Most of us have heard about web domains before, but what happens when someone wants to change theirs? A domain change is when you take your website address and change it to a new one. For example, let’s say your website is 10THDEGREEMarketing.com and your business name has changed. With a domain change, you can update it from the original address to something like 10THDEGREE.com. In cases like these, changing the website domain seems like a positive concept, and there are valid reasons to change the domain. There are also a large number of potential problems that may come with changing it as well. Here are some pros and cons of changing your website’s domain. 

PROS

The most obvious advantage when deciding to change your domain is that it may align better with your branding; a perfect example is the earlier scenario of changing the domain to reflect your business’ new title. Another upside could be consolidation. If your business has several different sites that have different names, you could rebrand them to be all on the same domain. In addition, there are times when a change to your domain can help boost your SEO, which has become more important than ever. For instance, having relevant keywords as a part of your domain can improve how visitors are finding your site. Finally, you could move to a better Top Level Domain (TLD). For example, moving from a .net domain to a .com one may be beneficial if you are a business. This is because a .com domain is more in line with businesses on a general level, and .net domains are better for businesses working in networking. 

CONS

When thinking about changing your domain, there are also downsides that you need to consider. If your old domain is not properly redirected to your new one, you can see some traffic drops. While this can improve later on, your organic search rankings will significantly drop in the short term. Also, if you don’t alert Google that you’re changing domains and submit a new sitemap, it won’t know to index the new site. Your site may lose traffic at first, but there may also be a loss of brand awareness based on how much of a change there is to the site’s domain. Traffic can be made up over time, but brand awareness can take even longer to recover. So as mentioned earlier, you need to make sure that if you do change your domain, that your redirects are properly in place. 

There are a lot of factors that can go into changing your domain, but it’s highly advised that you speak with an expert first. Sometimes it’s better to improve URL structure, or work with your expert on your existing domain’s SEO. If you have any questions or would like to get in touch with us, please reach out at contact@10thdegree.com.