A domain name is quite an important element in the SEO of a website. While not the sole criterion for achieving a high-rank position on a search engine, it plays a very important role in the establishing of a site’s identity and relevance.
Whether you are launching a new website or rebranding your existing one, you need to understand how the domain name influences the SEO of a site if you want to attain better search visibility.
This easy guide reveals to your how domain name impacts SEO, thus providing practical pointers on choosing a domain that would boost online success.
Incorrectly changing your domain can result in a significant loss of SEO rankings, with some websites experiencing a staggering 80% reduction in traffic due to flawed domain change procedures.
With over a decade of experience in the SEO industry, I believe it’s crucial to offer guidance on executing domain name changes correctly to mitigate the risk of diminished rankings and traffic.
A. Why Change Your Domain Name?
While changing a domain name isn’t a frequent occurrence, there are situations where it becomes necessary:
- Rebranding: When a company undergoes a brand overhaul, including a new brand name, the website address must align with the updated brand identity. A prime example is SEOMoz, which was later rebranded to Moz.
- Legal Issues: If a specific domain name infringes on trademark or intellectual property rights, it can invite unwanted legal conflicts, necessitating a domain name change to avoid litigation.
- Better Suitability: As businesses evolve, their focus, products, or services may shift. In such cases, a domain name that accurately reflects the company’s current offerings or mission is imperative.
- Memorability: Some domains are easier to remember and type than others. Opting for a simpler alternative can enhance user recall. For instance, Buffer transitioned from “BufferApp.com” to the more concise “Buffer.com,” reflecting the company’s growth beyond its initial app-centric focus.
- Merger or Buyout: Mergers or acquisitions often entail consolidating online presence under a single domain name, necessitating the cessation of use for one of the existing domain names.
- Domain Availability: If a desired domain name was unavailable during the company’s initial online establishment but becomes accessible later, the company may acquire it and switch to that domain name.
- Negative Publicity: In cases where a website’s name becomes associated with adverse news or public sentiment, a domain change may be required to mitigate the impact of negative publicity.
B. Domain Name Tips to Improve Your SEO
The six tips or items listed below will help you to improve your SEO in relation to the domain name and put your website in a better position to rank in the search engines:
1. Deciding On The Domain Name
When embarking on the journey of acquiring a new domain for your website or business, there are several crucial considerations to keep in mind.
First and foremost, the selection of your domain name is pivotal. Opt for a name that not only resonates with your business but also incorporates keywords or phrases that potential visitors might use in their search queries. This strategic choice can significantly enhance the discoverability of your website.
Equally important is to ensure that the chosen domain has a clean track record. Prioritize domains that haven’t been associated with spam or any other nefarious activities, as such a history could negatively impact your website’s search engine ranking and credibility.
Additionally, it’s equally important to assess the quality of inbound links directed towards the domain you’re eyeing.
High-quality backlinks can greatly bolster your site’s authority and visibility in search engine results. To thoroughly evaluate the backlink profile of your prospective domain, consider leveraging our complimentary Backlink Checker tool.
This invaluable resource provides insights into the entire spectrum of links pointing toward the domain, helping you ascertain its spam score and identify any valuable links that could benefit your website’s SEO efforts.
When transitioning from an old domain to a new one, meticulous tracking of various SEO performance metrics becomes paramount, particularly within the realm of Google Search Console.
Before embarking on any domain migration process, it’s imperative to establish a baseline by identifying and recording key metrics that are indicative of your website’s current SEO performance.
First and foremost, organic traffic serves as a fundamental barometer of your website’s visibility and reach in search engine results.
By benchmarking your existing organic traffic levels, you gain vital insights into the effectiveness of your current SEO strategies and can track changes post-domain migration.
In addition to organic traffic, monitoring keyword rankings is essential for understanding your website’s current positions for pertinent search queries.
This involves tracking the rankings of target keywords to discern which terms are driving traffic to your site.
Utilizing tools such as the SEOptimer keyword tracking tool can streamline this process, providing comprehensive insights into keyword performance and facilitating informed decision-making.
