Redirecting a web site-Advice and How to?

[themodeller]

Hello,


I have a site that has been up for a while www.defiancecombatselfdefense.com, I have created a new site nearly finished and want to direct it to a new one www.fracttactical.com

I cant wrap my head around exactly how to do this.

I was told to do this:
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Just add a redirect rule to your .htaccess files such as -

RewriteEngine On
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://newdomain.com/ [R=301]

That should redirect all traffic to the new domain.
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And to be honest I don't know if its correct or even how to do it?
Can someone advise?

Guy

[Acorn]

On your old site, you should place a box that allows a user to click into the new site.
In your old site design, in Web Properties... > Website > HTML code (body), place the following: <metahttp-equiv="refresh"content="3;url=http://www.fracttactical.com/"/>. This redirects the visitor from the old site to the new one after 3 seconds.

I wouldn't bother about the .htaccess file unless you wish to map specific pages on the old site onto the new one.

Acorn

[themodeller]

Hi Acorn,

Thank you.
- So if I have understood you correctly this will be an automatic redirect?
- Would I need to do this on every page?
- Also do you know if Google will penalise me for having information repeated on two sites, or does the Redirect take care of that?
G

[Acorn]

Yes, after three seconds, change it to <meta http-equiv="refresh"content="0;url=http://www.fracttactical.com/"/> for an immediate redirect.
No, Website tab ensure it is on every page.
Wouldn't think so as lots of sites do this .

Acorn

[themodeller]

Fab.
The only thing I don't understand is "Web Site Tab", what does that mean

[Acorn]

Acorn

[slavelle]

The benefit of using the 301 redirects as suggested to you is that the search engines will pick up on the change and update their links as well. This way Google gets the domain name right, the old site doesn't need to hang around any more (at some point, though it's hardly instant), and you preserve whatever search engine placement you had. At some point, once the old links are gone from the search indexes, the .htaccess stuff can go away (if it matters) as all of the index's links will have been replaced with corrected ones pointing at your new domain.

If you are only changing the domain name and everything else about the site remains the same, and you are going to keep the old domain name registered (forever) and you want to keep the old website index page in place (forever), then, yes you can forego the .htaccess method. Technically, the 301 redirects are the "correct" way to do this anyway though.

If you want a more technical, deep explanation of this, check out this post here: https://productforums.google.com/for...cs/KQ2RPsLR35Y

Does that make sense? Does it help at all?

[themodeller]

That's all great and VERY, VERY helpful and its worked which is even better!!!!!
Hoorah!!!! Thanks

[Acorn]

That's all great and VERY, VERY helpful and its worked which is even better!!!!!
Hoorah!!!! Thanks

Good, which approach have you followed so others may benefit?
Acorn