This morning on the bus I was curious as to the differences in incoming traffic from external links using the traditional http://www.* domain against the alternative http://* address.

I have used three small sites in this test sample, one active domain – michaelvisser.com.au – and two dormants; doubleplusminus.com and 2xexposure.com.

Before looking into the data I expect the difference across all three domains to be somewhere near 70/30 leaning towards higher use of http://www.* domains.

After setting my preferred domain within Google Webmaster Tools I have 196 external links pointing to http://www.michaelvisser.com.au and no link from http://michaelvisser.com.au. Experiment end.

I’m at a loss to resolve this issue, can the un-competing domain be 301’d to the main one?