Beware The Impact Of Using 301 Redirects

Let me share a story of the devastating effects changing a domain name and using 301 redirects can have on a sites traffic for several months. I have a DVD review site that has been running in one format or another since the year 2000. The site itself was reasonably successful and made a fair profit at times. Back in the summer of 2006 the core team on the site decided that we needed to expand in order to future proof the site. DVD as a format probably now has a limited lifespan and we wanted to expand into other areas such as games, music and the new HD formats for movies. We all agreed that the domain name needed to change as the name was very DVD specific. I was well aware that such a change could have a big impact on traffic, search engine hits etc. so I tried to do everything I could to minimise the hit. I arranged every single page off the old url to redirect to the new site, and I also set the redirects up with proper 301 error messages so that the search engines would know that the pages have moved somewhere else. I also started going through all of the back links and trying to get those sites to update those links including DMOZ (still pending at time of writing). To try and boost things along I also had a press release written which I distributed through the likes of PRWeb. I also ensured all the tools were in place like a google site map, rss feeds etc. Despite all of these things, the change has had a devastating result on traffic. After one month of the new site, traffic is at it’s lowest in years. I could see that the search engines know about all of the site pages but they were all ranking very low indeed. Income was at an all time low too. Eventually things returned to normal but it took a long time and a lot of hard work to get there. The one lesson I’ve learned from all of this is to not underestimate the impact of changing a domain name as it’s had a major impact for me and I suspect that it would do the same for you.

Web Hosting - Are You Getting Your Moneys Worth?

Web hosting. If the term means anything to you at all then you either already have a hosting provider or are looking for one. Either way I hope to educate you on some of the basics to look for in a hosting company. Personal, business, free, ecommerce or discount an educated consumer makes all the difference.

When reviewing hosting providers most people wouldn't put this point first, but I do. Support. Yes, most companies have some type of support, but not all are equal. First and foremost is availability. Support staff should be available 24/7 by phone and email. Response time should also be quick and wait times should be announced and published on the web site. Technicians should be friendly, educated and speak your language.

After support the next most important set of things to look for in a hosting company are features. If the company can't provide what you need then you might as well look elsewhere. Some basics are of course capacity and bandwidth, but more importantly is the ability to do what you need to with your site. Ecommerce, blogging, forums, scripting and databases are much more important anymore then the amount of space you get.

Last but not least is price. When I say price I don't mean to suggest you get the cheapest plan out there. You should find the plan that has the features you need and is affordable. Don't get more than you need simply because you can. There are many hosting companies out there with bargain basement pricing. They can do this because your server is in their basement next to their washer and dryer. Be careful who you do business with and remember you get what you pay for.

In summary I just want to point out that the hosting environment is changing. With blogs and the like becoming more prevalent hosting companies need to adapt to stay in business. You as the consumer need to be educated in what you need and don't be afraid to make a switch if you have to.

What Is A Domain Name?

A domain name is a word or word sequences that are entered into the address bar of an internet navigator to visit a particular website. In simple terms, a domain name is an online identity of a web owner.

A domain name helps to translate IP addresses to words. A domain name is a name that identifies one or more IP addresses, for instance the domain name microsoft.com represents about a dozen IP addresses.

Internet is based on IP addresses, not domain names, so every Web server requires a Domain Name System (DNS) server to translate domain names into IP addresses. Domain Name System stores and associates many types of information with domain names and helps to translate domain names to IP addresses.

Internet users use domain names as the URLs, ‘Uniform Resource Locators’. Domain names are used in URLs to identify particular Web pages. Take the URL http://www.pcworld.com/index.html, in the URL pcworld.com is domain name.

Every domain name has a suffix, which is termed as top level domain (TLD). The top level domain indicates the category to which a domain name belongs to. There are a limited number of top level domains, such as .gov (government agencies), .edu (educational institutions), .org (organizations, .mil (military), .com (commercial business), .net (network organizations), .ca (Canada), .uk (United Kingdom), .de (Germany or Deutschland), .us (United States) etc.

Technically, domain names are host names. Oftentimes domain names are referred to as "web addresses" that is technically incorrect and often domain names and hostnames are used interchangeably, but there are subtle technical differences between the two.
On the Internet, a hostname is a domain name assigned to the host. It is usually a combination of the host's local name with its parent domain's name. For instance in URL “fr.wikipedia.org," the host name is “fr” and the domain name is ‘wikipedia.org’. The host names are translated to IP addresses via the local hosts file, or DNS. A single may possibly have several host names. A domain name is not a host name, if it doesn’t have an IP address. Thus all hostnames are domain names, but not all domain names are hostnames.

ResellersPanel Debuts API and Launches a Hosting Plan Creator

UK host ResellersPanel announces the introduction of API (Application Programming Interface) software, which allows a 100% customization of customers’ websites, to its hosting platform. Some of the functionalities of ResellersPanel API version 1.0 include domain name availability checker, username availability checker, domain name and web hosting account registration, and web hosting plan selection. The API, which returns results in plain text and XML format, can be accessed via an authorized IP address through a secure SSL connection using a MD5 encrypted password (IPs are added via the ResellersPanel Control Panel).

Beside the API, ResellersPanel has also launched Liquid Plan Builder – a web hosting tool, which allows the resellers to create their own hosting plans and then resell them. It is now available in the Free Reseller Program’s Control Panel and is fully compatible with all the website templates currently supported by ResellersPanel. Each web hosting plan must include the following components: Disk space, Traffic, Hosted domains and E-mail boxes. They must have values different from 0. The Liquid Plan Builder-created hosting plans can be offered via the API.

Nick Blaskov, CFO of ResellersPanel, said that by using the API software to create accounts for their customers, the resellers gain the opportunity to have a billing gateway of their own, thus keeping a direct connection with the customers, and that the Liquid Plan Builder gives the resellers an unprecedented opportunity to create unlimited unique hosting plans, consistent with the goals of their marketing campaigns, and offer them directly on their online stores – something, which makes the Liquid Plan Builder an indivisible part of ResellersPanel’s fully automated reseller solution – the Free Reseller Program.