Possible To Change My Domain Name Without Hurting Rankings?

I've worked hard on a site and have it ranking nicely in the SERPs. Now I really want to change the domain name and I'm hoping to hear from someone who has actually done this.

If I 301 the site from the current two year old domain to a brand new domain (with better keywords in it coincidentally), will the rankings:

a) Go up
b) Stay the same
c) Go down a bit
d) Drop like a rock

 

why not keep both, and just start over with new name? hosted seperetlly?

maybe double the income too.

 

Thanks for your reply. This site offers something unique and we are building a community around it, so we just want a domain that is more memorable and lends itself to a new themed design.

 

I did a 301 with my site before.

I was in the same situation as you. I had a 2 year old website which was ranking well, but I wasn't happy with the name so I decided to adopt a new domain name for it.

Like you, the subject was quite unique so I didn't want to build a new site. I simply wanted to change the name.

I'll tell you right now, that you will lose traffic once you make the change. A 301 redirect will simply direct the traffic from your old domain to the new one. It won't carry the SERPs over.

The search engines will look at your new domain like a new website, so pretty much you have to market and rebuild link popularity from scratch.

My suggestion to you is, if you really want to change the domain, do it and don't look back! The sooner you do it, the better. If you're like me and serious about your online business, you should go with a name that you'll be happy with for the long-term.

 

I agree with steveb that you will get the traffic but SERPS you will have to build all over again.

 

if you use 301 redirect, your serp position will not change.

it will be the same

 

Yes, that's what Google is saying too. But the tool bar PageRank will take sometime to move from the old domain to the new one though.

 

Thanks steveb for the real life experience. I suspect that in practice it really doesn't transfer as well as Google thinks it should.

 

We did the 301 directs and it worked ok.

 

Maybe,it will go up if something good contents are added to the old one..

 

I'm not sure how this is possible when your new domain has no backlinks. All the backlinks pointing to your old domain will not change simply because of a 301 redirect.

 

People say a 301 will work but I did it and lost half my users. I would not recommened it dude.

 

I can see how this SHOULD work. A 301 says that Page X is now permanently moved to Page Y. So Page Y IS Page X. Therefore any backlinks to Page X should still be valid for Page Y.

Unfortunately, I think I am stuck with the current domain.