WWW vs. Non-WWW- What does it all mean?

Most people know that one can link one’s site with www or non www versions. This simply means that when one tries to open a site with http://www.Mycompany.com or http://Mycompany.com, both will open up your site. Simple? Maybe from the point of view of the user, however, search engines will treat your website differently if web pages link to www or non www versions. This is because, the way you type out the information will point to different destination, thus making search engines treat one URL as real and inbound and links on the other URL may not be counted. The formal name for this phenomenon in the search engine industry is Canonical URL Issue.

What should one do?
When the Canonical URL Issue arises, it results in a decrease in link popularity as search engines consider them as two separate URL’s and thus counts link popularity separately for both. See the Google PR of your pages with www and non www version to identify different PR for both versions. To prevent this, one should select the same form for the URL for inbound as well as internal linking. Stay consistent with your URL structure when you begin setting up your links and also ensure that all incoming links are pointed to the same form of your URL. In addition, follow the same structure within your own website. Also, ensure that your own internal links on your website are linked to the same URL as your inbound links.

What you need to remember?
Technically, there is no difference for search engines for using www or non www versions. Users approach the same with different points of view such as that with the www version, four more characters need to be typed. Others believe that all user’s type www first while attempting to browse the net. Keep in mind that many directories require www in the site location. It becomes simpler to use www as it is very common and most people get confused if you have a domain without www. No matter which choice you make, www or non www, consistency needs to maintained as far as internal linking is concerned.

What is the next step?
First check and ensure that both Mycompany.com and www.Mycompany.com are consolidated into one site instead of two. Remember that showing your content under two different URL’s will never be good for your company. Begin by finding out the Page Rank of each version and then choose the version that has higher PR since it is more frequently linked by other websites. Adopt 301 redirect so that you do not have two versions of your site available. This will change your ranking more positively as there will no longer exist a split on your site due to two sets of URLs thus giving you more power. Be patient, if you do not see the effect very soon, remember that search engines take time in whole updates of the web. Be patient and you will bear the fruits! 301 redirection can be made in many ways but the most popular method seems to be to either use .htaccess file or set on the server. You can set up your server with the right default host name when you do so or have your host do it for you. Configuration makes the difference, if the web server is not configured to have the proper default (www or non www) it would result in so many redirects that will result in an increase in time to load the site.

Redirection explained!
When you provide a redirect, users will naturally link to using the one that you desire to be used. To double ensure this, make sure that all of your internal links result with the correct link as wished by you. Consistent URL links of your site will force search engines to index the real URL. Also, since users will be linked to the URL structure you want, this will have various consequences. Firstly, this will result into saving of leakage of Page Rank. Most importantly, this will result to an increase in link popularity to improve your search engine ranking. Since the goal of each web site owner is to increase traffic to their website, the ultimate goal will be achieved fruitfully.

Michael Henderson, a proffessional web designer and SEO expert. He has worked on many projects for the world wide web design company in India and Overseas. His experience & understanding of web technologies, web applications, search engines & WWW standards made him act as consultant for clients for proposing optimal web based solution to back there business needs and an adviser for web developers & web designers for developing pages which meet W3C standards in all respects.