Google Page Rank Does Make A Difference - Something to Consider Before Moving Your Blog
I originally started blogging over three years ago, but for reasons I won't get into, I had to stop until early this spring - at which point I started blogging professionally. (That is, blogging with the expectation of earning at least a part-time living from ad and affiliate revenue, as well as ebooks and blogging services.) I've learned some good lessons and some hard lessons. Here are some that you should consider if you are planning to move your blog from one domain to another.
Since starting blogging professionally, there isn't a day that goes by (okay, one or two :D) that I don't research, write, post, analyze. This is all essential to being a successful pro blogger. What's also essential is using all this hard work to gain high rankings in the SEs (Search Engines) if you intend to draw in enough traffic to eventually build a loyal readership.
One of the things that I've learned the hard way is that the Google page rank does make a difference to your traffic. There are any number of bloggers that will tell you that this isn't true, but they are wrong - at least for my blogs. Having also read numerous blogs saying that it was a bad idea to have your blog on Blogger.com's blogspot.com domain, I foolishly took their advice, registered several domains, purchased hosting, and struggled to redesign my blog templates - all while still trying to blog as usual. Bad move.
What I've since learned is that a good blog is a good blog, regardless of URL. An attractive page design is important, but so is posting regularly. A good domain name is helpful but not crucial. (Some of the top blogs, both in readership and in quality, are on free hosts.)
By posting regularly, I mean writing and posting everyday, if at all possible. But what's more, you do need to rank high in the SEs. There are many factors involved in ranking high in the SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages), and regular, frequent posting is part of it.
If you have an existing blog on a free host and feel you have to move it, reconsider. If you have more than 10-15 posts, you've likely started to build some search engine results and possibly have a Google PR (Page Rank) greater than 0 out of 10. If you now move your blog, you have to start all over again. It may be 3-6 months before your new domain gets an updated PR. And in the meantime, your old blog URL will continue to drop in the rankings because you have ceased to post new content. (I don't recommend posting new entries to both URLs; some SEs will penalize you for this.)
Unfortunately for me, I recently moved several of my blogspot.com blogs to their own domain around the same time. And while my old blogs are dropping in traffic, my new ones are not yet gaining steady traffic. My rankings in a number of "top sites" lists has dropped significantly. Take this as a cautionary tale: on the Internet, quality and quantity of blog entries is more important than the URL you are using.
If you have already moved your blog to a new domain but are still maintaining the old blog URL, you can use a service like Feedburner's FeedBurner's BuzzBoost and/or Headline Animator to let visitors on your old blog know about the new blog. I've done this for a couple of blogs that I've moved, and it is has increased traffic to my new URLs. However, only steady, regular posting to my new blogs will ever increase traffic to the point of critical mass. And this point, posting 2-3 times a day may be the only remedy.
(c) Copyright: 2005-present, Raj Kumar Dash, http://blogspinner.countwordula.com/
Since starting blogging professionally, there isn't a day that goes by (okay, one or two :D) that I don't research, write, post, analyze. This is all essential to being a successful pro blogger. What's also essential is using all this hard work to gain high rankings in the SEs (Search Engines) if you intend to draw in enough traffic to eventually build a loyal readership.
One of the things that I've learned the hard way is that the Google page rank does make a difference to your traffic. There are any number of bloggers that will tell you that this isn't true, but they are wrong - at least for my blogs. Having also read numerous blogs saying that it was a bad idea to have your blog on Blogger.com's blogspot.com domain, I foolishly took their advice, registered several domains, purchased hosting, and struggled to redesign my blog templates - all while still trying to blog as usual. Bad move.
What I've since learned is that a good blog is a good blog, regardless of URL. An attractive page design is important, but so is posting regularly. A good domain name is helpful but not crucial. (Some of the top blogs, both in readership and in quality, are on free hosts.)
By posting regularly, I mean writing and posting everyday, if at all possible. But what's more, you do need to rank high in the SEs. There are many factors involved in ranking high in the SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages), and regular, frequent posting is part of it.
If you have an existing blog on a free host and feel you have to move it, reconsider. If you have more than 10-15 posts, you've likely started to build some search engine results and possibly have a Google PR (Page Rank) greater than 0 out of 10. If you now move your blog, you have to start all over again. It may be 3-6 months before your new domain gets an updated PR. And in the meantime, your old blog URL will continue to drop in the rankings because you have ceased to post new content. (I don't recommend posting new entries to both URLs; some SEs will penalize you for this.)
Unfortunately for me, I recently moved several of my blogspot.com blogs to their own domain around the same time. And while my old blogs are dropping in traffic, my new ones are not yet gaining steady traffic. My rankings in a number of "top sites" lists has dropped significantly. Take this as a cautionary tale: on the Internet, quality and quantity of blog entries is more important than the URL you are using.
If you have already moved your blog to a new domain but are still maintaining the old blog URL, you can use a service like Feedburner's FeedBurner's BuzzBoost and/or Headline Animator to let visitors on your old blog know about the new blog. I've done this for a couple of blogs that I've moved, and it is has increased traffic to my new URLs. However, only steady, regular posting to my new blogs will ever increase traffic to the point of critical mass. And this point, posting 2-3 times a day may be the only remedy.
(c) Copyright: 2005-present, Raj Kumar Dash, http://blogspinner.countwordula.com/
