302 Redirect - Does it pass link juice?

[Chris Sweeney]

I've never really messed with redirects before, but here is the situation. I have an old domain that is a PR4 and it is not being used by me anymore because I got a new exact-match domain in the same niche. Now please correct me if I'm wrong, but if I do a 301 (permanent) or even a 302 (temporary) redirect pointing that old domain to my new one, that will flow all of the link juice to the new site, correct? Then the new site will be a PR4 as well? Thanks!

[iAmNameLess]

No... you get credit for links and SOME PR but it doesn't make the new site automatically a 4. It also doesn't completely transfer all the same juice.

You're better off with a 301 redirect if you want any of the juice pointing towards your new site.

[yukon]

I doubt a 301 will pass full pagerank to the new site.

Try it & find out, the old PR4 isn't being used so you won't be out anything.

[dburk]

Hi Chris,

A 301 Permanent Redirect passes linkjuice, and a 302 Temporary redirect does not.

There is a decay factor built into the PageRank algorithm that will reduce the strength of your current PR by approximately 15% so you will need to do some promotional work to make up the difference, but most of your linkjuice will transfer through a proper 301 Redirect.

[GlobalTrader]

I was able to capture quite a few domain names that expired having Yahoo directory links a few years ago and did quite a bit of research on the subject at the time - all the trusted authorities indicated then and still do today that a 301 permanent redirect is the way to go.

[schttrj]

Originally Posted by dburk

Hi Chris,

A 301 Permanent Redirect passes linkjuice, and a 302 Temporary redirect does not.

There is a decay factor built into the PageRank algorithm that will reduce the strength of your current PR by approximately 15% so you will need to do some promotional work to make up the difference, but most of your linkjuice will transfer through a proper 301 Redirect.

You are right about the decay factor. And building some external links will help (especially trackbacks and pingbacks).

[Chris Sweeney]

Thanks everybody...301 it is!

[Chris Sweeney]

Wait a minute...why don't I just use that domain to backlink from instead? So whenever I want a PR4 backlink, I'll just link from that old PR4 blog (that I mentioned above) to my other sites. I think I'll get a new hosting account with HostGator and host my old PR4 blog on it. Then I'll point links (that will be sporadically placed) from the homepage to my other money sites hosted on GoDaddy's servers. Is that something Google may catch? One PR4 site on HostGator linking to 50 other sites on GoDaddy? Hmmmm

[agravity]

302 will not help you in getting PR juice

[iAmNameLess]

Originally Posted by Chris Sweeney

Wait a minute...why don't I just use that domain to backlink from instead? So whenever I want a PR4 backlink, I'll just link from that old PR4 blog (that I mentioned above) to my other sites. I think I'll get a new hosting account with HostGator and host my old PR4 blog on it. Then I'll point links (that will be sporadically placed) from the homepage to my other money sites hosted on GoDaddy's servers. Is that something Google may catch? One PR4 site on HostGator linking to 50 other sites on GoDaddy? Hmmmm

Your PR4 won't last very long at all that way.

[Chris Sweeney]

Originally Posted by iAmNameLess

Your PR4 won't last very long at all that way.

Oh okay, why not?

[dburk]

Because if you 301 to your new domain you have redirected all of your linkjuice to the pages of that new domain. Google doesn't assign PR to domains it is applied at the specific URL and it is internally updated with each new query.

[unitedsolutions]

I have heard that there are PR for domain names too?? Is that right???

[dburk]

Originally Posted by unitedsolutions

I have heard that there are PR for domain names too?? Is that right???

Hi unitedsolutions,

Nope. Where did you hear that?

[Chris Sweeney]

Originally Posted by dburk

Because if you 301 to your new domain you have redirected all of your linkjuice to the pages of that new domain. Google doesn't assign PR to domains it is applied at the specific URL and it is internally updated with each new query.

Right, thanks, I understand that. So if I were to 301 to the homepage of the new domain, all of the linkjuice will be redirected to the homepage of that new domain, which should give my new domain's homepage a little bump in the SERPs.

But what I was mentioning a few posts ago was that I may just forget about doing the 301. Instead, I'll just keep the blog as it is and just use it for free PR4 links whenever I want. Then iAmNameLess said...

Originally Posted by iAmNameLess

Your PR4 won't last very long at all that way.

And I'm wondering why it won't last long that way. Any ideas?

[dburk]

Hi Chris,

Oh... perhaps iAmNameLess also thought you still intended to redirect your traffic. If your website remains unchanged then I see no reason why your linkjuice would change.

[iAmNameLess]

Originally Posted by Chris Sweeney

And I'm wondering why it won't last long that way. Any ideas?

You would be doing a 301 redirect from your old site to new domain correct? That is why it won't last that long. Google will update the PR sometime, and you won't be a PR4 anymore for that site since you're doing a redirect.

Originally Posted by dburk

Hi Chris,

Oh... perhaps iAmNameLess also thought you still intended to redirect your traffic. If your website remains unchanged then I see no reason why your linkjuice would change.

I don't understand? Redirecting the traffic would come with the 301 redirect...? Maybe I am missing something here. I thought he was wanting to redirect an older domain to a new domain. So... if someone went to olddomain.com they would automatically be forwarded to newdomain.com so that would cancel out any PR from olddomain.com once the PR updates again, which might not ever happen.

[iAmNameLess]

Ah... I see... keeping it as a blog would still potentially lose your PR if you have a ton of outgoing links!!

All in all.. I would consider doing a 301 redirect to get some of the link juice... BUT... I think you're placing too much importance on PR. I don't believe PR is as important as it was a year ago.

[Chris Sweeney]

Got it, thanks again for your input guys. I guess the only way for me to know for sure is to try out some different things. I'll keep the thread posted if anything awesome (or anything really bad) happens!