Do http:// links to a http://www. site count the same to Google?

[initialeffort]

This is typically seen as two different websites. Most people will 301 redirect one to the other to keep visitors from going to the wrong place and to preserve link juice.

[oznappies]

There are a couple of things you should do:

1. In Google webmaster tools 'Site Configuration' 'Setting' set your prefered domain (generally the www version).

2. On your website configuration set up URLRewrite or a 301 redirect from site.com to www.site.com

3. In the head section of each page include a fqdn to inform search engines there is NOT duplicate content and all juice should pass to the www version of the page.

[oznappies]

The comment posted twice, sorry!

[KeriMorgret]

If that automatically adding of the www is done by a 301 redirect, most or all of the link juice should pass. It also makes it so that if the user copies and pastes the URL from the address bar, they're getting your preferred version there, and are thus less likely to link to you with the non-www version.

[celife]

Thanks, Keri.  I'm using the following code in .htaccess to redirect to the www version.  Do you believe this will "keep the juice'?  I believe new links will link correctly but I was curious about old links that may be going to http://example.com

RewriteEngine on
Options +FollowSymLinks

RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^example.com
RewriteRule (.*) http://www.example.com/$1 [R=301,L]

RewriteCond %{THE_REQUEST} ^[A-Z]{3,9}\ /([^/]*/)index.html?.\ HTTP/

RewriteRule ^(([^/]/))index.html?$ http://www.example.com/$1? [R=301,L]

[KeriMorgret]

I would need to look online at a reference myself to see if that's accurate.

One thing you can do is go to http://www.seoconsultants.com/tools/check-server-headers-tool/ (or your favorite search results for server header checker) and put in your non-www URL and see the server header code that is returned.

[celife]

Thanks.  My sites/webmaster tools have been configured as such for awhile but I'm unsure if the "link juice" will remain as strong for old links that are going to http://example.com (it would be time-consuming to track down and request the addition of www. to old links so I'd like to avoid it if possible).

[celife]

Thank you.

[KeriMorgret]

Jacob, Celife does mention that there is a redirect in place. Right now we're just determining if it is a 301 redirect.

[celife]

Thanks for the suggestion.  The results I got looked encouraging if I'm reading them right (never used that tool before) 

HTTP/1.1 301 Moved Permanently Date: Wed, 22 Jun 2011 05:55:04 GMT Server: Apache Location: http://www.example.com/ Content-Type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1

[Guest]

This post is deleted!

[KeriMorgret]

That looks great!

[celife]

Thanks for all of your help!