mirrors / linking pages similar domains

[scrawnybob]

hi everyone

Im in a bit of a fix - Orginally I got a whole load of close variations on my poker site domain name 4kingpoker.com - in my innocents it seemed logical to get the variations as I didnt want to find someone else using similar domains to mine

the webdesigner set them all up to point at the mainsite - which he didnt view as mirroring - which Ive found out is bad

a potential link swap contacted me pointing this out as bad SEO etc and a possible ban - and Ive got all the other related domain inactive now - as Id gone along with designer in all naivety

my question is this - what if anything can i do with them now ??

can i put a simple page of unique content on each page with a link to my main site - or is this bad too ?

if i cant do this - what can i do with them ?

do i need to keep them for fear of someone else getting them and using them ?

im getting mixed feedback - other people have several domains feeding into the main one but others say this is really bad

suggestions please

cheers scrawnybob

[ozim]

In situations like this it's important not to rely on some secret knowledge of SEO gurus but to use simple and logical thinking instead. SEs are there to provide people with the best possible search results. So whenever you have a SEO problem just try to think as if you were Google. So you are Google and you find three sites - A, B and C which are identicall or almost identicall. Your first thought - sites B and C are stealing content from site A. Ok, it may not be stealing, but is it worth to show people sites B and C if they don't offer anything original? I would say no. Actually, you don't know if it is site B 'stealing' from A or A 'stealing' from B so you may (or you may not) penalize both.

Does mirroring result in a ban - I don't know but probably not (as always there is too much panic about getting banned). Is mirroring a bad SEO - it definitely is.

Regarding your sites - it would be easier to comment if I knew your domains

[scrawnybob]

hi Ozim

thanks for the pointers - Now ive taken all the other domains Im not putting them back up until Ive sorted out if there is a valid and SEO friendly way to do anything else with them or not.

By the same token Im not keen to let them lapse and find some idiot has bought them and chucked up something that could be easily confused with my site - Ive already got people confusing my site 4kingpoker.com with one with an "s" in it - which IMHO isn't really a proper site. (sorry if its anyone here but i doubt it)

the other domains in the 4kingpoker family i have are variations on fourkingpoker, 4king8poker, 4kingcasino etc

hope i havent just shot myself in the foot telling everyone lol

anyway - I had thought to have a single different page on each eg. 4kingcasino where it would briefly discuss why playing the house is a net loser and playing poker against worse players is a winner

then with some type of link to 4kingpoker.com along the lines of "More great tips on how to play etc at"

but I dont know if this single page unique content with link is good or bad or just not worth the hastle.

Its been suggested to just put a 301 ? broken redirect on all the other domains and renew them to make sure no one nicks my 4king brand

any thoughts

cheers scrawnybob www.4kingpoker.com

[ozim]

Originally posted by scrawnybob@Dec 15 2005, 06:34 AM
the other domains in the 4kingpoker family i have are variations on fourkingpoker, 4king8poker, 4kingcasino etc

Since you removed the content of these sites this information is useless... :huh:

The ideas of having single unique page on each site or making 301 redirect do not make any sense to me. I'll put it straight - as long as you have only one site of original content, don't play with different domains, focus on just one! I guess this advice is correct not only from the SEO point of view...