Hi there I have a site (say, www.abc.com)... it's been around for years, has received some decent ranking by the search engines but now I want to move that site over to www.def.com... On the day of the switch, www.abc.com will simply be a redirect to www.def.com.... Do you guys think this will impact my search engine placement? The content located in the original domain will be the same on the new domain... Thanks!
Well your new domain won't get indexed (shown in SE's) from the first day itself since though it's getting the redirected traffic from your old domain. You still have to work on optimization for the new domain separately.
if the redirect is proper then there will not be any problems. the rankings will be affected temporarily but will be reinstated soon.but remember that redirect has to be proper otherwise you will badly affect as you must have gathered number of backlinks.
Of course it will effect your ranking. Because you are making changes. But nothing is static. So if you have good reason to make the change then do it. There is a reason we are not all still getting to and from the local market on a horse and buggy.
301 obviously but won't the origional domain serp start to fall or be de indexed? Logically Google will drop this down? Especially if it is a competitive search term. The evidence being we would se ethe top ten filled with redirects otherwise. I have never done this so this is a question rather than an answer