How to send one domain name to another – in three different ways

June 5, 2009 by Johnny
Filed under: Blogs & sites 

Let’s say you’re into weasel flogging. I know a lot of you are into it, so it’s a good example. Maybe you’ve registered “weaselflogging.com” and have a blog there, all about the most effective and efficient ways to flog weasels. But then you decide to buy a second domain name — say “flogthatweasel.com” — and you want to point it at your weaselflogging.com blog.

So to summarize, you want both domain names pointing at the same blog. You are NOT trying to launch a new site here. I mean, nobody needs two weasel flogging sites. You just want your bases covered with two domain names.

You choices are:

1. Domain forwarding
When you forward a domain, you’re simply saying to the browser, “Oh, flogthatweasel.com. You need to head over to weaselflogging.com.” So when someone enters flogthatweasel.com into their browser, it just sends them to weaselflogging.com. They know they’re heading to the different domain name, because as the page loads, the URL in their browser actually changes to weaselflogging.com.

2. Domain forwarding with masking
“Masking” means you’re hiding the actual URL of the page you’re sending visitors to. In this case, we still want users to wind up at weaselflogging.com, but we want them to think they’re at flogthatweasel.com. So basically, the same thing happens as in #1 above, but this time the URL in their browser doesn’t change. Instead, it remains “flogthatweasel.com,” just as they typed it in.

(This is a really useful strategy for affiliate links. Let’s say you’re an Amazon.com affiliate and are constantly sending people to Amazon to buy a book on weasel flogging. However, you don’t want them to know that it’s an affiliate link. So what you do is you register a domain name like www.weaselfloggingbook.com and you forward and mask that domain so that it goes to your affiliate link. The visitor will think they’re at weaselfloggingbook.com, but they’re actually at http://www.amazon.com/books/category=rodent-abuse&subgenre=weasel-flogging&affiliate=8309302.)

The problem with the way that most registrars do masking (like GoDaddy’s forward-and-mask service) is that the URL in the browser remains flogthatweasel.com as the visitor clicks on links and views other pages. It won’t change to, for instance, www.flogthatweasel.com/contact.htm.

3. Mapping
I don’t know if this is the official term, but I think of option #3 (which solves the problem from option #2) as “domain mapping.” In order for this to work, you need to own both domain names involved. You can’t do what I’m calling “mapping” with an Amazon URL because you don’t own Amazon.com. But don’t you wish you did?

In this case, you’re telling the new domain to use the same files as the old domain name. You’re saying, “If someone wants a file at flogthatweasel.com OR at weaselflogging.com, look in this folder on my hosting service to find it.”

This will make your links work properly. They will behave in all ways as if they are two totally separate websites, but they will use the same files. So if you make a change to the contact page of weaselflogging.com, the contact page on flogthatweasel.com will change too.

Happy domain play. I know you love it.

 

 

 

 

Comments

21 Comments on How to send one domain name to another – in three different ways

  1. patrick on Fri, 5th Jun 2009 7:01 pm

    2. your link to your ebook is gone. In Firefox I do not get a form to fill out to download it or get it emailed to me.

  2. amy on Sat, 6th Jun 2009 9:08 pm

    3. How do these techniques effect search engine rankings?
    Can they cause any duplicate content penalties, etc?

  3. Johnny on Sat, 6th Jun 2009 11:03 pm

    4. You know, I could try to guess at an answer and pretend I knew, but I don’t. The guy to ask about such SEO things is Michael Martine ( http://tinyurl.com/lkswmy ) because he knows one hell of a lot more about it than I do.

    I will say that I can’t imagine that forwarding (#1) would affect anything because it’s a simple redirection. I’m assuming that forwarding with masking (#2) is the same. #3 is the one I don’t know, and I’d see if Michael’s written anything about it. I have heard that supposedly the duplicate content penalty is way overstated, but I don’t know for sure.

  4. The Real Secret to Becoming a Popular Blogger | Copyblogger on Thu, 11th Jun 2009 2:38 pm

    5. [...] you can make someone smile a little when discussing the ins and outs of domain forwarding, they’re likely to come to you when they want to know more about, say, how to manage their web [...]

  5. Matches Malone on Thu, 11th Jun 2009 3:06 pm

    6. Of course, I have just the one domain name, but I guess I could get a few others. They’re cheap, right? :)

  6. Johnny on Thu, 11th Jun 2009 3:21 pm

    7. You should get several more and point them all to each other. Don’t have a website on any of them; just put them in a big loop.

    Domain A > Domain B > Domain C > Domain D > Domain A

    You’ll totally break the internet.

  7. amy on Thu, 11th Jun 2009 5:43 pm

    8. Please don’t break the internet – I’m using it.

  8. The Real Secret to Becoming a Popular Blogger on Thu, 11th Jun 2009 6:34 pm

    9. [...] you can make someone smile a little when discussing the ins and outs of domain forwarding, they’re likely to come to you when they want to know more about, say, how to manage their web [...]

