wesmaster - 8:09 pm on Sep 8, 2010 (gmt 0)

Choke,
In the past I have found success with buying existing websites that already rank well for my target keywords (and might have my target keywords in their domain) and 301 redirecting them to my existing website (that ranked "OK", but not as well, and does not contain my target keywords in the domain) for the same keywords. I basically jumped to their position in the SERPs once Google accepted the 301. In fact, once I even "rented" a guys domain (301 redirected to mine) for 3 months in order to accomplish this. I jumped to his spot in the SERPs, his website disappeared, then months later after his domain was back to hosting his website he showed back up, but I remained pages in front of his domain, on the first page. And years later I'm now #1 for my keywords.

Now, it's been a few years since I've done this, but I'm doing this on another website right now (just paid for the domain/website) and will be able to report if it still works. But, I'm being cautious and moving the domain/website content to my server for 90 days, adding a banner ad w/ link, and will only then 301 redirect after 90 days is up. My only reason for doing this is because I want to lessen my risk in case Google has changed how they handle such redirects. I can get some valid traffic through the banner ad for 90 days then take the risk, probably cutting my financial risk in half. I'm also having the original website owner "move" the website in Google Webmaster console to my domain after the 90 days is up. We'll see how this works out.