Backlinks: With or without "www"?

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This has been bugging me lately. When building backlinks, do you guys include "www" in your website's URL?

I know that Google does index the non www version as well as the www version, so my guess is that it treats both URLs as seperate sites. If that is really the case, which version would it be more advisable to build backlinks for?
#search engine optimization #backlinks #www
  • I don't think it matters, as long as you stick with one and keep building backlinks with that one way.
  • You are correct in that Google, and the other search engines, certainly do treat hxxp://www.mysite.com and hxxp://mysite.com as two completely different domains (however most browsers will redirect one to the other so you would still get there using IE or firefox for instance).

    You should be building backlinks to whatever you have your domain set as (with or with the "www"). For instance in Wordpress, you can change this in the General Settings of the admin panel. Personally, I always set my sites up with "www" as I view that as more "normal", but I knoiw others who always use without the "www". It doesn't matter which you choose, but you need to choose one and go with it.

    If you have links built to hxxp://www.mysite.com, but your domain is actually set up as hxxp://mysite.com, those links generally will not help your site in either SERP ranking or Pagerank. Note that if you have some straggler backlinks going to the wrong "www" version, you can set up a 301 redirect (which Google treats as a permanent redirect) in your site's .htaccess file. The 301 redirect will redirect all of the links going to the wrong version to the right version. You won't get 100% of the full power from the links, but you'll get most of it.

    Tom

    • [4] replies
    • Thanks Tom, this answered my question and has really cleared things up.

      I'm glad I'm on the right track, that is, building backlinks with the www in the URL, as my sites are all configured with the www in them.
    • This is an excellent detail Tom.
      It is the small things in life that make up the total sum.


      • [1] reply
    • This is interesting. Presently, I have a 301 redirect (.htaccess style) from the root directory of my domain to the URL of the portal page, which is dynamically generated off a PHP index page in a subdirectory. I asked in here a couple days ago if that would be a problem, but nobody answered. Since I made that change, I haven't seen any difference in my SERP ranking on Google. 'Course, it's only been just under a week, and there's no telling what will happen in the future. Most of the external links to this site, though, go to the forum anway, so maybe it's not a big deal at all.
      • [1] reply
    • Many thanks for this explanation Tom. I've been building my own backlinks for a while and was using Traffictravis to monitor their effectiveness. I was beginning to wonder if my work was worthwhile as TT didn't appear to be picking up any new backlinks. After reading through this thread, I ran another TT report, minus the "www" in my url, and lo and behold there were most of my new high PR backlinks showing.
  • One tip. If you are starting SEO for an existing domain, check the domain in Google with the "site:domain.com" command and check the backlinks for both versions in Yahoo Site Explorer (or other backlink tool) to see which has the most.

    If there are insignificant backlinks, I use the version indexed in Google. If there are significant backlinks, I use that version.
  • Like everybody said in this thread it really doesn't matter with or without www the only concerns in this matter is to have quality backlinks whenever what the domains is the important is how do you optimized well your site.
  • Very interesting. I have 53 pages in google indexed with the www but 178 indexed without the www

    So, does it not matter, or when using back links should i skip out on the www?
  • Banned
    [DELETED]
    • [1] reply
    • Well, if you go without the www it runs without that as well... if you go to the site www all links in that site are www but when you go without then all the links are without.

      I have more pages indexed without, should I just go without, or what? I'm not sure how to 301 redirect, I am quite new at this. Will this make much of a difference?
  • The "www." is a subdomain, so Google views "www.mydomain.com" as being independent from "mydomain.com", just as it would view any other subdomain.

    What I normally do on my sites, using a 301 redirect, is forward all visitors to "non-www." URLs.

    This also has the added benefit of rerouting any backlink juice and PageRank to the "correct" URLs, whenever someone happens to build a link to my sites utilising the "www."

    My advice: pick an URL format, and stick with it. Build all your links accordingly, and perhaps consider setting up a 301 redirect to force people to utilise the correct/preferred format, and to reroute any link-juice/PR to the correct destination URL.
    • [ 1 ] Thanks
  • Thank you, I use a joomla site so it wasn't very easy to accomplish. Had to add a string in the configuration php file in order to get it to work, but now it is working. Thank you very much for the information. I have a lot of learning to do, and I think a lot will come from here!
  • Wow....thank you for this info. I've been mixing my links between www and non-www as I thought that looked more natural....so much for that!
    • [1] reply
    • Exactly, I was curious when I noticed the non www had more pages indexed but less back links, when my www had more back links and less pages indexed. So I was curious and did a google search, found this thread. Glad I came across this.
  • You don't have to worry about www or non-www while building links...in fact you will not always have control over how people link to your site...so the best solutions is to use 301 permanent redirect of all the versions of url to preferred or canonical url...Goggle will accumulate all the link juice to that chosen version
  • For me I do include the "www" so that I can make sure that when you click the link it will lead you directly to the website that you have made back link.
  • Just choose one.... Although I prefer no www as its easier to remember!
  • PS I once had thousands of links pointing to my http://www. address, and then we switched companies and it just so happened that the default setting for our new shopping cart host was strictly to the http:// with no 301, and my rankings dropped like a stone. Had to reconfigure my webmaster tools account to specify the http://www. as my preference. Proof this stuff does matter.
    • [1] reply
    • I got a message from Google on Webmaster tools asking me to verify ownership of the non-www version of the site. I verified ownership, to which Google merged both sites into the www version. Google then suggested I do a 301 redirect, which I did and now Google Webmaster tools is merging everything into the www version.

      Here's the problem... Since I've done this, my keywords completely been destroyed. My top keywords are now random words like 'contact', 'press', 'email' etc and my top keywords which were at 85-100% are now in the 35-47& range.

      Anyone know how this happened?? The 301 redirects are working perfectly and Google is linking both versions of the URL to the www version, so why the messed up keywords??

      Also, if I check for searches in Google Webmaster tools, my original keywords are still showing the most searches, but I've gone from page 1 to page 2 or 3 for most searches -- I assume because of the keyword problem.

      Finally, if I search for my site in Google Keyword tool, the results are all my original keywords as well -- so why is Webmaster Tools showing random words for my keywords since the 301?
  • Exactly what tom said, use the address that your domain has and do not link to the other variation, as it will count as two different domains and you will be splitting links.
  • Using the exact address would be a better idea than using without "www" and redirecting.
  • It doesn't matter that you can put www or not google can get backlink automatically.
  • You can use the canonical tag to redirect the non www to the www or vise versa. It doesn't matter which you choose or you can claim both versions on Google Webmaster tools. This way your links could go to either version of your site. A natural link profile usually includes links to both version of a site so it's important to point one at the other.
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    Backlinks: With or without "www"?

    This has been bugging me lately. When building backlinks, do you guys include "www" in your website's URL? I know that Google does index the non www version as well as the www version, so my guess is that it treats both URLs as seperate sites. If that is really the case, which version would it be more advisable to build backlinks for?