Matt says if a domain changes hands, Google resets the links vale to zero/near zero.
Quote from John Andrews who is live blogging from live domain roundtable, but I got to ask Mr Cutts how do you know?
The choices
- When Whois record is changed
- When hosting or IP is changed
- Some monumental onpage change
Now all three have the potential to be indicators of change but each could also be innocent, changing whois info is quite common including ownership. I recently changed several domains which were marked as an individual to my companies name, the owner did not change as they had been company run from the site. People change hosting all the time, and people scrap their sites and start again (though this would cause potential inbound link issues) so neither of these seem likely. Which leads back to number 1 the Whois record incorporated into the algos? Other then for look up searches that is?
Update - I wasn't alone spotting this Patrick also noticed and asks his own questions on if its fair to penalise sites for changing owners
Update 2: From the comments, the reference of changing owners could be related simply to expired domains. In which case the comment might considered to make more sense, maybe
Has anyone noticed activity to indicate this is true? Not that I don't trust you Matt just hey it seems a little odd!
Its seems extremely strange that one of those things could make such a big change. A combination of the three in quick succession may set off alarm bells, but I think a blanket penalisation even for all three of these things happening together would be a pretty big over-reaction.
A fourth possibility occurred to me, changing ownership by reverifying a site in Google Webmaster Tools again I wouldn’t call it proof and again I do this all the time for clients given none of them seem to have suffered this penalty I don’t think its likely.
Ryan – Your right about a month ago I did all 4 of these things with a new client who had an incorrect Whois which we changed while transferring the site to a new host and doing a major upgrade moving from Wordpress to Drupal and reverfied the site via Google Webmaster tools. Again I didn’t notice any sudden plunge in rankings, and felt quite chuffed that it went so well.
Hi Tim,
may I suggest an hint…. none of the above, but a substantial change on the site’s main topic. This can be a trigger and an indicator of a true ownership change (bad for the new owner).
I’m staying tuned on the comments to this post
Possibly but that would naturally cause a ranking drop for all your terms, and all the inbound link text would no longer represent the page i.e you would be penalising yourself. The implication from the Roundtable discussion was that this was something that happened automatically as a specific penalty. Why would you need a specific penalty if your means for identifying the site already causes a similar effect?
Still since the comment wasn’t expanded on we are in the dark and Matt could have been alluding to normal drop in rank for content change.
What’s that Matt? Sorry I can’t hear you because I’m paying attention to something way more informative.
I’ve not seen any evidence of this, to be honest. Although I’m aware of people who feel they have been penalised for changing domain ownership, I’ve also encountered plenty of situations where this hasn’t happened.
I recently transferred a few of my domains from my personal name into my company’s name. I didn’t experience any noticeable drop in rankings as a result.
I’ve moved many a domain in terms of hosting, whois info and site redesigns and not noted or experienced any significant changes in rankings.
I suppose they ‘could’ have a filter if all three happen in any given period of time.
SEO.com had a different view in that he was talking about expired domains, I think there has been a bit of confusion somewhere, I’d expect he only meant expired and not on a sale/transfer of ownership.
Thanks Scott, expired domains would at least make more sense and answer in part my original question oh how, mind you Google would have to be seriously hammering the whois system to be able to determine if a site is about to/has expired and then renewed. Also when a domain expires the site is offline much the same way as when a page is removed after a period of time even if you reupload a page with the same name you don’t always regain the link love.
But it fits neatly with Patrick question of is it fair?
Maybe if someone from Domain Roundtable can chime in with if it was related to expired domains only?
I would have to agree with the consensus thus far and say that we have changed domain ownership for the same reasons above to fix errors and not experienced an troubles.
We have also used registrar ownership verification processes to gain ownership of 2 domains in the last 6 months, which scummy webmasters had registered for clients in their own name and refused to give up. The registrars received proper ownership information, we transferred them and have experienced no drop in rank.
I do think if any of the above is an issue it would be related to content and more specifically a dominant change in the content’s them or venue… Which is clearly obvious.
Our company recently sold a few websites that had top rankings for highly competitive, international keywords. I just checked and the sites are still there, although the whois info changed at least a month ago.
I don’t think they need to hammer the whois data Tim. I believe they bought some company that did something or other with whois data. So I assume they would just incorporate that.
Your right Ryan domaintools has all the data.
Regardless of if its domaintools or Google (who is a registrar as well ) they both still need to access the records and your not talking 1 or 2, most registrar may deal with a few thousand records a day in lookups but Google your talking a few million. That is a big difference
Google’s practice of reseting domains when expired is documented going back around 5 years, but certainly the issue of domains changing hands has been raised for some time as well – that’s why lots of people, when buying up a site, look to change WHOIS details only gradually.
2c.