Furthermore, it’s imperative to keep a vigilant eye on the number of pages that get indexed by search engines to ensure comprehensive coverage of your new domain. Verifying that all pages are properly crawled and included in search engine indexes safeguards against the potential loss of visibility and ensures the seamless transition of your website’s content.
Beyond these technical metrics, user engagement metrics play an important role in evaluating the efficacy of your website.
Metrics like the average session duration, bounce rate, and pages per visit provide invaluable insights into how users actually interact with your website and the overall user experience (UX) it delivers.
These metrics can be readily accessed through platforms like Google Analytics, allowing you to gauge user behavior and make informed optimizations to enhance engagement and retention.
By diligently monitoring these UX and SEO metrics before and after the domain transition, you can effectively gauge the impact of the change on your website’s visibility, organic rankings, and user experience.
This proactive approach empowers you to identify areas for improvement, optimize your website’s performance, and ensure a smooth and successful transition to your new domain.
2. Export Backlinks to Domain Name
Exporting all backlinks pointing to your current domain is a critical step in reinforcing the integrity and continuity of your website’s link profile, particularly when undergoing a domain change.
Search engines like Google heavily consider link equity when ranking websites, with a strong emphasis on the overall quality of the inbound links from authoritative sources.
By exporting your backlinks, you gain the ability to meticulously examine and verify that all links remain intact throughout the domain migration process. This ensures that you retain the valuable link equity accumulated by your current domain and mitigate the risk of losing visibility and authority in search engine rankings.
- Backlink Integrity: Verify that all existing backlinks pointing to your current domain are preserved during the domain migration process. This ensures that you maintain your website’s authority in the eyes of search engines.
- Quality Assessment: Evaluate the quality of inbound links by examining some factors such as domain authority, relevance, and anchor text. Identifying high-quality backlinks allows you to prioritize efforts to retain and leverage these valuable assets for your new domain.
- Link Acquisition Strategy: Analyze the sources of your backlinks to identify patterns and opportunities for future link-building initiatives. Understanding which websites and channels contribute to your backlink profile enables you to refine your link acquisition strategy and foster relationships with authoritative sources.
- Risk Mitigation: Identify any lost or broken backlinks that may result from the domain change, enabling you to effortlessly address and rectify these issues. Proactively managing lost backlinks helps minimize the impact on your website’s SEO performance and ensures a smooth transition to your new domain.
3. Request To Other Websites To Update Their Links
Requesting other websites to update their links to your site is a strategic endeavor aimed at enhancing your website’s SEO performance and authority.
This process shares similarities with broken link building, as it involves rectifying outdated or broken links that may negatively impact your site’s visibility and credibility.
To effectively navigate this aspect of SEO optimization, it’s imperative to craft personalized outreach messages tailored to the individual websites you’re targeting.
These messages should articulate the value proposition of your website and elucidate why updating their links would be mutually beneficial for both parties.
Here’s a detailed breakdown of how to execute this process:
- Research and Identify Target Websites: Begin by identifying websites that have backlinks pointing to your site but may need updating. This could include sites with outdated content, incorrect URLs, or broken links. Tools like backlink analysis software can aid in identifying these potential opportunities.
- Craft Personalized Outreach Messages: Tailor your outreach messages to each target website, addressing the website owner or webmaster directly. Start by expressing appreciation for the existing link and politely highlight the outdated nature of the link pointing to your site. Clearly articulate the benefits of updating the link, such as improved user experience and relevancy.
- Highlight Value Proposition: Emphasize the value proposition of your website and how updating the link can enhance the content quality and relevance for their audience. Showcase any recent updates, accolades, or noteworthy content that adds credibility to your site.
- Offer Collaboration Opportunities: Incentivize the link update by offering collaboration opportunities, such as guest posting, content contributions, or reciprocal linking. Highlight the potential for mutual benefit and foster a spirit of partnership and cooperation.
- Follow-Up: Be proactive in following up with the recipients of your outreach messages. Politely inquire about their decision regarding the link update and offer assistance or further clarification if needed. Persistence and professionalism can often yield positive results when securing link updates.
