A very early look at the .uk behaviour of top UK sites...

[Sound]

Nope, currently I can guarantee that google doesn't look at the age on the whois in their algorithm

The domains usage yes, the domains age itself no.

Do you work for google?

 

[Murray]

Do you work for google?

I make google work for me

 

[Blossom]

As Google don't provide the formula, it is guess work by all.

I Googled "seo age of domains Google" and top link was ;

http://www.ecreativeim.com/blog/2011/02/is-domain-age-important-for-google-rankings/

Ignore anything written about SEO from 2011. Hell, ignore anything written about SEO unless it was published in the last 3 months.

 

[Stephen]

Reassurance?

It won't be. Why should Google adjust their algorithm just because the .uk was launched? There are over 500 domain extensions now, many more coming soon - they're not going to code in an exception that says "because the poor .co.uk owners could only buy the .uk last week, we'll pretend they hopped into a time machine and treat the .uk domains as pre-aged".

Nominet has nothing to do with this in any case. Google's not going to reveal the "special sauce" of their search algorithm to Nominet any more than they would to you or I.

I understand that there are aspects of the .uk launch (and the .uk concept) that are less than ideal, but we have to maintain the distinction between what is reasonable to expect and what is impossible. Expecting Nominet to explain Google's algorithmic treatment of .uk falls squarely into the latter category. As such, there's no "sadly" about it - they were never going to provide the type of information you mention because Google was never going to give it to them in the first place!

No need to provide the recipe, just assurances and maybe some evidence that changing over from an aged .co.uk to a .uk if you follow these 10 steps (or whatever) will not harm rankings.

If .uk is seen as a migration for some business from .co.uk then Google may want to consider changing there algorithm (if the age of a domain is factor - as some on the forum don't think it is), as it will reflect reality and as Google want to provide the best results, making the small change would help.

It was mentioned that Nominet are in discussion with Google and other search engines and hope they can make some gains for the .uk.

The more reassurance provided on rankings, then the more likely it is .uk will be adopted quicker.

 

[Edwin]

I am finding loads and loads of sites that have switched from .co.uk to .uk as their main URL.

Basically, I used a variant of the Google search from the other thread, namely:
KEYWORD site:.uk -site:.co.uk -site:.org.uk -site:.ac.uk -site:.gov.uk -site:nhs.uk -site:nls.uk -site:bl.uk -site:supremecourt.uk -site:.ltd.uk -site:.plc.uk -site:.me.uk -site:.net.uk -site:.nhs.uk -site:.police.uk -site:mod.uk -site:.sch.uk -site:.parliament.uk

To pull up a list of relevant sites, change KEYWORD to a random (common) word. For example, I've tried "book" and several other terms.

That will give you a list of pages on .uk domains that contain that keyword in them.

Then visit each URL, strip the domain down to the root (i.e. if it's example.uk/gdffhhh/blahblah/ then you want www.example.uk) and see what happens when you go to the .co.uk version.

It won't take you long to find numerous examples of real businesses that are either 301 redirecting the .co.uk to the .uk, or which have set up a "we have moved" page on the .co.uk telling people to visit the .uk.

I found about 25 such sites in half an hour before I got bored of the exercise. When you vary the keyword, loads of different sites come up so there must be tons of them out there.

 

[Edwin]

Just to prove to myself that it really is THAT easy, I tried the keyword "restaurant" and then the keyword "furniture" and I've doubled the list of sites I've found to 50 (took me less than half an hour to add another 25).

(Remember that I'm basically throwing darts blindfold at the issue, since there could be hundreds of thousands of keywords on the .uk sites that are live so far, and I'm just trying a few at random)

 

[Murray]

It won't take you long to find numerous examples of real businesses that are either 301 redirecting the .co.uk to the .uk, or which have set up a "we have moved" page on the .co.uk telling people to visit the .uk.

I wonder how many are co.uk sites that have been penalised trying to start fresh on the .uk

The second search I did came up with a .uk I recognised because I know the co.uk is penalised

 

[Edwin]

I wonder how many are co.uk sites that have been penalised trying to start fresh on the .uk

If I had to guess, very few. The sites I saw looked like a completely normal cross-section of the web: business/corporate sites, ecommerce sites, personal blogs and sites, portfolio and resume sites, community sites etc.

 

[mally]

I've tried mine thats penalised, well spotted Murray if you've seen it!

 

[Brassneck]

I've tried mine thats penalised, well spotted Murray if you've seen it!

So what are you going to do - a 301 to the new domain name or something different or more complicated?

I was planning to use a lot of my .uk entitlement to try to sort out some penalised sites.

