I am new to this forum and so I wish to make sure that the information I have learned here I manage to implement properly!
I have webdesign client and their client has decided to change their domain name from ".com" to ".co". Now this is something that I wouldn't have suggested at all but it's what they wanted and is done now.
They now have DOMAIN.com and DOMAIN.co with exactly the same content.
Additionally they have a canonical issue too with both www and non-www versions.
My questions are:
If I understand it correctly to maintain PR/Link JuiceI need to 301 redirect the DOMAIN.com to DOMAIN.co with the following .htaccess file on the old DOMAIN.com:
CODE
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !^www\.DOMAIN\.com$
RewriteRule (.*) http://www.DOMAIN.co/$1 [R=301,L]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !^DOMAIN\.com$
RewriteRule (.*) http://www.DOMAIN.co/$1 [R=301,L]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !^www\.DOMAIN\.com$
RewriteRule (.*) http://www.DOMAIN.co/$1 [R=301,L]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !^DOMAIN\.com$
RewriteRule (.*) http://www.DOMAIN.co/$1 [R=301,L]
That I believe will cover the canonical issues and the 301 redirects.
I assume I then add the following to the new DOMAIN.co .htaccess file to prevent canonical issues on that site:
CODE
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !^www\.DOMAIN\.co$
RewriteRule (.*) http://www.DOMAIN.co/$1 [R=301,L]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !^www\.DOMAIN\.co$
RewriteRule (.*) http://www.DOMAIN.co/$1 [R=301,L]
I have also read that registering and submitting sitemaps at Google/Bing Webmaster Tools for both the old and new domains can speed up the redirects being picked up?
If this is correct my question then is what to do with the old DOMAIN.com? Does it need to be hosted for the 301's to be effective or can it be parked?
Any advice would be appreciated as this is my first redirect!
Very best wishes
Trevor
