Domain Name changes and search engines

[JohnQ]

Hey. I'm hoping someone can please help me,

I'm about to move my site to a new host: if I move my domain name, is that going to have an impact on my current search engine positions; and will every url for my site now have to be redirected or will they be automatically redirected (so search engines no surfers will not even know we moved?)

thanks,

JohnQ

[seobook]

if you use the same name and shift it to a new host it usually should not hurt your rankings.

I would suggest placing the site on the new host first and then pointing the domain name at the new nameserver.

[David Wallace]

The best thing to do is to set up a 301 permanent redirect from the old domain to the new one. this will tell the search engines that the domain has permanently changed. This usually requires that you keep the old domain hosted in some way and then you either modify the .htaccess file on Unix and with Windows, I believe you do that through IIS.

[AussieWebmaster]

Originally Posted by David Wallace

The best thing to do is to set up a 301 permanent redirect from the old domain to the new one. this will tell the search engines that the domain has permanently changed. This usually requires that you keep the old domain hosted in some way and then you either modify the .htaccess file on Unix and with Windows, I believe you do that through IIS.

This is for when you change the domain name itslef or the name of pages...

[David Wallace]

Originally Posted by AussieWebmaster

This is for when you change the domain name itslef or the name of pages...

Aahh I see that JohnQ was talking about moving hosts, not changing domains. I must have read through that one too fast!

Correct 301 redirects are for domain name changes and page name changes - not hosting changes. So long as you keep your file structure the same, changing hosts will not have any effect, good or bad, on search engine positioning.