www, non www, redirection, and SEO

  • Samantha

    (@cwsuteradmin)


    9 years ago

    Looking for some advice on what appears to be a fairly ambiguous topic:

    In the admin panel for my site (settings >> general), I have the WordPress Address (URL) set to https://www.my-site.com

    In Google’s Webmaster Tools, I have both the www and non www versions of my site verified, and have specified my domain preference to be the non www version : my-site.com

    I have added rewrite rules to my .htaccess file only to handle pretty permalinks:

    # BEGIN WordPress
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^index\.php$ - [L]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule . /index.php [L]
</IfModule>

# END WordPress

    I am also using the Yoast SEO plugin, which is placing the following canoniclazation in my site head: <link rel="canonical" href="https://www.my-site.com/"> As I understand it, the plugin is doing this based on the way I have my WordPress Address (URL) and permalinks structure set.

    When I look at the Google Webmaster tools, the non www version of my site is showing that there is no structured data on my site, and that my links are being redirected to the www version of my site. The www version appears with all of the structured data I expect, and without redirects. I understand that it is redirecting from non www to www because of the way I have my WordPress Address (URL) set.

    According to Moz Local’s documentation, it will benefit my site’s SEO health if I make my preferred domain name in Google Webmaster Tools and my WordPress Address (URL) match.

    So, I’m looking for opinions:

    • Is there any detriment to changing my WordPress Address (URL) to the non www version of my domain name?
    • If I do this, do I need to add rewrite rules to my .htaccess file to handle the www-to-non-www change?

    OR

    • Should I simply add a rule to my .htaccess file to rewrite www to non www, without changing the WordPress Address (URL) in the admin settings for my page?

    OR

    • Is it better to change my preferred domain in Google’s Webmaster tools from the non www version to the www version?
    • and if I do that, will it hurt the SEO progress I’ve made in the last few months? (it may be important to note that all of my local directory listings and social media profiles use the non www version of my domain.)

    Any insight is greatly appreciated.

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