Without sounding negative, I think Matt Cutts (noticing a pattern) mentioned expired domains on his unofficial blog other then that I don’t think it has been documented? Certainly its not been happening I still routinely pick up just expired domains and they manage to keep their backlinks indeed I know many SEOs who actively seek such sites with dmoz and yahoo directory links.
Your second point is interesting though how do you gradually change a whois? do you mean change the address one time, the name next etc? Given that in the UK the document is legally binding and certainly misinformation on it is enough for nominet to suspend it I can’t see how you can do it?
Maybe I’m missing something…
If this becomes true, a webmaster should be care full with every website move or just some changes within your whois information.
No machine is able to decide if a site is sold or not.
I think they spider big forums like sitepoint or DP for website sales, but again whats bad if you sell your work?
I remember John Scott talking about issues around this in 2003 – certainly it doesn’t mean to say that it applies in all instances. But something to be cautious of. Jim Boykin mentioned about signing a contract to change WHOIS gradually a while back on his blog.
2c.
Sadly Jim needs to watch his videos
a quick search revealed nothing of note on the subject. I would have been interested in how he went about setting that up and why he felt the need. The general consensus seems to be its a myth, but I sort of want some one to come out and suggest it has happened even on a newly expired domain just so this thread has some real purpose for all the comments 
Isn’t this old news? Didn’t Matt discuss this about two years ago now? I’ve got to ask; why should the incoming links stay as is if ownership changes and the site content or anything else changes?
Anyway; anytime you change things up with your domain, many things can happen. It’s the same thing if you just change the name to redirect to another domain name. I just thought all of this stuff has been covered over and over again on many different types of fora, etc. It appears some out there don’t get out too much.
Hi Doug, yep from quotes by yourself, Brian and Todd on Sphinn it would appear this was old news rewrapped in light of Matts more recent comments. Though finding the earlier quotes to add to the story is proving elusive so perhaps there is some running ground left.
Many people would be horrified if as Matt said sites (which people are buying as businesses not a domain) were to suddenly lose their rankings because their inbound links were cut. It would if true (which ever single commentator who has purchased, sold domains in this thread have said it just is not) completely change the whole turnkey site industry and seriously damage the value of sites when it came to sales. Even if it is just for expired domains it would have some impact.
Now if the new owner changes the content to a completely different subject as mentioned further up the comments then quite rightly the links are going to lose their weight. But lets put it another way why should a name change on the whois document effect rankings?
The links should stay as in all honesty the belong to the site/domain. If I am to sell a online store, clearly I am going to make it rank and do some pretty significant link building to make it a better offering for purchase. So if the buyer is running related content, or in this case the developed content, why on earth would the site stand to lose its backlinks or rank.
So, Google me this… Yahoo sells to MSN they should lose all authority, rank and inbound links… Right? To hell with any merit a domain may have, I think not.
The links, rank, trust, and authority are exactly why domains do not depreciate in value… Unless you screw one up.
When you 301, backlinks are transferred regardless of the name. It then boils down their worth… Are the considered relative enough or will they be devalued. They will however remain attached to the domain, and transfer over (After a while).
This sounds like more Warmongering and inducing fear on Webmasters.
Matt Cutts give it a break!
The guy who buys your house after you cannot pay your bank note can resale it for a value greater than zero, something around the market going rate!
A property does not become valueless just because it changes ownership!
Google needs to stop playing God!
If this is true, then why do banned domains continue to be banned by Google long after they’ve expired and re-registered by other people?
here’s a link to Jim Boykin’s article talking about buying sites
jimboykin.com/screw-the-sandbox-buy-and-old-site/
Thanks Greg but I don’t think that is the one Brian means as it does not mention him using phased whois as part of a contract which is what I was after
Unless he meant
Not quite the same thing at all but I can understand why he said it when he did, though it is related very much with the sandbox which is not something that really exists these days.
Tim, you better go see Matt and clarify this. From what I gather there is no consensus to support this claim.
What Matt means is that if you buy a travel related domain and use it for SEO blog or viagra, etc. incoming links will be devalued.
But you never know, need to verify with him! He does talk in riddles! I guess he tries to see how much he can scare Black Hats off and always pushes the envelope.
I personally agree Igore. I have seen websites, that had been sold, they ownerships been changed, even the hostings, and there has been no change in the results. Matt is High I guess
Yes, I’ve noticed that activity before. I bought an expired domain (who hasn’t) and noticed a big drop in it’s PR and the links Google associated with it soon after I got hold of it. So I suspected they must have know the domain was bought and changed ownership.
I have never gone thru such any case. First time i am reading such comment and that too from Matt. Matt Please give one such example where you can show changing the ownership affects link value to zero.
I will raise this comment in SEO forums.
Edit by Tim I removed the comment spamming link, but kept the comment because I thought it was funny
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