking any link structure achieved by apples.com.

People want to believe in the 301 redirect because it is convenient. But the reality is the websites that link to apples.com never linked to oranges.com. I use this analogy because it quite literally is two different domains with two different keywords. Oranges have absolutely nothing to do with apples.

As I mentioned most people use this practice and don't see where the are losing things. But if you have an established website with a decent amount of inbound links you don't want to risk breaking those links.

Some argue that all the page rank and link popularity and all the other factors get past the long with the 301 redirect. to even try improve this is impossible because there are so many other factors involved.

So boil it down to what makes logistical sense. It does not make logistical sense for Google to give oranges.com all the inbound link juice that was previously going to apples.com.

 

[Almo99]

I have an SEO friend that does 301 re-directs for people all the time. The main disadvantage is that you lose some link juice when you do it. The upside is, a redirect from a strong domain to a weaker one will boost the ranking of the weaker one. I haven't tried it myself though, so I don't have first-hand experience of it (that's why I have expert friends ;-)).

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[mrandrei]

I think it's just okay. You just have to make sure you use a permanent 301 redirect. That way, the link juice will be passed. Take note, however, that it may take some time for Google to reindex the site.

 

[Kate V]

you also want to think into the future because when it comes to growing the new destination site the old redirects are going to have to be managed if you make any changes.

Additionally, any changes made to 301 target pages may cause them to become irrelevant to the inbound links that are getting redirected to them.

you are clearly working on your Seo and so the probability of changing a page title and content on 301 target pages is high which again will lead to irrelevance from inbound links that were established on the previous site.

Plainly: if apples.org was linking to apples.com and then apples.com is 301 to bananas.com and you continue to grow bananas.com with banana related articles the 301 redirect from apples.org being forwarded to bananas.com has absolutely zero relevance.

Hope that makes sense.

Even if passing link juice through 301 is true... You are still creating a content management and logistics nightmare for the future.

The reason so many people embrace 301 is because it is quick and easy... and they Want to believe in it. just like they want to be at the top of the search engines tomorrow. just because people have been using 301 for years doesn't mean they haven't been losing things along the way.

From an architectural standpoint we believe 301 was intended for internal domain use... and not to be used long-term.