Multiple Domains and Microsoft Server

[chanda7]

I am very new at this, so I need a great deal of help. I'm doing a SEO consultation for a company that has about 5 domain names, one main site. I've found in the archives here about how you either need to have all the domains resolved to one IP or you need to have the secondary domains do a 301 redirect.

I have two questions:
1) How do I figure out how their domains are set up in the first place to see if it even needs to be fixed? If you load the page of a secondary domain, it does something so quickly you can't see it and then goes to an index page. All the files are being pulled off the same IP as the main domain according to the logs but I don't know if that is the same thing as having the domain resolved to the same IP (I suspect it isn't).

2) If it needs to be altered, how do I tell them to fix it? I've seen some instructions here for Unix-based servers but not Microsoft. Or is it something their web host has to do?

Thanks for your patience.

Chanda

[TheNige]

There are a few ways.

1) You can do it at the DNS level where you can have domain look-ups on the DNS server forwarded to the domain of your choice.

2) You can do a 301 redirect on the MS Webserver. In IIS (Internet Information Services) you would set up a website for each domain, then set the option to forward permanently to another URL (the main domain).

3) Using host headers for each domain to point to the same site (although this method will show the same site, it will use the different domain names.)

[Krapulator]

Do you have access to the server?

[chanda7]

I have someone who has access to the server for me.