Redirecting many domain names to one

302 redirects

[SirTalksalot]

Hi,

I'm just wandering how I do this? I currently have several domain names pointing to the same site, and I don't want to get penalised for it. I've been told I want to use 302 (or was it 306?) redirecting.

How do I do this correctly?

[encyclo]

You should always use a 301 Permanent Redirect rather than a 302. The precise method depends on your server setup, but there are a few examples listed in the following thread:

Redirects For Fun And Profit [webmasterworld.com]

[apprentice]

I was just about to start a new discussion about that! What I want to ask may actually be too straight forward to a point towards been silly - but here I go: Consider having a 301 in place from www.example1.com -> www.example.com. The latter is the primary domain where the website is actually hosted and the one that is used to link to. Submitting www.example.com to the key SEs is obvious - however should example1 also be submitted (even though is completely empty and is just used for the 301)? Would it be indexed and retained in that index even though it probably won't have any inbound links? To give an example of what I mean, it is often common to see government or corporate websites purchasing several domain names just to establish an authority on that name. I.e. they might purchase BlueWidgets.com even though it will only be used for redirecting to bw.com. In such case, I have seen (at least in Google), BlueWidgets.com been listed without a title or description. So is it worth submitting such a 301-enabled domain? Apologies for been slightly off topic.

Regards.

[jdMorgan]

The correct response would be for the search engine to follow the 301 redirect, and to use the primary domain (the domain being redirected to) in the search results listings. In most cases, they will, although they sometimes have problems caused by algorthmic attempts to save uninformed Webmasters from themselves and from others.

In this case, we can only implement the correct solution, and wait for them to tweak their algorithms. For the past two years at least, there has been *much* discussion here about 302s being used -- intentionally or unintentionally -- to "hijack" pages, causing the redirecting URL to appear to be the correct URL for the content of the page that it redirects to. Google is only now getting this under control, and Yahoo fixed it only last year. A search on WebmasterWorld for "302 hijacking" will turn up several days' worth of reading.

There is no benefit either to "submitting" a redirected domain/URL, or to "submitting" *any* URL which has no incoming links; Notice that the Search Engine Submission forum here at WebmasterWorld is now deprecated, since "search engine submission" went out with the 1990s. Search engines now follow links; no incoming links, no significant or sustained search results positions for your pages.

The purpose of purchasing those alternate domain names is for "branding", for type-in traffic, and to prevent others from purchasing them and trading on your good name -- domains are cheaper than legal cases. So, you purchase them to capture traffic from people "guessing" or typing in your domain incorrectly, and to preserve your brand name.

Whenever you have a question about the correct server response for a given situation, go to the source -- the HTTP protocol specificiation [w3.org]. It will confirm that as encyclo posted, a 301 is the correct response, and a 302 may cause you problems.

Jim

[apprentice]

Thanks for the response and for the resources Jim! That answers what I was looking for and more besides.

Regards.

[wmuser]

You should use 301 Permanent Redirect

[SirTalksalot]

Thank you guys, this is just what I was looking for. Good on ya! :)