Blog is now completely dead after domain name change - help needed

[LukeSB]

I started a blog about a year ago on a fresh domain and uploaded around 60 articles.

It started to gain some good traction after around 6 months but after a while, I realized that the domain name may conflict with copyright in the future because it is based on a game and the domain had to game name in the URL.

I bought a new domain and followed all of the steps published by Google but it is still completely dead after 4 months.

The site is getting around 5 - 6 impressions a day as opposed to thousands like before.

Any idea what I could do to kick start it back up again?

If anyone has had this problem before please give me some tips on what to do, thanks in advance.

 

[xReminisce]

did you 301 redirect your old to new blog?

followed all of the steps published by Google

Not sure what steps you are referring to here.
Article link please?

 

[LukeSB]

did you 301 redirect your old to new blog?

Not sure what steps you are referring to here.
Article link please?

Yes all of the pages are 301 redirected as they should be to the new pages with exact same URL structure etc.

 

[xReminisce]

Yes all of the pages are 301 redirected as they should be to the new pages with exact same URL structure etc.

Alright

The site is getting around 5 - 6 impressions a day as opposed to thousands like before.

• Where are these imps hitting first?
  • Your old site or your new site?
• Is your new site indexed?
• How long has it been since the migration

 

[LukeSB]

Alright

• Where are these imps hitting first?
  • Your old site or your new site?
• Is your new site indexed?
• How long has it been since the migration

The impressions on the old site gradually dropped day by day as you would expect but the new domain is only getting a few impressions a day on a random blog post.

The old domain now gets 0 impressions.

The new site is indexed and I manually indexed all of the new URLs on the new domain on Google Search console like I do on all of my sites.

It's been 3 - 4 months since the migration so I would have expected some traction by now.

Might be worth mentioning that it's exactly the same for Bing. The site used to get good traffic from Bing but since the URL migration, it gets a few clicks here and there.

I have followed every guide and video on the internet and I am sure I did it correctly.

 

[xReminisce]

The old domain now gets 0 impressions.

Check if the old domain is indexed still
or if anything is ranking on it.

This seems like one of the rarer cases where 301 kills both sites completely.
3-4 months is a very long time and the damage it has done is most likely already settled down.
Usually, juice should be passing across a lot faster and the new sites could see imps increasing and serps dancing within the first week or two.

If bing is also dead, there may be something on the new site that is screwing everything up.
Have you checked robots, is there recaptcha on the site that's too aggressive and bouncing everyone offf? SSL not configed properly?
Are host the same?

Another question, this site is just a duplicate 1:1 from the old one right, you mentioned same url structure etc, so same code underneath too.

@tazarbm @RoiBox @TheMarquis what do you think about this

 

[LukeSB]

Check if the old domain is indexed still
or if anything is ranking on it.

This seems like one of the rarer cases where 301 kills both sites completely.
3-4 months is a very long time and the damage it has done is most likely already settled down.
Usually, juice should be passing across a lot faster and the new sites could see imps increasing and serps dancing within the first week or two.

If bing is also dead, there may be something on the new site that is screwing everything up.
Have you checked robots, is there recaptcha on the site that's too aggressive and bouncing everyone offf? SSL not configed properly?
Are host the same?

Another question, this site is just a duplicate 1:1 from the old one right, you mentioned same url structure etc, so same code underneath too.

@tazarbm @RoiBox @heMarquis what do you think about this

The site is an exact replica of the old one. Same theme, structure robots.txt etc.

It just seems like Google has decided to torpedo the site because I changed the URL which is strange because the OLD URL didn't have much authority anyways.

No recaptcha on the site and SSL is configured correctly.

Thanks for taking the time to look into it for me.

It's a shame because I haven't added any more posts and I don't wanna start adding content if the site is just dead in Google's eyes.

 

[xReminisce]

The site is an exact replica of the old one. Same theme, structure robots.txt etc.

It just seems like Google has decided to torpedo the site because I changed the URL which is strange because the OLD URL didn't have much authority anyways.

No recaptcha on the site and SSL is configured correctly.

Thanks for taking the time to look into it for me.

It's a shame because I haven't added any more posts and I don't wanna start adding content if the site is just dead in Google's eyes.

Yeah, I am just thinking since you mentioned BinG
Bing usually likes leftovers from Google
And to be gone from Bing's serps, there usually something wrong.
If you have bing's webnaster tools http://www.bing.com/toolbox/webmaster
throw the new site in there and see what errors it throws at you

 

[tazarbm]

It's been 3 - 4 months since the migration so I would have expected some traction by now.

3-4 months is a very long time and the damage it has done is most likely already settled down.

um, shouldn't he wait at least 6 months again? I mean, if it took 6 months for google to get that new domain out of the sandbox why wouldn't this new domain need 6 months as well? Personally, I think you should continue working on the site as usual, and in 2-3 months it should start working...

Another question, this site is just a duplicate 1:1 from the old one right, you mentioned same url structure etc, so same code underneath too.

and the exact same content too, right? Because - you know - the content is the most important part

@tazarbm @RoiBox @TheMarquis what do you think about this

I'm clueless to be honest. If he's done everything right (by following the guides he says he'd followed) I don't see why the new domain would not rank, unless it's being sandboxed like I alluded to above... I really can't think of anything else, but then again, I'm not a SEO expert, so...

 

[xReminisce]

um, shouldn't he wait at least 6 months again? I mean, if it took 6 months for google to get that new domain out of the sandbox why wouldn't this new domain need 6 months as well? Personally, I think you should continue working on the site as usual, and in 2-3 months it should start working...


and the exact same content too, right? Because - you know - the content is the most important part


I'm clueless to be honest. If he's done everything right (by following the guides he says he'd followed) I don't see why the new domain would not rank, unless it's being sandboxed like I alluded to above... I really can't think of anything else, but then again, I'm not a SEO expert, so...

It's possible that it is stuck in that sandbox phase.
I wonder, how those imps are getting through, are these previous ranked articles or are there new articles that never got ranked before in the old site?
Then again, it is also possible to not even go through that sandbox phase due to the 301 migration.
I feel like the process may have been rushed and got shot down(most likely due to the fear of DMCA), and wasn't dripped through enough and got flagged in the process which ended up either stuck in sandbox or killed completely. May got a stray hit on one of the billions updates that happened in the past months.
But that is still only on Google's side at the very least.

based on a game and the domain had to game name in the URL.

Honestly, most games devs and publishers won't care about the site, especially if you are a content dev, or anything similar and not providing illegal 3rd party tools or hacks etc.

 

[Black Belt Spodermen]

Did you improve its backlink profile before transferring the content?

 

[Kamran2435]

Here are some tips on what you can do to kick start your blog again:

• Create new content that is even better than your old content. This is the most important thing you can do to attract new visitors and keep your old visitors coming back. Make sure your content is well-written, informative, and engaging.
• Promote your content on social media and other online channels. Share your articles on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and other social media platforms. You can also submit your articles to relevant websites and directories.
• Guest blog on other websites in your industry. This is a great way to get exposure to a new audience. When you guest blog, be sure to include a link back to your own website in your author bio.
• Run paid advertising campaigns. This can be a great way to reach a wider audience and drive traffic to your website. However, it's important to target your ads carefully so that you're not wasting money.
• Optimize your website for search engines. This will help your website rank higher in search results, which will lead to more traffic. You can do this by using relevant keywords in your titles, meta descriptions, and throughout your content.
• Build backlinks to your website. Backlinks are links from other websites to your website. They are a sign of authority to search engines, and they can help improve your website's ranking in search results. You can build backlinks by guest blogging, submitting your website to directories, and participating in online forums