- Build Genuine Relationships: Focus on fostering genuine relationships with the website owners and webmasters. Engage in meaningful conversations, provide value, and demonstrate genuine interest in their content and audience. Building rapport can lead to organic link updates and long-term collaborations.
4. Migrate To Your New Site
Migrating your old website to a new domain is a significant undertaking that involves transferring all its content, including text, images, and other multimedia elements, to a new web address.
While the prospect of such a transition might seem daunting, especially for those unfamiliar with web development, with the right approach and tools, it can be accomplished smoothly and efficiently.
If your website is powered by WordPress, the process of migrating to a new domain is notably streamlined. Here’s a detailed guide on how to execute this migration effectively:
- Export Content from WordPress: Begin by accessing your WordPress dashboard and navigating to the export feature. This functionality allows you to export all pages, posts, media files, and other content associated with your website to a downloadable file. By doing so, you create a comprehensive backup of your website’s content, ensuring that nothing is lost during the migration process.
- To initiate the export, simply go to the “Tools” section in your WordPress dashboard and choose “Export.” Choose the option that helps you export all content, and WordPress will generate a downloadable file containing your website’s data.
- Utilize Resources for Guidance: Transitioning your WordPress website to a new domain can be facilitated by leveraging available resources and tutorials. Platforms like WPMU DEV offer invaluable guidance on how to move content from one WordPress website to another effectively. These resources provide step-by-step instructions, tips, and best practices to ensure a quite seamless transition with minimal disruption.
- Take advantage of the documentation and tutorials listed by reputable sources to familiarize yourself with the migration process and address any potential challenges that may arise.
- Implement 301 Redirects: One of the crucial aspects of domain migration is setting up 301 redirects. A 301 redirects page is a permanent redirect that automatically directs users and search engines from the old domain to the new one. This ensures that existing links to your website remain functional and that visitors are seamlessly redirected to the new domain.
- You can implement 301 redirects using various methods, including editing the .htaccess file on your server or utilizing your website’s control panel. By configuring redirects, you preserve your website’s SEO equity and prevent any loss of traffic or rankings associated with the old domain.
- Ensure Continuity and Visibility: Throughout the migration process, it’s essential to prioritize the continuity and visibility of your website. Conduct thorough testing to verify that all content has been successfully transferred to the new domain and that redirects are functioning correctly. This includes checking for broken links, missing content, and any other issues that may arise during the transition.
- Monitor your website’s performance closely following the migration to ensure that it remains accessible online and continues to meet the said needs of your audience.
5. Set Up 301 Redirects
Setting up 301 redirects is a crucial step in ensuring a seamless transition when migrating your website to a new domain.
This permanent redirection instructs both users and search engines that your content has moved permanently from one URL to another.
Whether your website is hosted on an Apache server or through a web hosting service with a control panel, implementing 301 redirects is relatively straightforward.
If your website is hosted on an Apache server, you can edit the .htaccess file to configure the redirects. Here’s a step-by-step guide on how to set up 301 redirects:
- Access the .htaccess File: Using an FTP client or file manager provided by your web hosting provider, locate and access the .htaccess file in the root directory of your website.
- Edit the .htaccess File: Open the .htaccess file using a text editor and add the following specific lines of code:
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^olddomain.com [NC,OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^www.olddomain.com [NC]
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://newdomain.com/$1 [L,R=301,NC]Replace “olddomain.com” with your old domain name and “newdomain.com” with your new domain name.
This code snippet redirects all requests from the old domain to the related URLs on the new domain.
- Save and Upload the .htaccess File: After making the necessary changes, save the .htaccess file and reupload it back to the root directory of your website. Ensure that the file is named “.htaccess” and that it is placed in the correct location.
Alternatively, if your web hosting service provides a control panel or web page for managing redirects, you can use this interface to set up 301 redirects. Look for options like “Redirects” or “Domain Management” in your web hosting dashboard, and follow the prompts to configure the redirects.
Once the 301 redirects are in place, it’s essential to ensure that internal links on your new domain are working correctly. Broken internal links can massively impact user experience and SEO performance in a negative manner. To address this, consider using plugins like Broken Link Checker for WordPress sites to scan for broken links and correct them as needed.
