Complete Overhaul - Website

Scotwed

I have been with Smugmug for a few years and have no major problems however, I have only used the service as a bolt-on to my own website http://www.scotwedphotos.co.uk using the service from my 'Gallery Link'. http://gallery.scotwedphotos.co.uk/

I have worked very hard on SEO of my website, for years, and it now features on pages 1 and 2 of Google, for all my required search phrases.

I have been doing wedding photography for a number of years but, had never managed to get the quality of lenses which I knew that I needed, until now. For that reason, I had not displayed my work in 'full page', it just isn't good enough. I have now acquired all the high quality lenses which I need and when I start producing better quality work, I wish to completely overhaul the appearance of my website, using Smugmug as the main page, rather than a bolt on service, just to view images in the gallery.

My problems are:

I don't want to lose or affect the SEO success, which has resulted from the written content, of my current home page.

How do I change from the current http://gallery.scotwedphotos.co.uk/ to making Smugmug my home page at http://www.scotwedphotos.co.uk?

Should I consider leaving the current set-up and introducing a new Smugmug website, under a different domain name, Start from scratch?

Any help, advice, thoughts would help me decide on this important issue.

Hero Amanda

Hi Scotwed,

We understand your concern! We'd recommend setting up the new domain, then forward your old domain to the new one. It will definitely affect the SEO, but we have no way of knowing how Google will react to the changes. I wish there was a way we could force it on our end, but there isn't.

If there's anything else we can help you with, just let us know!

denisegoldberg

I've merged your two identical threads. I suspect you entered the second thread because your first wasn't showing. When your initial posts include URLs they are marked to be approved by a moderator; sometimes it takes a little time for a moderator to see the thread needing approval.

Have you considered doing the work to update your smugmug site to cover your full domain and then using your current domain name? I wouldn't change your current setup until you are ready to unveil the full smug site.

If it were my site, I would be concerned about my viewers (who are already entering my domain name) losing track of my site. Of course once you move to your new site, if you choose to use a different domain name you could forward your current domain to the new URL (as Amanda noted above).

To change your smug site to reference the full site name instead of the subdomain you would update the Custom Domain setting in your Account Settings... Me... Custom Domain. See the help page at http://help.smugmug.com/customer/portal/articles/93340-how-do-i-use-my-custom-domain-.

--- Denise

denisegoldberg

Scotwed wrote: »

I...from my 'Gallery Link'. http://gallery.scotwedphotos.co.uk/

I just looked at a few of your galleries and I noticed that you have allowed access to the Original sized photos. Are you aware that this allows your viewers to download copies of your photos for free?

Yes, I know, you have right click protection turned on. This feature is merely a very small stumbling block; it is quite easy to click to the original and then download it directly from the browser cache. I recommend that you change your galleries to not allow access to Originals - set the largest size to anything other than Original. The original will still be used for printing purposes.

--- Denise

Jenuine

Hi Scotwed,

I would concur with Denise's summation of protecting your images by changing your maximum viewing to something smaller than Original. The original image cannot be watermarked by our system and leaves the image vulnerable for downloads, screen shots and all manner of options for collecting the image. Here is information on how to protect your images, the maximum viewing is mentioned here as well.

http://help.smugmug.com/customer/portal/articles/1230107?b_id=1644

Best,

Jen
Support Hero

Scotwed

Hero Amanda wrote: »

Hi Scotwed,

We understand your concern! We'd recommend setting up the new domain, then forward your old domain to the new one. It will definitely affect the SEO, but we have no way of knowing how Google will react to the changes. I wish there was a way we could force it on our end, but there isn't.

If there's anything else we can help you with, just let us know!

Thank you Amanda, SEO has become a finely tuned science. I've noticed that even changing just one key word on my home page, can drop that search phrase many places, in Google search results.

Denise (and Jen), That was the reason for the duplicate post :-) I'll have a look at the Original Image problem although, I do provide the digital images, to wedding clients, in any case.