Change of Domain Name - is it risky?

[Indizine]

A client of mine has announced they wish to change their domain name to a slightly different version, and they will set up redirects 'for a bit'.

They have PR5 and a lot of strong links, rank high for most of their keywords, including mid page 1 for a phrase that gets well over a thousand searches a day.

Is this a good move in your opinion?

What's the possible side effects from this?

How long should they keep the old domain going for the redirects?

[SimonM]

There are probably some SEO people on here that can answer this better than me. But IMO there is a risk in doing anything like that, but if done properly it shouldn't be too much of a problem.

I know a competitor of a client of mine who were ranking top for a whole load of competitive keywords in their industry for years dropped several pages down the SERPs when they moved from a PHP to .NET site and didn't use 301 permanent redirects.

So they must ensure they use permanent '301' redirects for all the pages. I don't understand why they will only keep the redirects 'for a bit'. Making the redirect permanent shouldn't cost anything more than the renewal of the old domain and will ensure traffic loss is minimal.

There are some tips from google here:

http://www.google.com/support/webmas...y?answer=93633

[Indizine]

I've removed your need to further describe SEO's

The website itself isn't changing, just the domain name, so your second para doesn't relate to my question i'm afraid.

[SimonM]

Ha! Thanks for the edit.

I think the warning in the second paragraph still applies, in that if you don't separately redirect each page of the old domain to the same page at the new domain it will harm your PR.

[LOS Design UK]

Hi Mate

Off the top of my head the first answer would be yup, it will fall into the google sandbox as a new domain and will have to go through the ageing process.

Unsure if it would be expediated BUT that is the first point to consider...

301s are indeed the way to go and if it makes pertinent business sense then do it. If it is just cosmetic or he/she thinks the DN is better suited for an SEO project then I would think again.

As for changing from 1 file type to another, this would only have a major impact if the site hierachy changed dramatically as with any site mods.

JMTC mate.

Catch up soon
Daren

[wood1e]

Why change, that is what I would ask.

Is there current domain name the company name? Are they changing to a more SEO driven URL?

Would this benefit the business more than keeping with the current URL, being that the SEO URL may bring a higher ranking for that matching keyword, but bring lower ranking for all other keywords.

So further to the reason, is it precived or real?

[Indizine]

Yes, I know to redirects, it'a any other fallout they should consider. I see no need, the name change is purely cosemetic and a shimmy of the same words, though I see why, the need does not seem to outweigh the risk of ruining what they have so far.

[Google Top Search]

I'm am not an on page SEO expert by any means, but in my experience, this is a huge risk and will in fact drop the sites rankings in the SERPS.

So what I'm saying is that there is a lot of safe things you can do with the re-directs, but the off page seo stuff will kill the sites SERP positioning.

I would not do this unless it was 100% necessary.

[Indizine]

and this is what i'm looking for answers to...what is the overall fallout of this move?

having done some seo on their site already, and to get it in some good positions for what they need, to lose any of it would be a crying shame and IMO should not be compromised for such a cosmetic change.

[Alvin]

Only a real fool does this sort of thing.

Start another site if needed,but don't mess with the golden egg.

I can think of no reason to remove a successfull site.

Can anyone.?

Alvin