Success in Changing Domain Without Losing Positioning

Changing domain can have a serious impact on organic traffic and is usually not advisable from the perspective of SEO. This is because each domain name is linked to several metrics and characteristics such as relevance, authority, seniority, etc. In this article, I will explain the risks of changing the domain and describe in detail the steps you must follow to change the domain without losing positioning and minimizing traffic losses.

Steps to Change Domain Without Losing Positioning

1. Register or acquire the new domain. The first thing you have to do is acquire a new domain. Keep in mind that the domain TLD (.com, .com.MX, .mx, etc.) is often used as a location signal; using a different TLD from your old domain may affect the ranking of your website. You must be very careful if you buy an old domain. There is always the risk that the domain is prohibited by some search engines. Investigate a bit about domain history, check previous WHOIS records, check if the domain has pages indexed in the search engines, use Archive.org to see if the website has old content. Add the new domain to the Google index, as well as Google and Bing Webmaster Tools in order to look at your statistics and see if you have received warnings about those websites. If you believe that the domain has been banned due to spam, submitting a reconsideration request can be a good idea before transferring your website.
2. Load a "Coming Soon" or "Under Construction" page uploading an HTML page with the message "coming soon" to your new domain a few weeks before changing domain allows search engines to crawl and index the new website. As a result, placing some content on your page and mentioning that this will be the location of the new site helps search engines to detect that your new domain is a real website.
3. Transfer some parts of your old web page to the new domain possible, do not suddenly transfer all the pages of your website to the new location, but try to move small segments little by little. For example, you might want to assign a subdomain first and check if the transition was a success. Then, a few weeks later, after validating that your positioning has not been severely affected, proceed to the rest of your website. Start with the section that receives the least amount of traffic and then focuses on the others. Although this step is optional, I recommend it, as it can help to avoid serious problems of SEO positioning.
4. Change everything to the new domain the next step is to upload all the pages, images, files from your website to the new domain. If you decide to change the structure, folders or URL's in the new site, make sure to write down the changes, you will need them for the next step.
5. Redirect old sections to new ones once you upload all the content to the new domain you will have to redirect the old domain to the new one. Keep in mind that this must be done page by page, which means that ALL pages of the old domain should be redirected to the new URL of the page in the new domain. Assign each page to the new appropriate URL and not only reorient them all to the main page. I recommend the use of redirects 301 because this way you can get to the new website most of the indicators, features, and statistics such as PageRank, inbound links, etc. However, keep in mind that redirects 301 should be used for permanent changes. If you plan to undo this change in the future, you should use the 302 or temporary redirects. However, I must tell you that this type of redirect does not pass PageRank, backlinks, or any other indicator to the new landing pages.
6. Use the change of address tool in Google Webmaster tools after changing the domain, register the old and new domain in the webmaster tools of Google, tell Google that the previous domain has been transferred to a new address. Google understands clearly and will take you into account to recover your positioning.
7. Update of important links although the 301 redirects are supposed to pass most of the PageRank and other metrics, I recommend that you try to update the most important backlinks that point to your old website. Of course, you do not have to contact all the webmasters that link to your website, only the most important and reliable ones. To get a list of all the sites that link to your website, you can use the Xenu tool or Google Webmaster Tools.
8. Be patient and stay informed. Change of domain without losing positioning is one of the most significant differences that exist on the internet. You must be very patient and make sure you take the time to test everything, down to the smallest detail, before transferring your entire website. You should also anticipate the renewal of your old domain and not let it expire until your new domain gets all the positioning. This way you will not lose traffic, backlinks, or PageRank.

If you follow these recommendations to the letter, you will ensure a change of domain without losing positioning. Besides, you will not only reduce organic traffic losses, but you could improve your positioning. Do not forget that you should never change your domain unless you have no other option.