What? Trouble with just three letters? One of the world’s most familiar abbreviations, WWW, can cause a lack of flow through your website. When a person goes to visit a website, they commonly type in “www.example.com”. Thankfully, most websites now do not require the WWW to be typed in. Except, on the rare occasion when a server is not configured correctly for this, the WWW may need to be typed before the URL.

Many sources claim that using the WWW is preferable to not using it. The argument is that supposedly more traffic comes to the site. Many sources also claim that not using the WWW is preferable to using it. The argument is that supposedly nothing interrupts traffic at all and the domain name is easier to understand and remember. So, which way is really preferable?

After much research, the conclusion is that whoever sets up a website needs to set the WWW “option” up before the website has time to be indexed into the various search engines. For example, if a person decides to leave the WWW off of the web address, then three months down the road they decide to add it back on, search engines such as Google and Yahoo! (who have already indexed the website by now) will see this as a new website, which they don’t like! because indexing of the website will have to be redone. Though, it is possible to switch back after the search engines have indexed the website. If this happens, there will be a short period of time before the website starts showing up in the search engines’ directories again, causing a short lack of traffic through the website.

Whatever the preference, make sure the WWW is set up before the website’s introduction to the World Wide Web for maximum traffic and fewer linking problems.

For further reading, please visit these sources:

• no-www.org/
• wisdump.com/webmastering/benefits-of-removing-www-from-your-url/
• www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=44232