  9. The Real Secret to Becoming a Popular Blogger | Marketing Blog | Affiliate Blog on Thu, 11th Jun 2009 10:03 pm

    10. [...] you can make someone smile a little when discussing the ins and outs of domain forwarding, they’re likely to come to you when they want to know more about, say, how to manage their web [...]

  10. The Real Secret to Becoming a Popular Blogger | Internet Marketing Superstar on Sun, 14th Jun 2009 2:08 pm

    11. [...] you can make someone smile a little when discussing the ins and outs of domain forwarding, they’re likely to come to you when they want to know more about, say, how to manage their web [...]

  11. The Real Secret to Becoming a Popular Blogger | feed hat blog on Wed, 17th Jun 2009 8:17 am

    12. [...] you can make someone smile a little when discussing the ins and outs of domain forwarding, they’re likely to come to you when they want to know more about, say, how to manage their web [...]

  12. The Real Secret to Becoming a Popular Blogger | Design Website on Fri, 19th Jun 2009 4:57 pm

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  13. The Real Secret to Becoming a Popular Blogger | Haroun Kola: Eco geek, Rainbow guru on Wed, 24th Jun 2009 8:51 pm

    14. [...] you can make someone smile a little when discussing the ins and outs of domain forwarding, they’re likely to come to you when they want to know more about, say, how to manage their web [...]

  14. SPDworks on Tue, 4th Aug 2009 12:04 am

    15. I would loooove to put in the site URL right about now, but I’m waiting patiently, as needed, of course. Actually, usually I’m not all that patient. Ask the many soda machines that ripped me for a quarter or more. This is a big secret, so don’t tell anyone, but I’m the reason they bolt those babies to the floor now:P Anyway, I’m thinking I want door number three, Monty. Sorry I’m not wearing my pajamas and carrying a giant carrot or something, but I’m sure you’ve got something good in your polyester pocket for the likes of this audience member anyway, don’t you?;) Thanks ever so much for all you do Mr. JBT (and remember, that bit about the bolted soda machines…that’s between you and me, k?)

  15. The Real Secret to Becoming a Popular Blogger | OpenABlog on Wed, 5th Aug 2009 2:13 pm

    16. [...] you can make someone smile a little when discussing the ins and outs of domain forwarding, they’re likely to come to you when they want to know more about, say, how to manage their web [...]

  16. Consumer Mailing Lists on Mon, 17th Aug 2009 5:51 pm

    17. This is some great information, are there any specific sites or software to use when doing this process? I’m especially interested in hiding affiliate links, this is a great way to get people to actually use the affiliates. Thanks for the info.

  17. Johnny on Mon, 17th Aug 2009 7:42 pm

    18. I have a suspicion that’s a spam comment since the name is “Consumer Mailing Lists” and I’m not sure the question is totally applicable to this topic, but I’ll try to answer anyway.

    No special software is involved. You just go to wherever your domains are hosted and go to the domain info interface and do it there. You can indeed use it to hide affiliate links (get a new domain name and have it forwarded & masked to the affiliate link), but why hide them? I tend to be pretty open about that kind of thing.

    It is useful for article marketing, though, where they don’t allow long-form affiliate links.

  18. Siraaj on Tue, 2nd Feb 2010 1:49 pm

    19. Hi Johnny,

    I have my blog on muslimbestlife.com/blog, and I’m want it so that anytime someone goes to muslimbestlife.com, they see what’s on muslimbestlife.com/blog – you know how I can go about doing that?

    Siraaj

  19. Johnny on Thu, 4th Feb 2010 6:17 pm

    20. Hey Siraaj,

    The simplest solution is to do a simple Javascript redirect. Go ahead and put an index.html file at muslimbestlife.com that has the following code in it (in the section) and it should handle it for you:

    (Note: This code isn’t mine. I got it online. The author is credited below)

    //Browser redirect Script- © Dynamic Drive (www.dynamicdrive.com)
    //For full source code, 100′s more DHTML scripts, and Terms Of Use,
    //visit dynamicdrive.com

    var browser_type=navigator.appName
    var browser_version=parseInt(navigator.appVersion)

    //if NS 6
    if (browser_type==”Netscape”&&browser_version>=5)
    window.location.replace(“http://muslimbestlife.com/blog”)
    //if IE 4+
    else if (browser_type==”Microsoft Internet Explorer”&&browser_version>=4)
    window.location.replace(“http://muslimbestlife.com/blog”)
    //if NS4+
    else if (browser_type==”Netscape”&&browser_version>=4)
    window.location.replace(“http://muslimbestlife.com/blog”)
    //Default goto page (NOT NS 4+ and NOT IE 4+)
    else
    window.location=”http://muslimbestlife.com/blog”

  20. Johnny on Thu, 4th Feb 2010 6:21 pm

    21. Dammit, how the fuck can I paste code?

  21. Johnny on Thu, 4th Feb 2010 6:23 pm

    22. Dammit… just email me if you’d like the code. It wants to USE it here, and the code tags aren’t working for some reason.

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