i think i have made a big mistake (HELP)

ok so what i did was,

i had a high ranked teen forum and i turned it into a chat forum for all ages, and changed domains.
in 2006 i started an all age forum forumcentral1 (com)
in 2010 i changed the domain to goteen (net) and made it a teen forum, it took ages to get back to first page but the forum was going well.
2 days ago i changed the domain to chatforums(net) as some say its a premium domain and will rank well, i changed it because i wanted and all age forum.
i went from goteen (net) to chatforums (net)
link popularity:
forumcentral1.com: 2060
chatforums(net): 302
goteen(net): 10512

hears the advice i'd love to hear from you guys if thats ok.

could i have made my forum for all ages using goteen.net???
because teen forums i noticed all have older members anyway.

but if a person typed into google "chat forums" and seen the domain with teen in it, would they still click my link?

i just think i have made a big mistake changing domain as i spent hundreds on backlinks for goteen domain and forumcentral, and even tho goteen is redirecting to chatforum domain, i still think i will lose out.

so people say chatforums(net) is a premium domain and i should stick with it.
but must say i should change back to goteen and title it as chat forums.

your comments are going to be helpful as i really need ya help guys, cheers.

old domain are redirected to new domain, just whats your thoughts please?

maybe i should have went back to forumcentral1 (com)??? as its been redirecting to go teen.

 

You need to have Google Webmaster Tools updated for your original domain to point to the new domain. You should also have the original domain redirect to the new one.

 

they are redirected mate. thanks.

 

I think you made a wise decision in promoting the growth of your forum. When it comes down to marketing your website, it is all about perception. While goteen is a shorter and more attractive domain, it still limits the forum to a teenage audience. However, with chatforum you are not limiting the audience.

Also, I can't emphasize enough the importance of redirecing. If the goteens domain has a large amount indexed links on the search engines, you should have all of them redirect to the top level chatforum. If not the to the top level, at least to various deep links through out the new domain. It can be a deciding factor in the strength of your rankings over the change in your domain.

 

thanks WC Rocket,

in the first place, as i was running forumcentral1.com for 4 and a half years, before i changed to goteen.net, the reason why goteen has such a good ranking is because forumcentral1.com is pushing goteen, as forumcentral1 had such a good ranking. if i was to remove the direction coming from forumcentral1.com, then goteen.net would drop in the ranks.
so really, i should have changed back to forumcentral1.com true? as thats the top level domain here.
but yet people say chatforums.net will get me to the top, yeah maybe, but very slowly yeah?

 

After 5 years, unless the domains have never been dropped, it isn't going to matter. Count the number of backlinks for each domain and if there is still any direct or referral traffic through them. In the end, any PR is going to get shifted to the domain you want it at. You may have better chances by having both older domain redirecting to the new one, versus a redirection path.

 

thanks mate.

at the moment i have forumcentral1.com and goteen.net redirecting to chatforums.net hoping they will push me back up the ranks.
but then my host says .net domain are a short term ranking what ever that means.
do you think chatforums.net is the perfect domain for a chat forum? as thats the search terms i want to use for people to find my site "Chat Forums" and Chat Forum"
stick with chatforums.net?

 

THe perfect domain is going to be the one you are satisfied with. Continually second guessing the domain is going to take time away from what really matters, content and marketing. Changing the domain will confuse your users more than it will confuse the search engines. As long as your domain extension is a com/net/org you will rank fine. Quality backlinks and consistent growth over time will keep you from sinking in ranks.

 

orsm reply thanks.
so goteen and forumcentral1 should push everything to chatforums.net, like in ranking, like once google updates everything, my new domain should appear at least second page as its getting pushed by 2 good domain that had very high ranking yeah?
im happy with chatforums.net domain and so are my members. so just leave as is yeah? and thanks so much for helping me out.

 

No problem. Keep an eye on indexing errors in your Google Webmaster Tools. Anything that shows as a 404 should be redirected with a 301. Stick with chatforums.net, it has an air of commerciality and easy to remember. The new domain is not getting pushed per say, but it any value the older domains hold is getting transferred to the new domain.

 

unreal mate, case closed thank you, will look into webmaster tools now.

cheers thank you.

 

It could be better to create a new forum on chatforums.

 

what and keep goteen.net as a teen forum? that way i guess i could have a teen forum and chat forum? hmm..

 

Yes. Domain redirection is considered as a type of search result manipulation: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/URL_redirection