By setting up 301 redirects and ensuring the functionality of internal links on your new domain, you can preserve your website’s link equity, maintain search engine rankings, and provide a pretty seamless user experience for visitors navigating your site. This proactive approach effectively contributes to the success of your website migration and supports its continued growth and visibility online.
6. Verify the New Site in Google Search Console (GSC)
Verifying your new website in Google Search Console is a crucial step in ensuring that Google accurately recognizes and indexes your new domain.
This process allows you to establish ownership of the site and gain access to valuable insights and tools for managing its performance in search results. Here’s a detailed guide on how to verify your new site in Google Search Console:
- Log in to Google Search Console: Access the Google Search Console (GSC) dashboard by logging in to your Google account.
- Add Property: Once you are logged in, click on the “Add Property” button. Enter the URL of your new domain in the provided field.
- Select Unverified Property: After adding your new domain as a property, it will appear in the list of unverified properties within your Google Search Console account. Select the newly added property from the list.
- Choose Verification Method: Google Search Console offers various verification methods to confirm ownership of the domain. Select a viable verification method from the options provided. Common methods include:
- HTML Tag: You’ll be provided with an HTML tag to add to the <head> section of your website’s homepage.
- HTML File Upload: Download an HTML file provided by Google and directly upload it to the root directory of your website.
- Google Analytics: Verify ownership by adding a special tracking code snippet to your website’s homepage through Google Analytics.
- Domain Name Provider: Verify ownership by adding a DNS record provided by Google to your domain’s DNS settings.
- Complete Verification: Depending on the selected verification method, follow the instructions given by Google to complete the verification process. This may involve adding code snippets, uploading files, or modifying DNS settings on your website.
- Verify Ownership: Once you’ve implemented the provided instructions on your website, return to Google Search Console (GSC) and click the “Verify” button to confirm ownership of the new domain.
- Use Change of Address Tool: After successfully adding and verifying your new domain in Google Search Console, utilize the Change of Address tool to inform Google of the domain migration. This tool helps Google understand the transition from the old domain to the new one, facilitating a smoother indexing process.
- Access the Change of Address tool within Google Search Console and follow the prompts to submit the necessary information about your old and new domains.
- Monitor Site Performance: With your new domain verified and indexed in Google Search Console, you can now monitor your site’s performance, identify indexing issues, and receive alerts about potential SEO issues. Periodically review the data provided by Google Search Console (GSC) to optimize your site’s visibility and ranking in search results.
C. Summarizing How Domain Names Impact SEO
In conclusion, domain names play an important role in SEO and online branding strategies. A well-chosen domain name not only reflects your brand identity but also impacts your website’s search engine visibility and overall online success.
By incorporating relevant keywords, choosing a memorable and easy-to-spell name, and considering factors like domain age and authority, you can enhance your website’s SEO performance and attract more organic traffic.
Moreover, domain names contribute to establishing trust and credibility with users, which can positively impact conversion rates and customer retention.
As search engines continue to change over the time and prioritize user experience and relevance, investing time and energy into selecting the right domain name and optimizing it for SEO is paramount for long-term success in the digital landscape.
Suggested read: Website Development: Common Technical Mistakes and How to Fix Them
D. Common FAQs on How Domain Names Impact SEO
What role does the domain extension (TLD) play in SEO?
The domain extension, or top-level domain (TLD), can influence user perception and trust but has minimal direct impact on SEO. While country-code TLDs (.us, .uk) can indicate geographical relevance, generic TLDs like .com, .org, and .net are widely recognized and generally preferred for their universality.
Can changing my domain name affect my search engine rankings?
Changing your domain name can potentially impact your SEO rankings, especially if not done properly. It’s essential to implement proper redirects, inform search engines of the domain change, and update all references to the old domain to minimize disruptions to your SEO efforts.
How do subdomains and subdirectories affect SEO?
Subdomains and subdirectories can impact SEO differently. Subdirectories (e.g., example.com/blog) are generally preferred for consolidating authority and maintaining a cohesive website structure, while subdomains (e.g., blog.example.com) can function as separate entities, each with its own SEO considerations.
