You just added blog.yourname.com to your Jottings site. The SSL certificate is installed. The custom domain is live.

Now you're wondering: what happens to yourname.jottings.me?

The answer is: we don't delete it.

Why Not Just Redirect?

When you switch to a custom domain, the obvious thing to do is redirect the old subdomain to the new one. That's what every platform does.

But I didn't want to do that.

Here's why: redirects are forever.

If I set up a permanent (301) redirect from your Jottings subdomain to your custom domain, and then something happens—maybe you lose your domain, or you need to move your site elsewhere—that old URL becomes permanently broken. It's gone from the internet, and anyone who bookmarked it, linked to it, or shared it will hit a dead end.

That feels wrong to me.

The Parking Page

Instead, we do something different. We keep your old subdomain alive, but we serve what I call a "parking page."

The parking page is simple. It's your site, rendered exactly as it was, but with a subtle notice at the top:

This site has moved to a new domain. Visit it here: blog.yourname.com

That's it. No aggressive redirect. No blinking arrows. Just a gentle nudge that tells visitors where to find you.

The Technical Side: Canonical URLs

Here's the important part: we don't want search engines to think your site is duplicated.

When Google crawls both yourname.jottings.me and blog.yourname.com, it could see them as two separate sites competing for the same keywords. That's bad for SEO.

So we add a canonical tag to the parking page:

<link rel="canonical" href="https://blog.yourname.com/" />

This tells search engines: "This content exists on another URL. That URL is the real one."

Over time, Google transfers all the SEO value from the old subdomain to your custom domain. Your search rankings follow you. No loss of authority. No broken backlinks.

Why This Matters

This approach respects three groups of people:

For you: Your old links still work. If someone shared yourname.jottings.me/my-favorite-post, that link still takes them to your post. You don't have to worry about external sites breaking.

For your visitors: They see your content. If they find an old link or bookmark, they still get where they're going. No 404 errors. No frustration.

For search engines: They understand that you've migrated to a new home. Your SEO doesn't get reset. Your years of optimization transfer with you.

What About Analytics?

One thing to note: traffic to your old subdomain won't appear in your custom domain's analytics (since they're technically different URLs). But that's okay. The important thing is that your content is still accessible, and search engines know where the "real" version lives.

If you want to track all traffic together, you can add both domains to the same Google Analytics property, and analytics will understand they're the same site.

The Graceful Transition

The web moves too fast. Platforms die. Domains expire. URLs break.

I designed the parking page as a buffer against that. It's not perfect—nothing is. But it's better than the alternative.

Your old subdomain becomes a gentle redirect sign, not a dead end.

And that feels like the right way to do it.

If you have questions about how this works on your site, feel free to reach out. We're always happy to explain what's happening under the hood.