Changing domain from .co.uk to .com and not losing .co.uk traffic

[steessex]

Hi all

I've been pulling my hair out with Shopify support who can't give me a concrete answer on this as I don't feel they truly understand the question.

All I want to know is if we change our primary domain from .co.uk (which we've had for a few years) to .com on our shopify store does this act as a server level 301 redirect thereby redirecting the 'significant' organic (and other) traffic from our .co.uk Google SERPS to the new .com domain?

So to be clear, if someone then comes across www.ourbusiness.co.uk/some-url in a Google result and the clicks on this link its then redirected to www.ourbusiness.com/some-url, taking with it all the .co.uk SEO ranking juice etc.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you

Stephen

[Andrew]

Hi Stephen,

Hyde here from Shopify. That's a great question!

If all you're doing is switching one domain for another on your store, and because you're not otherwise changing the sitemap of the site, then it should be sufficient for you to simply notify Google of the changes through the change of address tool in Google Search Console without it affecting your SEO ranking or traffic.

However, I would recommend also chatting to an SEO expert to get more in-depth consultation on this point. You could look at our list of experts here - this is a team of third-party developers who can make custom changes to your store on a contracted basis.

They may be able to develop a custom solution for your SEO query or may have access to an already existing integration that I'm unaware of. As with all Expert contracts, requirements and prices are agreed upon before any work commences, so you can always check in with a few different Experts to ensure you're getting what you want for a competitive price.

Let me know if you have any other questions!

All the best, Hyde.

[Josh_Uebergang]

Stephen,

If you keep the domain connected in your admin (under Online Store > Domains) then select to redirect all traffic to your primary domain:

Then yes, it will 301. We've done many Shopify SEO full project migrations and domain changes.

[Christine6]

Can anyone link to a good article on the details of setting this up?  I'll be in a similar situation in a couple of months (changing store domain name due to a trademark registration).

[SyntechDigital]

Hi @Christine6 

Take a look at this article:

https://www.mannixmarketing.com/blog/how-to-properly-301-redirect-a-website-domain/

[PublicApps]

Hi Steessex,

Interesting question. This is my current understanding:

"If we change our primary domain from .co.uk to .com on our Shopify store, does this act as a server level 301 redirect?"
- No. 301's are not automatically created when you enter a new primary domain name in Shopify's admin/settings/domains. 301's are created by your own webserver or web servers of your domain name provider. If you've 'bought' your domain name through Shopify, ask them for the redirects.

"taking with it all the .co.uk SEO ranking juice?"
- Link juice in search engines is NOT transferred 1:1 to new domains. Using Google's Move Site tool also does not ensure link juice retained in Google. It's like moving your brick and mortar shop from Londen to New York. It may still be the same relevant shop for particular customer segments, but now it has to redetermine its position among shops in New York.

Regards,
Jesse