If I change my URL, not my host IP, will my traffic drop?

4 replies
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Hello all,
I need to re-brand my website as I've been informed of a trademark infringement and don't have the money to fight it in court. I will be staying with my current provider and they will configure my Magento based web shop and setup a 301 re-direct, so that when someone types in the old URL it will automatically change to the new URL.

I have heard horror stories about peoples traffic and ranking disappearing down the plug hole when URL's change. Would this be the case for me even though the new URL will effectively be pointing to the same IP address as the old URL?

Sorry for the long winded question but my URL change over date is in a couple of days and I'm already starting to panic. This could mean the end of my business.

Thanks in advance.
#change #drop #host #traffic #url
  • Profile picture of the author paulgl
    You don't actually fight in court.

    You keep saying url. Do you mean domain?

    If you are in trouble over the domain, how on earth
    would you be able to keep the domain active via
    301, type in, forwarding, etc.? That makes no sense.

    Infringement is infringement. But they cannot just
    take your domain. Your host might shut you down,
    but that's another matter. In fact, if there was
    any worry about infringement, the domain would be
    taken offline by your host (maybe), if they were
    scared.

    Since your host is allowing you keep your domain active,
    the whole infringment thing falls apart.

    As far as urls, I have never heard of anyone getting in
    trouble for using a trademark in a url.

    Paul
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    • Profile picture of the author punksluck
      Thanks for the response but it hasn't answered my question. Maybe I wasn't clear.

      I am re-branding my website as I have an agreement between myself and the other company, to trade under a different name. As I'm re-branding it naturally makes sense for me to also change my domain name (Uniform Resource Locator) as I want my brand to be consistent on my website.

      My question is; will I experience a huge drop in traffic and ranking if I keep the website on the same host server and IP address, but just re-direct the old web address to the new one? or will it not make any difference either way?
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      • Profile picture of the author JSProjects
        Originally Posted by punksluck View Post

        Thanks for the response but it hasn't answered my question. Maybe I wasn't clear.

        I am re-branding my website as I have an agreement between myself and the other company, to trade under a different name. As I'm re-branding it naturally makes sense for me to also change my domain name (Uniform Resource Locator) as I want my brand to be consistent on my website.

        My question is; will I experience a huge drop in traffic and ranking if I keep the website on the same host server and IP address, but just re-direct the old web address to the new one? or will it not make any difference either way?
        Best thing you can do is a 301 to your new domain. Any traffic that goes to your previous domain will be sent to your new one. And your backlinks will still pass some link juice to the new domain.

        That said, I'd start building fresh backlinks as soon as possible to the new domain since, I'm guessing, you'll eventually not have control over the previous one?
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  • Profile picture of the author micksss
    Sounds like it's the way it has to be... so just make sure you setup your 301 redirect(s) correctly, add fresh content, and keep doing what you were doing before this whole mess.
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