Why does expired domains still work for SEO?

[Sir]

Hi everyone

I’ve been doing an experiment during more than 1 year to try to see if its possible to buy expired domains.

I know its considered black hat, but like I said, I wanted to experiment, that is what SEO is about.

What I did was to buy domains that just expired, immediately added content on a WP setup, filled it with relevant content to the expired domain and then started building links to other relevant sites from these domains.( Here is a pretty good post on how to do, and I did it in a similar way. http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2297718/How-to-Build-Links-Using-Expired-Domains )

This is nothing new and SEO:s has been doing it for along time.

There is a lot of rumors around the SEO world that the domains becomes worthless after they expire. But after trying it out during more than 1 year and with about 50 different expired domains I can conclude that it DOES work, 100% of the time.

Some of the domains are of course better than others, but I cannot see any signs of the expired domains or the sites i link to has been punished by Google. The sites im liking to ranks great ONLY with those links

So to the question:

WHY does Google allow this? They should be able to see that a domain has been expired right? And if its expired, why dont they just “delete” all the links to that domain after the expiry date? Google is well aware of this problem so what is stopping them?

Is there any one here that know how this works technically?

[KevinBudzynski]

One reason it's difficult is that a domain may have expired because the owner forgot to renew it. Once it's expired, the owner quickly renews it. Should they begin from square one? Probably not--so that's why it isn't deleted (and may be the answer your looking for).  If a domain has expired and no site goes up, it will eventually just gradually "disappear" (although may not fully).

[TheeDigital]

With questions like this, I tend to look at it not from Google's point of view but from a person's point of view. The spiders are getting smarter after all and Google always says to write content and create websites for people not the Spiders.

So to answer your questions, you might want to ask yourself these questions:

• How am I supposed to know that the links on my website are broken, because a site I was linking to is now down?
• How do I know that the domain I am now visiting was down for a month or even a year?
• How do I know said blog is being used for black hat purposes? It it has relevant content and helps me, that's all that matters.

[Sir]

Thanks for the answers but I'm afraid that doesn't answer the question. How does it work technically?

[KeriMorgret]

The only people who would know exactly how it works technically would be the people at Google who work on that section of the algorithm. They don't tend to hang out in forums and give away the inner-workings of how things rank, and likely are under many NDAs so they couldn't say even if they wanted to.

[Sir]

Please use that sarcastic tone some where else Keri. And I'm not asking for the algorithm.

I guess its me that has asked the question in a wrong way, I apologize for that. Let's take Google out of the picture completely for the most important question.

Is there ANYONE in the whole wide world that in some way can see if a domain has been expired and then been bought again just seconds later? If yes, HOW?

The next question would then be why Google doesn't just put the PR back to 0 and "block" all the linkvalue that the domain name had before it expired. Because its not very likely that its the same owner that buys the domain after it has expired (the domain doesn't just expire immediately, its sits in a quarantine for a few months). But as I said, don't ask yourself that yet, answer the first question.

Is there any technical yoda in here?

[danatanseo]

Greetings, I am going to weigh in here, not because I am any kind of Yoda at all, but purely from a common sense point of view. I hope that's okay.

I would deduce that if anyone was able to know when a domain was released and how soon it sold thereafter it would have to be the domain registrar. So, let's say, hypothetically, that some domain registrar decides they are going to start publishing a list of domains that were released for sale and then sold immediately. Then let's say Google gets a feed of that list and just automatically, via the algorithm, discounts every single one of those domains down to PR 0, and strips them of all potential link authority value...

I'm sure you can see dozens of problems with that scenario. Here are just a few:

1. No one can really evaluate the new owner's identity or purpose without knowing who the new owner is. If registrars disclosed that information, I can't even imagine the number of privacy issues that would arise.

2. The assumption would be being made that the new owner is not the same, related to the old company. I'm sure there are plenty of cases where this happens.

3. Google would be making the assumption that the selling of the domain to a new domain owner was to end the business. Again, there are probably many many instances when this is not the case.

It seems to me that Google, nor any other search engine, can reasonably deduce the motives of a new domain owner. I mean, there are some smart folks at Google, but I don't think clairvoyance has entered the algorithm yet. Consequently, it probably seems more reasonable to let expired domains retain some of their value with the belief that most business owners are only going to buy domains relevant to their business and that end users will cast their "votes" for how well these new owners use the real estate by exhibiting either engagement or bouncing and viewing another site. Eventually, the algorithm will more or less accurately sift through the results and serve up results that visitors find engaging.

Sure, maybe it works for a year, two years, hell, even three years. So maybe this approach is viable, for now for a website or a page that just seeks short term benefits. But, if what you are building is a business that you want to last, a brand that you want to matter to people 20, 50, 100 years from now? Then I think there are far better uses of your time, effort and resources.