Multiple Domains Pointing to the Same IP Address

How Do Search Engines Treat Multiple Domains That Point to Same IP Address?

[dmarbiz]

I have a client that has two domains (Company.com and CompanyName.com) pointing to the same IP address. The content on both sites is identical. However, I have found that the Search Engines are treating them very differently...

Google has a total of 475 URLs indexed for Company.com - but only 15 URLs indexed for CompanyName.com. And, Yahoo is showing a total of 257 URLs indexed for Company.com with only 30 URLs indexed for CompanyName.com. Why is there such a disparity here?

Any advice I could get on this topic would be appreciated... How is this type of setup (multiple domains pointing to same IP address) indexed by the SE's? Will this type of setup have an adverse effect on the SEO efforts for this client? Are the pages from the CompanyName.com site being treated as duplicates and thereby penalized by Google & Yahoo?

[Marcia]

Do they have separate hosting, or is one just pointed to the other?

[dmarbiz]

Hello Marcia. One is just pointed to the other...

[sublime1]

This is a common situation (a notable case is www.domain.com and domain.com). The general recommendation is to pick one of the domains as primary and cause requests to the other to be redirected with an http 301 status to the primary. The 301 status ("moved permanently") is honored by spiders.

This is most easily accomplished by configuring the web servers. With Apache, you can create a Rewrite Rule (in fact ther Apache Rewrite Guide has an example of "canonicalized hostnames").

[Mr Bo Jangles]

Do they have separate hosting, or is one just pointed to the other?

Why did you ask this Marcia? Can you explain further the ramifications if it's one as distinct to the other.

Like many others, I have registered a number of domains that are related to my main domain, but because of fear of damaging my SE results, I have 'uncoupled' them (stopped them pointing) to my main domain - and they're just wasted.

I'd be interested to know if anyone can advise a useful and safe way to apply these 'related' domains to aid the 'main' one.

[hutcheson]

Um, how shall I put this?

The general recommendation is to pick one of the domains as primary and cause requests to the other to be redirected with an http 301 status to the primary. The 301 status ("moved permanently") is honored by spiders.

This is most easily accomplished by configuring the web servers. With Apache, you can create a Rewrite Rule (in fact ther Apache Rewrite Guide has an example of "canonicalized hostnames").

Yeah, that works.

[sublime1]

hutcheson - couldn't have said it better myself :-)

[Mr Bo Jangles]

Um, yes, well when one says "the generally accepted ...."
does this mean - "well I've read it around the traps, and I'll regurgitate it here, but I've no idea whether it's actually 100% safe"?

I've got these 'sub'domains on the same server as Marcia mentioned, and simply had them 'pointed' at my principal domain - so that's why I was asking her why she asked the question.

And generally, if one simply has these 'related' domains e.g. californiafriedwidgets.com
sanfranciscofriedwidgets.com

'pointing' to your main site: friedwidgets.com

and you have it like that because you're too scared of making the 'sub'domains actual sites in their own right because of duplicate content penalty, do you get *any* benefit at all to your main site by 'pointing' these 'related' domains at all? Or should you just let them expire?

[dmarbiz]

[This is a common situation (a notable case is www.domain.com and domain.com). The general recommendation is to pick one of the domains as primary and cause requests to the other to be redirected with an http 301 status to the primary. The 301 status ("moved permanently") is honored by spiders.]

Sublime1, your advice regarding a 301 redirect seems logical to me. But, what effect would this action have on the Search Engines? Would they eventually index the same amount of pages for CompanyName.com as they do for Company.com? Or, would I begin to see Google and Yahoo only indexing the URLs from the domain I choose to be the primary domain?

Also, I understand that Yahoo is still having problems with 301 redirects. And, they don't seem to be in any rush to remedy the situation either... Is there perhaps a solution that can be geared toward Yahoo that doesn't involve a 301 redirect?

I'd like to be reasonably sure that whatever solution I choose will have a positive effect on the SE's if that is possible...

[sublime1]

dmarbiz -- we have observed 301 redirects working with Google. I cannot comment on how Yahoo responds.

Perhaps I was too equivocal in my first post: The purpose of the HTTP 301 status code is to inform the user agent of a new location for a URL. It's not a trick or anything, it's the "right" way to handle the kind of situation you have described. I can't imagine that Yahoo doesn't somehow deal with it correctly, although how quickly they update their indexes is a whole different matter.

Perhaps someone else can comment specifically on Yahoo.

[hutcheson]

I can't imagine Yahoo getting this wrong.

It's sort of like asking for recommendations on proper use of a screwdriver. You can, I suppose, hold the metal bit and thrust the tip of the handle at your nail, but

HTTP is designed to be used a particular way. And "301 redirect" is, to force a metaphor, the particular screwdriver blade designed for the problem you have.

Does it work? It has to work for any screw head, um, spider, designed to be used on the internet. Does it work for Google and the ODP? I know for a fact that it does.

Does it work for Yahoo? I can't imagine that Yahoo's programmers are so incompetant as to not handle that correctly. If it doesn't work, it's Yahoo's problem, not yours; and it will be happening to millions of sites, not just yours.

[Abdelrhman Fahmy]

Google and Yahoo using (302)!
check Server Header for gogle.com , gooogle.com, yahooo.com

[Marcia]

Yahoo and Google won't have any problems with 302's but we will.

What happens is that the domain that's being redirected will come up for a search for the URL (if it's in the index at all) with the listing having the title & description snippet from the site it's pointing to. I just looked at another one a few hours ago.

With one site I'm now stuck with that's got just such a situation I wasn't told about, the redirected page won't rank anyplace. There are links to it, but the PR isn't going to the page it's redirected to. NO Google rankings, and if the 302 is changed to a 301 for the sake of Google, it will cause a problem with Yahoo.

hutcheson, Yahoo is having problems with 301's; Tim has said over in the Yahoo forum that they're working on it. Plenty of people are suffering with this and there's no telling when it'll be remedied.

[dmarbiz]

Many thanks to all in this thread for your responses. The information you've all added has definitely shed some light on the situation for me. And, I now understand how the 301 redirect would work (and the effect it would have on SE's) if we choose to go that route with this client.

However, after sharing this info with the client, I doubt that they will be choosing the 301 redirect option at this time... They want the multiple domains to have more paths leading into their site. And, they now realize that using the 301 redirect for the CompanyName.com domain would eventually lead to none of the CompanyName.com pages being indexed by Google (Yahoo would probably just index the same # of pages for the time being).

So, I'm hoping to get some advice regarding a few more questions regarding this situation...

1) If we choose to leave the 2 domains as is, how will the two domains pointing to the same IP address affect indexing and ranking in the SE's for both sites?

2) Why is there such a huge difference in the number of pages currently indexed? (Google is currently indexing 475 pages for Company.com & 15 pages for CompanyName.com - Yahoo has 412 pages indexed for Company.com & 15 pages for CompanyName.com)

3) Will these 2 sites be treated as duplicates by Google & Yahoo and then penalized for it? Perhaps Google & Yahoo are already treating them as dupes?

[sublime1]

The prevailing theory is that having near-exact duplicates will not hurt, but any SE with a duplicate filter will remove all but one copy (which one survives is probably something simple, like the most recently updated or something). So, just having another domain name for the same content is harmless. I am quite sure it does no good, either, however, as we inadvertantly had this problem a while back and noticed for a few days that both instances of the page were indexed, but as quickly one went away.

There is a lot of talk up here about duplicate penalties. But while it may be that Google is using a more clever means of identifying duplicates, I have yet to hear anyone present information that would lead one to conclude that such a penalty actually exists. Absence of benefit, yes; penalty, don't think so.