Best way to move vbseo'd forum to new domain

**Johnny5** · 10-20-2009 12:54 PM

Hi,

It looks like we'll be relocating our vbseo'd forum to a new domain name. Can anyone please share what they know to be the best way to accomplish this without losing progress made in search engines, or at least with losing as little of it as possible?

Thank you.

**Brian Cummiskey** · 10-20-2009 02:17 PM

The best thing to is to keep the old domain hosted, and apply a simple htaccess file on the site to pass to the new domain.

Assuming the same structure (ie, if was in /forums, still in /forums)

Code:

Options +FollowSymLinks
RewriteEngine on
RewriteRule (.*) http://www.newdomain.com/$1 [L,R=301]

in root of the old domain. That will pass all old traffic to the new domain, ie

old.com/f2/thread1/ to
new.com/f2/thread1/

still, you will likely have a re-indexing period and may see a traffic drop.

the best thing to do is to stay on your current domain.

**Johnny5** · 10-20-2009 02:21 PM

Thank you, Brian.

What would I have to change in the code you posted to direct a forum that was previously installed in the site's root to newdomain.com/forum/ ?

**Brian Cummiskey** · 10-20-2009 03:25 PM

Code:

Options +FollowSymLinks
RewriteEngine on
RewriteRule (.*) http://www.newdomain.com/forum/$1 [L,R=301]

should do it

**Johnny5** · 10-20-2009 03:50 PM

Hmm, that would redirect anything and everything to /forum/ though, right?

While I want to move everything forum related to /forum/, I don't want the non forum custom vb pages I added redirected to /forum/ too. Is there a way to make exceptions for everything I don't want redirected to /forum/?

The idea is to be able to create something of a homepage with links to the forum and other features.

Thanks so much for your help.

**Brian Cummiskey** · 10-20-2009 04:22 PM

yes, that will redirect everything to /forum.

you will have make a case-by-case rule set for everything else thats not part of your forum ABOVE the forum directive, as in

Code:

Options +FollowSymLinks
RewriteEngine on
RewriteRule /script.php http://www.newdomain.com/script.php [R=301,L]
RewriteRule (.*) http://www.newdomain.com/forum/$1 [L,R=301]

**Johnny5** · 10-20-2009 04:44 PM

Great, thank you. One last question if you don't mind.

If I want to redirect additional otherdomain(s).com to newdomain.com (that is, not olddomain.com which newdomain.com is replacing), would you redirect otherdomain(s).com/whatever to newdomain.com/whatever, or have otherdomain(s).com/whatever redirect only to newdomain.com/?

For example, if old domain was JohnnyCars.com and new domain is Cars.com (if only), I obviously want to redirect JohnnyCars.com/anything to Cars.com/anything.

If I acquired FastCars.com and wanted to redirect it to point to Cars.com, should FastCars.com/whatever redirect to Cars.com/whatever, or just lead to Cars.com's homepage?

Thank you!

**Brian Cummiskey** · 10-20-2009 05:46 PM

just park the other domains on the new domain, and with vbseo htaccess will convert it with the "if not www.thisdomain.com , make it www.thisdomain.com" rule that comes default in the file.

**Johnny5** · 10-20-2009 05:52 PM

Sorry, I'm not sure I follow.

By "park the other domains on the new domain" do you mean do a 301 redirect from the other domains to the new domain just like I'm doing for the old domain?

In that case, do I want otherdomains.com/whatever to redirect to newdomain.com/whatever, so that otherdomains.com effectively acts like an alias, or do I want otherdomains.com/whatever to redirect to newdomain.com's index page, newdomain.com/

Thanks, Brian. Sorry if I'm testing your patience. I'm just really concerned with getting this right.

**Brian Cummiskey** · 10-20-2009 05:57 PM

by park i mean go into your control panel on your server and physically PARK the domain on your newdomain. it will not have a 'website' at all. it will simply alias to the newdomain.com. Then, vbseo redirect will take care of the redirect to move to the newdomain from the parked domain.

Effectivly, you don't want the otherdomain to ever show up at all, and will simply act as a type-in catcher.

**Brian Cummiskey** · 10-20-2009 05:58 PM

ie, go to: gooogle.com (extra o) and it is parked and directs to google.com without ever knowing it was wrong.

**Johnny5** · 10-20-2009 06:03 PM

Thanks.

As for the migration from olddomain.com to newdomain.com, would you recommend against for any reason simply renaming olddomain.com to newdomain.com via the server's control panel so that I don't have to copy files/import database into a new virtual host on the server, and then (re)creating olddomain.com on the server and just setting up its .htaccess for the 301s?

Doing it that way would seemingly save a ton of hassle as there would be no trying to recreate the current setup (files/database) in a new folder for a new virtual host.

**Brian Cummiskey** · 10-20-2009 07:30 PM

Sure, just make sure DNS is setup to resolve properly and there shouldn't be an issue.

**Johnny5** · 10-21-2009 10:22 AM

Thanks again for all your help, Brian!

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