After moving a client’s site to our server, his Google ranking dropped from page one for all his top 3 search terms to page 8, page 3, page 6. After a while we tracked it down as probably due to a canonical domain issue. My site: search on the URL showed the usual www.example.com form of the domain was not indexed in Google! Damn near swallowed my tongue. The only SERPs that were showing were from the non-www form of his domain. Before, his site always ranked well-- but for the www.example.com form.
I found out that the former Web host kept the domain under his control but he pointed the Web hosting to our server. This workaround totally surprised me, but our now-vacationing DNS guy apparently went with it at the time. My not being knowledgeable enough about DNS stuff, I thought the client’s site was still hosted with a large famous web hosting company, because the nameservers record in WhoIs showed their nameservers. Not so. He said he pointed the hosting to our servers.
We’ve never had these canonical domain problems here. Our canonical domain is always the www form. This is the first occurrence, so our tendency so far is to blame the other guy. The only trouble is, we DNS rookies here who are left here without adult supervision don’t know what to ask the guy who pointed the domain to our servers-- so we can find out who did it.
We looked in our DNS Made Easy for that client and found that the “hard code” box wasn’t checked for the 301 redirect. Everything was set up to 301 redirect the non-www to the www, but that box was unchecked. I don’t know if that was the problem or not. We’re still waiting on the DNS to refresh to see if that makes both forms resolve to the www form.
My question is, who do you suspect dropped the ball on this—the other guy or whoever here who set up the DNS Made Easy on this hosting? Sorry, but our remaining staff don’t know enough about DNS to tell the client what happened.
BTW, I went into Google Webmaster Tools and set the preferred form to the www.example.com. They still suggest to make sure the 301 is set up. So this apparently only helps them with SERPs.
Did it redirect to example.com/page or did it work as expected (i.e. display the page with the www url)? If it worked/works as expected, then the fault may be with Google.
Kaled.
Another obvious question...
Is the site properly indexed (and uptodate) on other search engines - if it is then that further strengthens the theory that Google is at fault.
Kaled.
When searching both Yahoo and Bing the following happens:
1) The site appears in its accustomed rankings for top search terms. No changes.
2) The www and non-www forms both redirect to http://www.example.com.
2) Site: shows that the www form is indexed and up to date for all pages.
I'm guessing now, but either
a) Google has processed the canonical domain issue before Yahoo and MSN have, or
b) The problem is exclusively Google's and hopefully my going into Google Webmaster Tools and changing the "preferred domain name" as Google calls it. Hope it's OK to paste in a G Webmaster Tools URL: See [google.com...]
I found out that the former Web host kept the domain under his control but he pointed the Web hosting to our server.He didn't point the webhosting he just changed the nameservers in the domain name to point to the new IP address this is common pratice and not the issue.
I think the issue is the site wasn't moved properly and you can verify if the steps were followed from Matts post.
I use dnsmade easy and wasn't aware you could perfom a 301 from the control panel I always set up both domain names and do a server side 301 to the www version.
I don't know if it's the real cause, but the tech people at DNS Made Easy say that the problem was that the old host left the nameservers assigned to his server. DNS Made Easy could see where we entered the info into their system but saw that the domain registrar still pointing the domain to different nameservers.
He said, "Any http redirections you set up in our system won't propagate across the internet until you change your DNS settings at the registrar to point to our servers."
We're reviewing all our policies. It can be a problem when you don't know what you don't know.
Example I own a domain registered with expertsrs I move my website to a new IP address expertsrs doesn't change the nameservers to point to the new server I go into my domain admin area and change them to point to the new server.
From what I am reading in your post the site really hasn't moved and is still hosted at the old host.
Have you tried pinging the site to see what IP the website is on?
The guy with the admin control over the domain account has cooperated and has changed the nameservers to ours. Now both the www and non-www redirect to the full http://www.example.com. That straightened out in just a few hours.
Our problem was always with the guy who used to host our client's site through a virtual host at a big third party company.
He kept the nameservers set to the third party hosting company but said he pointed the IP to ours. Wouldn't do the right thing and simply change the freaking nameservers.
I still don't fully understand the intricacies of DNS. But now we'll see if the client's page 1 rankings come back. That's the core issue.
The Webmaster with control of the domain changed the nameservers from his to ours at 3pm Eastern of Thursday.
Sometime during the overnight hours of 19 July -- 20 July the sitemap of the www form appeared in a site: search.
At about 9 am on 20 July www.example.com/index.asp appeared in the site: search.
So we'll see if the clients' former page 1 rankings that were based on the www form come back, and if so, when.
We'll see if the
