MSNBot not crawling site

[Sub01]

I am having a problem with MSNBot crawling my site.

I closed down an old web site in December, and started a new one about a month ago. I specified a 301 redirect in the .htaccess file from the old domain to the new one. I have an xml site map for the new site, and its location is specified in the robots.txt file using the SITEMAP: location.

Doing a search for site:domain shows only 15 pages for the new domain, none of which is the home page. The cache indicates the pages were indexed more than a month ago. Doing the same search (site:) for the old domain shows about 10 pages that were indexed about a week ago, however, clicking on the cache takes me to a page that just says Object Moved click here. There are no pages like that on my site.

My server logs indicate MSNBot has not crawled my site. Is it possible the bot is having a problem following the redirect? If so, is there anything I can do about it?

The content and design of both sites is pretty much the same (the new site has fewer pages). MSNBot had no problem crawling the old site, so I don't think coding is an issue.

I would welcome any feedback or comments on the issue.

Cheyenne Miller
Webmaster
www.harvesthomeorganics.com

[incrediblehelp]

Check this post:

linkdomain: and inurl: Turned Off at MSN

What is the URL of the old website and new website?

[Sub01]

incrediblehelp wrote:

Check this post:

linkdomain: and inurl: Turned Off at MSN

What is the URL of the old website and new website?

Oops, I forgot to include that with my post. The old domain is www.internationalhealthfood.com the new domain is www.harvesthomeorganics.com

I read the post about several of the tools being disabled at MSN. That could very well include the site: tool, however, I am not sure that would explain why the MSNbot is not crawling my site, unless MSN is not updating their index until they resolve the problems they are having...That would surprise me quite a bit.

Cheyenne Miller
Webmaster
www.harvesthomeorganics.com

[incrediblehelp]

A couple of points:

You closed the website down 4 months ago and then started the new website only 1 month ago? Sounds like you are starting from scratch with the new one.

Even if the 301 redirect has been in place for a month it may not do much since the old website was taken down so long ago.

[Sub01]

Thanks. Good point. It will probably take a few months to get straightened out.

Cheyenne