Hi,
I just noticed that Google has indexed all my pages with: [url]http://storename.com/[/url]… instead of [url]http://www.storename.com/[/url]… ( which I normally see)
Does this make any difference? The Links do work.
I have 82 pages indexed (site:storename.com) and only 2 for (site:www.storename.com).
I only have 3 or for test products on the site, most of indexed pages are for categories and other pages.
Yahoo is about the same, has indexed 8 with http://www.storename.com and 33 with http://storename.com.
I plan on getting an ssl certificate (store is just a demo now). Was planning on getting the certificate with the site: www.storename.com. Will I have any problems?
what is best practice and should I change anything?
Thanks,
Bob
It depends on where your external links are pointing to from a seo point of view
most users will use the www if giving you a link
rank but the search engines are only indexing you as http://storename.com
so gaining weight behind your domain could prove hard work
had the same issue a while back it was incorrect setting of either the www records on the domain dns panel or was error in config file
I encourage all clients to use www.
Hmmmm. Now I am a little concerned over this. I just noticed that my store doesn’t have the www in front of my domain name. While my old/current cart does. How the heck do you get CS to default to www?
Hi,
I may not change mine. I don’t know know how it got this way, but had to happen during setup, which I did not do.
From what I am reading, it does not matter if you have www or not. What matters is that any links you use is one or the other, but not both or our Boss/Defacto Owner Google will think its two sites and split the metrics. WWW is from the old days when it was similar to a subdomain.
All my pages work with or without the www and Google has aleady indexed the pages on the site without www. I may not do anything at this point.
Any changes can be made in .httaccess file.
Bob
You can specify your preferred domain in Google Webmaster Tools. Setup information available at:
[url]http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=44231[/url]
Bob
[quote name=‘jobosales’]You can specify your preferred domain in Google Webmaster Tools. Setup information available at:
[URL]http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=44231[/URL]
Bob[/quote]
Well I knew I had seen that setting somewhere before. So Google webmaster tools is where I seen it. Since I already have all my links within my old and new static pages linked without the www I think I will just keep it set as is (no preferred domain). Even if you type in the www it just automatically removes it and takes you to that page.
That will work but you will be potentially splitting your SERPs between the www and non-www URL. You really want to consolidate these on a specific URL.
Bob
First you should change in webmaster tools the preferred domain to non www
Second change your settings in your config.local.php file.
CS-Cart make an automatically redirect to the one or other choice. If you have in the config file yoursite.com and someone type in browser www.yoursite.com, will be redirected to the non www address. The only thing what I don’t know is if the redirection within CS-Cart is a 301 or 302. If there is a 301 redirect then your site will not create duplicates with www and non www.
That’s all what you can do. And wait for the results of Google.
Since I am moving from an old cart system that uses the www wouldn’t it be better in my case to have my CS cart use www too? How do I do that? Obviously have Google default to www too. Right now since my old cart uses www while CS doesn’t, so I really can’t force it to choose since my old cart is still live. I have noticed that it does forward properly but would like to have things uniform. And obviously rank high (since I rank VERY high for most keyword terms with my old site).
[quote name=‘IsItFast’]Since I am moving from an old cart system that uses the www wouldn’t it be better in my case to have my CS cart use www too? How do I do that? Obviously have Google default to www too. Right now since my old cart uses www while CS doesn’t, so I really can’t force it to choose since my old cart is still live. I have noticed that it does forward properly but would like to have things uniform. And obviously rank high (since I rank VERY high for most keyword terms with my old site).[/quote]
As I said: change this part of your config.local.php
FROM:
[quote]// Host and directory where software is installed on no-secure server
$config[‘http_host’] = ‘yourcompany.com’;
$config[‘http_path’] = ‘/2010’;
// Host and directory where software is installed on secure server
$config[‘https_host’] = ‘yourcompany.com’;
$config[‘https_path’] = ‘/2010’;
[/quote]TO
[quote]// Host and directory where software is installed on no-secure server
$config[‘http_host’] = ‘www.yourcompany.com’;
$config[‘http_path’] = ‘/2010’;
// Host and directory where software is installed on secure server
$config[‘https_host’] = ‘www.yourcompany.com’;
$config[‘https_path’] = ‘/2010’;
[/quote]and your webmaster tools settings to your preferred domain with www
Maybe you will have to make a new verification process of your page.
Thanks indy…I wasn’t sure how to specify it in the file but I found out I just needed to add the www in front of the domain name listed. I think this will work best for my situation. EDIT: I see that you have now edited your previous post explaining how.
Now I just got to go through change about 10000 links to reflect this. Wish I would have thought about this beforehand.
So in Google WT should the radio button “stick” on the use www option? When I click for it to default to www and hit save a little window pops up below it and says my site has to be verified in order for those settings to work. But my site IS verified. If I click on the verified link it tells me it already is verified. I’ve tried several times and it keeps telling me the same thing.
Perhaps you missed this:
[QUOTE]You may need to reverify ownership of your sites. Because setting a preferred domain impacts both crawling and indexing, we need to ensure that you own both versions. Typically, both versions point to the same physical location, but this is not always the case. Generally, once you have verified one version of the domain, we can easily verify the other by finding the verification HTML file or meta tag. However, if you’ve removed the file or meta tag, you’ll need to repeat the verification steps.[/QUOTE]
You are verified for the old non-WWW URL.
Bob
Thanks Bob…that makes sense. I’ll get this updated right now.
EDIT. I just checked and it is www verified. I had to verify my non-www to make the changes take effect.
Hmmm…and you still get the popup? Hopefully someone else can jump in with a solution.
Bob
Nah…it’s fixed. It was odd that I had to add my non-www site to webmaster tools, then verify it. The www version was already verified but for whatever reason I had to verify the non. After that, all worked properly.
It appears that the redirect is a 302 and not a 301. It’s pretty important for SEO purposes for this to be a 301 redirect.