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Redirecting a Domain Via Network SolutionsDecember 14, 2011
By Jill Whalen
Hi Jill,  I'm a reader and fan of your newsletter from its start. Remember when Meta keywords were the "secret" to effective SEO?I have a question I would appreciate some help on. We are registering a second domain name. We don't plan to use it now (it will not have any content to be indexed), but if someone types the URL, we want to redirect the visitor to our current site. From an SEO standpoint, can I use Network Solution's "forwarding service" without negative impact? Bruce ++Jill's Response++ Hi Bruce, It depends on what Network Solution's forwarding service consists of. If they're 301-redirecting the additional domain to your current one, then that would be fine. Most other solutions are not ideal. Many hosting services and registrars don't 301-redirect, however, so be sure to check that out. If they don't, you can always just do your own redirect at the server level instead. BTW, Meta keywords were never really the secret to SEO success, but I do remember when people thought they were! :) Hope this helps. Best, Jill Jill Whalen is the CEO of High Rankings,  an SEO Services Company in the Boston, MA area since 1995. Follow her on Twitter @JillWhalenIf you learned from this article, be sure to sign up for the High Rankings Advisor SEO Newsletter so you can be the first to receive similar articles in the future! Add Your Comments |
 
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Jill Whalen said: 
We just (Nov 2011) when through this with a client and Network Solutions: it took NS two weeks, but they finally determined that they cannot consistently serve up a 301 redirect for a domain unless the domain is actually hosted (at an additional fee).
I say "Consistently" because the approach NS is using does serve up a 301... the 2nd time you ask for the page. It appears some caching is going on and the response you get varies depending upon whether the page is already in the cache.
The client ended up moving the domain to an other Registrar (while not strictly necessary) and using cheap hosting to handle the 301 redirect correctly and consistently using .htaccess.