 

[mally]

Yep just 301

RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^domain.co.uk$ [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^domain.co.uk$
RewriteRule (.*)$ http://www.domain.uk/$1 [R=301,L]

Its jumped from around 100 to aeound 30-40

 

[Edwin]

Here's a list of sample sites that have transited from .co.uk to .uk AND set up some kind of redirect (301/automatic or splash page) on their old .co.uk domain:

10degrees.uk
adorecruises.uk
alfieskitchen.uk
armerah.uk
b-v.uk
balticdesign.uk
beautygalaxy.uk
bibus.uk
bizz.uk
bonvoyage.uk
charityevents.uk
cloudignite.uk
cre8ivestorm.uk
crossbeam.uk
davidoconnell.uk
direct2u.uk
donnyburnside.uk
dpdm.uk
epijim.uk
foodzia.uk
geekdesigns.uk
gentlemen-gin-gourmandise.uk
gladdy.uk
gmvisuals.uk
heeley-som.uk
ib3.uk
ikenya.uk
imageandbrand.uk
inkcreate.uk
inwx.uk
ivince.uk
jan-andrews.uk
jeffail.uk
jsweb.uk
kintan.uk
ksphoto.uk
leasingoptions.uk
liphook.uk
locally.uk
londoncanals.uk
magazinesubscription.uk
mancrush.uk
markhadley.uk
marriedinstyle.uk
mid.uk
moonworks.uk
myholidaycottagemarketing.uk
needasurvey.uk
netbrand.uk
nimbl.uk
nixtape.uk
nksconsulting.uk
orantec.uk
pamweaver.uk
picturesmith.uk
pregnancy.uk
safaribookings.uk
safetynet.uk
scottishlass.uk
servicebasket.uk
sheesham.uk
shopend.uk
soulsolacetherapies.uk
ss88.uk
stocklots24.uk
stringdolls.uk
stripykat.uk
techdive.uk
thejudge.uk
theoldmanorpuddletown.uk
thisnation.uk
timrogers.uk
tomashmore.uk
tonycunnane.uk
turntwo.uk
ukbuy.uk
voucherpug.uk
wanago.uk
willbaker.uk
zeltus.uk
zvps.uk

They're all real sites (no parking pages).

 

[Murray]

They're all real sites (no parking pages).

I checked a few of those, quite a few (seemingly) penalised co.uk's

 

[Edwin]

I checked a few of those, quite a few (seemingly) penalised co.uk's

Ok, not sure how you're seeing that, but I'll take your word for it. I already explained how I generated the list - there's no picking and choosing involved at that stage.

 

[Murray]

Ok, not sure how you're seeing that, but I'll take your word for it. I already explained how I generated the list - there's no picking and choosing involved at that stage.

You can see on SEMRush

Just looked at the most obvious ones from their names since I'm limited to the number of searches I can do without a subscription, you know the voucherpugs & leasingoptions of the list + I already knew about bonvoyage and few others.

 

[PanzerWagon]

The vast majority are penalised domains like I pointed out in previous threads. Setting up a we have moved page with either zero links or no followed links is a sure fire sign.

Those who have 301 redirected are living on borrowed time too as the penalty will catch up with them.

If you have a successful site operating on .co.uk you would be mad to switch to .uk as the risk far outweighs any reward.

The only marker of .UK success will be how many brand new sites are launched on it as it's obvious nobody of size is making the switch. Has anyone here launched one from scratch on it yet that wasn't previously on a .co.uk?

Finally, Edwin, are you on the Nominet Payroll for pushing .UK?

 

[Edwin]

Finally, Edwin, are you on the Nominet Payroll for pushing .UK?

No, of course not. The evidence from many recent threads is that a lot of people are interested in how .uk is developing. I'm attempting to provide a small part of the answer to that question.

Also worth noting that nothing I post on here will affect the adoption of .uk by real businesses one iota. I am merely an observer, taking notes.

 

[PanzerWagon]

No, of course not. The evidence from many recent threads is that a lot of people are interested in how .uk is developing. I'm attempting to provide a small part of the answer to that question.

Also worth noting that nothing I post on here will affect the adoption of .uk by real businesses one iota. I am merely an observer, taking notes.

I'm just messing :-D

 

[Edwin]

I've summarised the very latest status of the Alexa top 20,000 sites as a blog post. Will be interesting to revisit in a few weeks/months time to see how things have improved...

http://www.webmastering.co.uk/domai...-websites-making-use-of-their-new-uk-domains/

 

[Retired_Member38]

I checked a few of those, quite a few (seemingly) penalised co.uk's

This is another huge issue of trying to analyse change over. Its only likely to be small or spammier sites who dump their .co.uk for the .uk purely because of a penalty. Any big brands can get it fixed, or at the very least have no choice but to continue to try and take 6-12 months to fix it as they're too set on their current url.

What is going to be a great indicator is any massive brands launching new, that have access to .uk and .co.uk both unused.... we need to see which they go with. Big money brands where you're going to see their url's on tv ads, on buses, in train stations etc.... I realise the chance to see stuff like this is going to be few and far between though.