Q and A: How do I get search engines to recognize my main domain from the alias domains?
Dear Kalena...
I took out several domains that all pointed to one primary domain. A year on I have changed the content of my site completely and so the 'pointing domains' are totally irrelevant. Now however Yahoo have dropped my primary domain in the search results and only include one of the irrelevant domains. Could you advise how I would go about having the alias domains dropped and my primary domain reinstated with Yahoo?
Ade
Kalena's Answer:
Dear Ade
A client of mine is facing the identical situation right now, but on Google. How big an issue this is really depends on your definition of "pointing" domains. If you merely have the alias domains on the same IP address as your main site, that may not suffice. Does your primary domain have a Google cache? If it doesn't, then Google and or Yahoo may be assuming one of your alias domains is your primary site and ignoring all other domains.
You should park all the aliases to the main domain in your hosting panel so that when the aliases are typed in to the browser URL field, they redirect straight to the primary domain or show the content being cached from the primary domain. When you look at the Google cache for your alias domains, they should each show the message "This is Google's cache for [primary domain]". If they don't, you haven't got the DNS set up properly to point to your primary domain.
The alternative is to use manual 301 redirects from the aliases to the main domain. Your .htaccess file will then instruct search bots of the preferred domain and the others should no longer be indexed. It might take a week or two for the search engines to make the connection and index the primary domain, but it will happen.
You can help things along by creating a sitemap for your primary domain and uploading it to Google's Webmaster Tools and Yahoo Site Explorer. I recommend using the free XML Sitemaps Generator to create your sitemaps.
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I took out several domains that all pointed to one primary domain. A year on I have changed the content of my site completely and so the 'pointing domains' are totally irrelevant. Now however Yahoo have dropped my primary domain in the search results and only include one of the irrelevant domains. Could you advise how I would go about having the alias domains dropped and my primary domain reinstated with Yahoo?
Ade
Kalena's Answer:
Dear Ade
A client of mine is facing the identical situation right now, but on Google. How big an issue this is really depends on your definition of "pointing" domains. If you merely have the alias domains on the same IP address as your main site, that may not suffice. Does your primary domain have a Google cache? If it doesn't, then Google and or Yahoo may be assuming one of your alias domains is your primary site and ignoring all other domains.
You should park all the aliases to the main domain in your hosting panel so that when the aliases are typed in to the browser URL field, they redirect straight to the primary domain or show the content being cached from the primary domain. When you look at the Google cache for your alias domains, they should each show the message "This is Google's cache for [primary domain]". If they don't, you haven't got the DNS set up properly to point to your primary domain.
The alternative is to use manual 301 redirects from the aliases to the main domain. Your .htaccess file will then instruct search bots of the preferred domain and the others should no longer be indexed. It might take a week or two for the search engines to make the connection and index the primary domain, but it will happen.
You can help things along by creating a sitemap for your primary domain and uploading it to Google's Webmaster Tools and Yahoo Site Explorer. I recommend using the free XML Sitemaps Generator to create your sitemaps.
Add to: Digg | Del.icio.us | Ma.gnolia | Reddit
Subscribe via: Yahoo Feeds | Feedburner | Technorati | Bloglines
Labels: 301 redirects, domain names, duplicate content, google webmaster tools, sitemaps.org, yahoo site explorer
