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Best Way to Change Website?

by Ebizer
7 replies
  • SEO
    • |
Hi All,

My website (Writing-Etc.com) has been online since 1998. For 10 years, I used it to promote my website copywriting services. About 2 years ago, I gave up copywriting and changed the website to an "online success center" where I promote various IM products/services.

I now want to completely change the focus of the site to attract book writers (and readers). Sounds easy enough, right? Just make the changes and republish the site.

The problem is, I don't want to get rid of the IM material that's there now because it's still bringing in a few bucks.

So what do I do?

I considered just getting a new domain name and transferring everything, but this doesn't appeal to me because (1) I've been unable to find a suitable name, and (2) it would mean 'starting over' with the search engines and the existing site has a fairly decent ranking on Google.

I've also considered moving all the IM pages to a subdomain (internet.writing-etc.com), but not sure how I would redirect visitors.

Any ideas/suggestions, Warriors?

Thanks,
Nan
#change #website
  • Profile picture of the author paulgl
    Don't trash content that makes money.

    An easy (and good) solution is to start a whole new website.

    You could just redo the main index page, and branch off in
    2 directions keeping all content in place where it is.

    The problem with that, is that now you have muddled the site.

    Any change to the site to do two separate and distinct things
    with it is going to muddle up the works.

    Keep the site intact. Keep that cash rolling in. Get whole new
    website for your new venture and put a link on the main page of the old one.

    However...

    You could analyze what page your visitors land on the most. If it's
    the index page, you have got to keep the site intact. If all traffic is
    going to individual pages first, then you may indeed be able to branch off
    in some way, keeping all content exactly where it is. Don't let it become
    orphaned or it will lose PR.

    Personally, I like the adjunct domain and website better. They could feed
    off of each other. Forget the subdomain.

    Paul
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    • Profile picture of the author Ebizer
      Thanks Paul!

      I agree that a 'new' website is the best solution, BUT ... I would really like to use my existing domain name for the new content since it's so appropriate. I did try to find a suitable name (for the new material) but, as usual, everything worth anything is taken. <sigh>

      I really didn't think the subdomain idea was practical, but wanted to throw it out there just in case.

      What if I were to move the IM material to another domain and do a 'temporary' redirect, along with a 'moved' note on the index page of the current site? Then, after a suitable period (six months?), do the revamp of the writing-etc site?

      Nan
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  • Profile picture of the author Ross Dalangin
    It's very easy to do. You can still use that domain for your new website by just just copying the homepage and use it to the new sub-domain. For example, create a new sub-domain like internetmarketing.Writing-Etc.com and copy the homepage then saved it as index.html. Upload that new index.html to internetmarketing.Writing-Etc.com sub-domain.

    Don't remove all the files from the domain Writing-Etc.com except the index.html or index.php inside that folder because it will be used by internetmarketing.Writing-Etc.com sub-domain. After that you can upload the new set of files for your new design or new concept.

    Ross
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    • Profile picture of the author Ebizer
      So Ross ...

      Are you saying the only page I would move to the subdomain is the current home page and save it as index.html? What about the links that are on this page? When clicked, would they take visitors to the appropriate page on the main domain?

      If this is what you mean, then all I would have to do is design a 'new' index page for the new site concept, right?

      How would moving the IM index page to a subdomain affect search engine results?

      Nan
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      • Profile picture of the author paulgl
        The problem is muddling up the content that makes money
        buy re-doing the url structure.

        You want to keep old content and new creation on the same
        website. That's normally the opposite of what people want.

        Seriously, consider how much money you are making from the old
        stuff. Is it worth keeping? If it is, then don't overwrite or delete any
        of the old content, just redo the main page and put a link to another
        page where the old content is found. I would not do a subdomain.
        Just my preference. It's easier to maintain directories, yet I know you won't
        really maintain the old stuff.

        If your current homepage has all the links to your IM stuff, and
        you move those links to a subdomain, you then lose the PR of what
        your main page gave them. The subdomain is now treated as a new
        domain. And you would do index.php, not html. You certainly would
        not want to put the new site in a subdomain, as that is just the same
        as a new domain.

        After looking at your site, it appears some content is semi related to
        what you want to change it to. Here's another shot as to how I would
        do it. I would keep the left column as is, just making the newer links
        appear at the top. Label the old links with something like, Other Resources
        or something. I would then change the copy to what the new site is.
        That way, you keep everything intact, links stay safe. All newly created
        content gets link at the top of the left column. You would want to keep
        some links up at the top, about me, blog, etc.

        But hey, your choice, Good luck.

        Paul
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        • Profile picture of the author Ebizer
          Ross, Paul ...

          Thanks so much!

          Not sure how I'll proceed, but I appreciate the suggestions. It's more than I had when I started this posting. :-)

          I'll mull over everything and hopefully come up with a solution that works to my best advantage.

          Success to you both!

          Nan
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  • Profile picture of the author Ross Dalangin
    Of course because I feel you're not using a CMS like wordpress in it. Even you're using wordpress or any other CMS, there's still a solution for that. Be sure to have a backup before you start changing something. Let me know when you started changing it. PM me when you encounter a problem with this.

    You'll have to give backlinks to the new sub-domain to let search engines crawl it. Don't worry about the pages because it is still there. The only problem is the homepage but if you give backlinks and traffic to it then it wouldn't be a problem anymore.

    Ross
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