Changing Domains - 301 old https to new https
-
Brief History:
Our company made change to a new domain. Both domains had an SSL configured on it in which the old domain SSL was controlled and created by Shopify which gave us limited control. Because we couldn't redirect the old https:// to the new https:// So basically we duplicated our new HTML website and put canonical ref on all duplicate pages to the final domain to help get search to navigate to the newer domain.
Question:
In the near future I would like to take down the old domain and do a 301 domain forwarding. What is the correct course of action to complete this? Our old domain was indexed and SERP results were tied to it's https:// url's.
-
Hi
Cloudflare does not need to be added two times (or to each domain) to work or it would only be used on the old domain for an Automattic 301 redirect to the new site/ domain so I would only use it once to make sure I get the set of 301s for the old domain.
Does that make sense?
(The "yournewdomain.com" does not need to run on Cloudflare only the "yourolddomain.com" domain)
You will then want to see how this is used in the following pattern:
https://yourolddomain.com/*
Select “Forwarding URL” and “301 – Permanent Redirect” for the settings, and input the following rule:
https://newyourdomain.com/$1
The /$1 enables the wildcard part to function. Then click on “Save and Deploy.”
cite: https://woorkup.com/free-url-forwarding/
Let me know if I can be of any help,
Thomas Zickell
-
Thank you for the response Tom - This does make sense and I will implement and let you know how it works out. I have very limited experience with the free Cloudflare account so I do have one question. Does the domain I am forwarding everything need to be controlled by Cloudflare as well? Didn't know if that was needed for everything to play nice.
-
Thomas is right you IF YOU STILL HAVE THE DOMAIN you can use Cloudflare to do 100% Free URL Forwarding With HTTP & https 301 wildcard redirects with no server.
"Because we couldn't redirect the old https:// to the new https:// So basically we duplicated our new HTML website and put canonical ref on all duplicate pages to the final domain to help get search to navigate to the newer domain."
So the canonical ref on all duplicate pages to the new domain will help get Google to navigate to the newer domain but not like a 301 redirect will. So on Shopify, you are pointing the old URLs to the new domains URL's I hope if not please 301 use Cloudflare for 301 domain forwarding
- If so Follow the tutorial below on how setup free URL forwarding with Cloudflare, along with 301 wildcard redirects.
- https://woorkup.com/free-url-forwarding/
if you do change the URL's after the forward slash "/" or don't want Cloudflare to run your old domain so you can take down the old domain and do a 301 domain forwarding you should read the guides below.
- https://builtvisible.com/domain-migration/
- https://mza.seotoolninja.com/blog/achieving-an-seo-friendly-domain-migration-the-infographic
- https://searchengineland.com/changing-domain-names-2016-10-easily-overlooked-steps-can-save-seo-248484
this setup, you don't want to duplicate your web site HTTP to HTTPS if needed.
If I where you I would just do what is in this guide the only cost is the cost of your old domain & it will auto line up urls (if you did not change them aside from the domain name.
- Read & use this https://woorkup.com/free-url-forwarding/
Hope this helps,
Tom
-
If I'm correct, you're no longer using the old domain and just redirecting to the new site?
If that's correct, why keep it with Shopify at all, you could instead point it to a different server (or to Cloudflare which'll be able to handle to redirects through page rules without you having to do any code).
The best course of action is to 301 redirect the site to the new site, then on the new site (after checking for issues) submit sitemaps/fetch as google. To speed up this process slightly you can also submit a sitemap for the old site, Google will see the redirect when they try to crawl any page.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
After you remove a 301 redirect that Google has processed, will the new URL retain any of the link equity from the old URL?
Lets say you 301 redirect URL A to URL B, and URL A has some backlinks from other sites. Say you left the 301 redirect in place for a year, and Google had already replaced the old URL with the new URL in the SERPs, would the new URL (B) retain some of the link equity from URL A after the 301 redirect was removed, or does the redirect have to remain in place forever?
Technical SEO | | johnwalkersmith0 -
Merge 2 websites into one, using a non-existing, new domain.
I need to merge https://www.WebsiteA.com and https://www.WebsiteB.com to a fresh new domain (with no content) https://www.WebsiteC.com. I want to do it the best way to keep existing SEO juice. Website A is the companies home page and built with Wordpress Website B is the company product page and built with Wordpress Website C will be the new site containing both website A and B, utilizing Wordpress also. What is the best way to do this? I have research a lot and keep hitting walls on how to do it. It's a little trickier because it's two different domains going to a brand new domain. Thanks
Technical SEO | | jarydcat10 -
SERP result (URL) doesn't change after a 301
A couple of months ago there was a result in Google for our branded search term which wasn't the 'official' URL, actually the result shown in the SERP was www.mycompany-ip.nl. We've applied a 301 redirect of this URL to the 'official' URL which is a subdomain: department.mycompany.nl. From Google the redirect is obviously working, but up until now, I don't see Google replacing the incorrect URL by the correct URL. I am wondering what to do to make the result correct. André
Technical SEO | | ConclusionDigital0 -
Best Practice - Disavow tool for non-canonical domain, 301 Redirect
The Situation: We submitted to the Disavow tool for a client who (we think) had an algorithmic penalty because of their backlink profile. However, their domain is non-canonical. We only had access to http://clientswebsite.com in Webmaster Tools, so we only submitted the disavow.txt for that domain. Also, we have been recommending (for months - pre disavow) they redirect from http://clientswebsite.com to http://www.clientswebsite.com, but aren't sure how to move forward because of the already submitted disavow for the non-www site. 1.) If we redirect to www. will the submitted disavow transfer or follow the redirect? 2.) If not, can we simply re-submit the disavow for the www. domain before or after we redirect? Any thoughts would be appreciated. Thanks!
Technical SEO | | thebenro0 -
Selecting a new domain name
If a two word domain is already taken (e.g. onetwo.com), which of the following is a better alternative? 1. one-two.com 2. onetwo.org Best,
Technical SEO | | ChristopherGlaeser
Christopher0 -
301 redirect
What is a proper way to redirect any url containing a give word (anywhere in the url) to another sepcified url? Is it like this? RedirectMatch 301 ^thisword$ http://domain.com/newlocation
Technical SEO | | sesertin1 -
New website with slightly new urls
Hi we recently designed our website in work and changed some of the urls. the old site used to be http://www.example.ie/contact-us.htm now it's is http://example.ie/get-in-touch The problem we are having is with sitelinks (the ones auto generate in the serp) ie: about, contact us, team etc etc. Once cliked on, these OLD links are all going to 404 pages because of the change of url. Help with this would be greatly appreciated - I was thinking of blocking these old sitelinks in google web master.
Technical SEO | | GlenBOB0 -
How to Redirect only specific pages to new domain
My HTACCESS FILE IS AS FOLLOWS: rewriteengine on
Technical SEO | | askthetrainer
rewritecond %{HTTP_HOST} ^mydomain.com$
rewriterule ^mydomain/(.*)$ "http://www.mydomain.com/$1" [R=301,L] #4d864805b49b5 I want to move ONLY specific pages from this domain to a new domain How do I edit my HTACCESS (which redirects http:// to www.) to move specific pages from old domain (which I have to delete) to new domain.... I.e. http://mydomaon.com/move.html needs to move to http://mynewdomain.com/move.html Where i can delete the original domains0