Re-directing old domains to New Domains

[SEOCM]

I previously had a domain with good ranking, but had to redirect this to a new domain for branding purposing and has only been around for 1 year instead 10 years like the previous.

Does the weight of the entire pagerank from the old domain get transferred to the new domain?  How does Google handle this?  The old domain had a good keyword in the name, which help rank that keyword...does that keyword also get transferred to the new domain with Google?

[SimonCullum]

Hi SEOCM, (apologies for the lack of paragraphing here, doesn't work on an iPad). Note: Keri added paragraph marks, and the iPad issue is in our bug queue. (Thank you)

Q1) and Q2) If the redirect was done correctly (a 301 permanent redirect in effect) then Most of the previous website's strength will be applied to your new website, there is some loss though, usually varies between a 5% and 20% loss. A 301 redirect tells the search engines that the move is permanent, so Google after a fairly short while, recognises this new site as the new home of the previous site.

Q3) Keywords in Domains are believed to now not have as much ranking weight as they used to. Most of the old website's overall strength will be applied to the new website rather than say an individual keyword in the previous domain.

So don't worry, so long as the migration from the old site to the new one was done correctly, you'll likely get the maximum benefit that you can.

Regards, Simon