Keyword-rich domains redirection

[jeffcool]

Hi everybody !
I am new to this forum. So, intro : I am Jeff living in Switzerland.

I have a set of keyword-rich domains which I would like to point to my main website in order to get more search engine results. (I should mention that my main website has not a "visible" "keyword oriented" name which makes it difficult to go out naturally with search engine)

What is the best way to do it ?

1. Point all domains to the main website using 301 permanent redirections ?

2. Redirect (301) all domains to a "master" domain being redirect (301) itself to the main website ? (I have read that this is better tolerated by search engine than 1.)

3. Develop mini-websites for each domain (kind of "sales-landind" page) and have some natural "manual" links to the main website all along the content ?

What happens in case of 301 redirections ? Does the "parent" domain inherit from the "son" website ranking or the other way around ?

What happens in the case of mini-websites strategy ? (I fear those sites will be ranked very low and never "get out" of search engines either and thus not helping the main website)

Any other ideas to valuate those keyword-rich domains ?

Jeff

 

[enlytend]

A 301 redirect is a permanent redirect. When Google (and the other search engines) see a 301 on an entire domain, they assume the domain being redirected no longer exists and they will remove it from the index. Any inbound links will be sent to the target domain and any pagerank along with them.

If you're getting type-in ("direct navigation") traffic on these domains, then a redirect is definitely the way to go - it's a very common practice. However if the traffic is from search rankings on content that is (or was) on those domains, you'll lose that traffic when the domains disappear from the index.

If you want to keep the search traffic, you'll need to keep those domains as separate sites with a link to your main site. Just make sure there isn't duplicate content between any of the sites - keep it unique.

What happens in the case of mini-websites strategy ? (I fear those sites will be ranked very low and never "get out" of search engines either and thus not helping the main website)

That's another thing - unless you have significant, unique content on each site, that's correct. A bunch of low-content one-pagers linking to one site would be considered "doorway pages" and Google doesn't like those one bit. From their "Webmaster Guidelines":

Doorway pages are typically large sets of poor-quality pages where each page is optimized for a specific keyword or phrase. In many cases, doorway pages are written to rank for a particular phrase and then funnel users to a single destination.

Whether deployed across many domains or established within one domain, doorway pages tend to frustrate users, and are in violation of our webmaster guidelines.

It can also hurt the rankings of your main site:

Google may take action on doorway sites and other sites making use of these deceptive practice, including removing these sites from the Google index.

Source: http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=66355

 

[jeffcool]

Thanks a lot for the reply. Very clear indeed.

 

[angilina]

Hi everybody !
I am new to this forum. So, intro : I am Jeff living in Switzerland.

I have a set of keyword-rich domains which I would like to point to my main website in order to get more search engine results. (I should mention that my main website has not a "visible" "keyword oriented" name which makes it difficult to go out naturally with search engine)

What is the best way to do it ?

1. Point all domains to the main website using 301 permanent redirections ?

2. Redirect (301) all domains to a "master" domain being redirect (301) itself to the main website ? (I have read that this is better tolerated by search engine than 1.)

3. Develop mini-websites for each domain (kind of "sales-landind" page) and have some natural "manual" links to the main website all along the content ?

What happens in case of 301 redirections ? Does the "parent" domain inherit from the "son" website ranking or the other way around ?

What happens in the case of mini-websites strategy ? (I fear those sites will be ranked very low and never "get out" of search engines either and thus not helping the main website)

Any other ideas to valuate those keyword-rich domains ?

Jeff

Only redirection of domains to one site will not help that one site in SEO. These redirections will have no affect at all.

If these domains are established and have some PR and that redirection will be in the benefit of the user, then I guess they will help a little in terms of passing the PR to the main site.