Google, has recently started redirecting Blogger/ Blogspot blogs to country specific domains. For example, if you open abc.blogspot.com in your browser, you might be redirected to abc.blogspot.co.uk if you are located in UK or to abc.blogspot.in if you are located in India.
Google mainly implemented this feature to have selective censorship - i.e, Google can now block a Blogger blog in one country but still make it available in other countries.
This country specific URL redirection has some negative impact on your blog. I have highlighted some of them below:
- Facebook Likes, Tweets, and Google plus for your blog posts may be diluted as the URLs for the same posts become different for visitors from different locations. That could also affect your blog's SEO. A recent analysis has shown that links from Social Networking sites are highly valued by search engines. Now the redirection could cost you links to your '.com' URL.
- It may also cost you some Google juice as external websites may link to your country-specific pages.
If you think redirection isn't a good idea, you can add the following code to your Blogger template and it will ensure that your visitors are served with your .com blog irrespective of their location.
1. Go to Blogger Dashboard -> Template.
2. Click the “Edit HTML” then “Proceed.”
3. Paste the following code into the template after the <head> tag.
4. Click Save Template button and View your blog. It will no longer redirect your blog to country specific URLs.
Note: Implementing this code may affect your Blogs Template Designer. If you would like to make any customizations to your blog's template make sure you remove this piece of code and customize. Once you're done, add the code.
Follow the steps to stop Blogger/Blogspot blog from redirecting:
1. Go to Blogger Dashboard -> Template.
2. Click the “Edit HTML” then “Proceed.”
3. Paste the following code into the template after the <head> tag.
<script type="text/javascript">
var blog = document.location.hostname;
var slug = document.location.pathname;
var ctld = blog.substr(blog.lastIndexOf("."));
if (ctld != ".com") {
var ncr = "http://" + blog.substr(0, blog.indexOf("."));
ncr += ".blogspot.com/ncr" + slug;
window.location.replace(ncr);
}
</script>
4. Click Save Template button and View your blog. It will no longer redirect your blog to country specific URLs.
Note: Implementing this code may affect your Blogs Template Designer. If you would like to make any customizations to your blog's template make sure you remove this piece of code and customize. Once you're done, add the code.