I hope someone can clarify redirecting expired domains. I'm looking to buy expired domains for use in a private network. 1. Am I correct that you should check whether the www or non-www has more backlinks & better metrics, then redirect it to whichever (www or non-www) has the better backlinks & metrics (to get the most link juice)? 2. if #1 is correct, is my understanding correct that wordpress does the redirecting automatically so all you have to do is set it to www. or non-www in the General Settings? If I'm wrong here, how should it be done? Appreciate the help. Thanks.
yes to 1. Thats what I do. I also install a 404 redirect to the homepage plugin to ensure that link juice flows from the other pages that don't exist anymore. As for 2. Thats also what I do and I believe it is correct but I too would be interested in anyone else's opinion on this.
1. Correct - most of the time it's fairly straightforward to see which of the versions has the majority of the backlinks pointing to it but every so often you will come across a domain that has good backlinks to both www and non-www versions and if this is the case then I normally choose the www version as the main one and redirect the non-www one but that's just my personal preference. 2. I'm not 100% sure on this - I seem to remember a Wordpress site I run didn't automatically redirect non-www visitors until I changed my .htaccess to make this happen. Maybe new versions of Wordpress do it automatically though...?
2. it will do it automatically if you install a plugin such as "link juicer keeper" which is free in wordpress
Both are correct. WordPress automatically redirects www to non-www or non-www to www depending on your settings.
