In short, no. This is a question that comes up quite frequently with clients moving their web presence. When you have an existing site on another host, you run the risk of shooting yourself in the foot when it comes to SEO. Your existing site already ranks in the search engines, but launching a second domain to target the same search keywords serves to weaken both websites. The issue is that your existing site already has sites linking to it, whereas the new site doesn't. By starting a second site and promoting it, you're taking your marketing push away from the original domain, lessening the impact of your efforts.

Having multiple sites can be confusing for you to manage, as well as to market to consumers. The last thing you want to do is confuse your potential customers as to which website they should be accessing to get current information.

While there are certain cases where a new domain name might be the right choice, the odds that a new domain name will rank in the search engines right away for competitive keywords are pretty slim. New domain names can work when there is a specific marketing push to promote them, but getting organic search engine traffic right away is pretty unlikely.

The biggest issue with new domains is that search engines like Google use domain age as an indication of quality. Since there are no other sites linking to your newly created domain, it takes awhile for the search engines to even realize your site exists and is a legitimate source of quality information.

Domain Redirects

The best practice you can employ is to transition your old domain name for use on your new website. This can be a tricky process, but in the end is definitely worth the effort. One of the key things to remember is to redirect important pages on your existing site to their new equivalents on your new site.

Submit Your Sitemap

One of the best ways to get your site noticed quickly is to submit your sitemap to Google Webmaster Tools and Bing Webmaster Tools. Adding your sitemap to these sites is invaluable, as it tells the search engine directly that your site exists and what pages it should be crawling.

When making a transition from an old site to a new site, there is always potential for there to be a hiccup in your organic search traffic when making the change. Creating redirects and submitting a sitemap are the best ways to make a smooth transition from your old website to your new one.

To view the original article, visit the Lone Wolf blog.