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https://merchantcircle.com

Infrastructure

· 9 checks — DNS, redirects, IPv6, crawlability, URL variants, and domain intelligence rolled into one auditable list.
SCORE
77
GRADE
C
FIX
1
REVIEW
5
PASS
3
INFO
0
Probed from Madrid, Spain
301 Moved Permanently
Checks
9
3 PASS 5 REVIEW 1 FIX
D
CDN & Delivery
Action
No CDN detected
FIX
No CDN detected
Warning::
No CDN detected
A CDN can significantly improve load times for users around the world by caching content at edge nodes closer to them.
No CDN detected

Consider using a CDN to improve global delivery speed and reduce origin load.

B
Redirect Chain
1 redirect(s), 2692 ms total
REVIEW
1 redirect(s), 2692 ms total
Info::
Single redirect
Got: https://merchantcircle.com → https://www.merchantcircle.com:443/ (301)
Info::
WWW normalization redirect
Warning::
Redirect overhead: 2692 ms total
Got: 2692 ms

https://merchantcircle.com

674 ms · HTTP/1.1

301

https://www.merchantcircle.com:443/

2018 ms · HTTP/1.1 FINAL

#URLStatusTimeProtocolServer
1https://merchantcircle.com301674 msHTTP/1.1awselb/2.0
2https://www.merchantcircle.com:443/2002018 msHTTP/1.1nginx/1.18.0 (Ubuntu)

See the visual redirect chain in the HTTP Probe tab →

C
IPv6 Readiness
Action
No IPv6 support
REVIEW
No IPv6 support
Info::
No IPv6 (AAAA) records found
IPv6 support is increasingly important for global accessibility. About 40% of internet users have IPv6 connectivity.
No IPv6 Support
About 40% of internet users have IPv6. Consider adding AAAA records.

IPv6 support is increasingly important for global accessibility. About 40% of internet users have IPv6 connectivity.

Why this matters

No AAAA records — same impact as 'no IPv6 (AAAA) records'; IPv6-preferring clients pay extra latency falling back to IPv4.

Source: Google IPv6 stats

C
Crawlability
Action
robots.txt present, sitemap with 2 URLs
REVIEW
robots.txt present, sitemap with 2 URLs
Info::
robots.txt is present
Got: 6939 bytes
Critical::
robots.txt blocks all crawlers
Disallow: / for all user-agents prevents search engines from indexing any page. This will remove the site from search results.
Info::
sitemap.xml is present
Info::
sitemap.xml is valid XML
Info::
sitemap.xml contains 2 entries
Info::
Sitemap index with 2 child sitemaps
Info::
robots.txt references sitemap

Disallow: / for all user-agents prevents search engines from indexing any page. This will remove the site from search results.

Why this matters

Disallow: / in robots.txt blocks every search crawler — the site becomes invisible in organic search.

Learn more ▾

Common deployment mistake: a staging robots.txt with `User-agent: * / Disallow: /` ships to prod. The site falls out of search results within days. Verify your robots.txt is the production-intended version. If this is intentional (private site), no action needed.

Source: Google Search Central

robots.txt 200 OK
Size 6939 B Sitemaps referenced 7 User-agents Adsbot-Google, Slurp, yahoo-mmcrawler, yahoo-blogs/v3.9, ScoutJet, rogerbot, Mediapartners-Google, MSNBot, ia_archiver, Googlebot, Googlebot-Mobile, Teoma, psbot, DuckDuckBot, Googlebot-Image, bingbot, dotbot, * Blocking Yes — all crawlers blocked
User-agent: Mediapartners-Google
Disallow: /ajax/
Disallow: /map/
Disallow: /signup/
Disallow: /auth/
Disallow: /merchant/
Disallow: /redirect/
Disallow: /ads/
Disallow: /profile/
Disallow: /partner/
Disallow: /local/
Disallow: /neighbor/
Disallow: /neighbors/
Disallow: /quotes/
Disallow: /vehicleimages/
Disallow: /wp-admin/
Disallow: /wp-includes/
Disallow: /wp-content/plugins/

User-agent: Googlebot
Disallow: /ajax/
Disallow: /map/
Disallow: /signup/
Disallow: /auth/
Disallow: /merchant/
Disallow: /redirect/
Disallow: /ads/
Disallow: /profile/
Disallow: /partner/
Disallow: /local/
Disallow: /neighbor/
Disallow: /neighbors/
Disallow: /quotes/
Disallow: /vehicleimages/
Disallow: /wp-admin/
Disallow: /wp-includes/
Disallow: /wp-content/plugins/

User-agent: Adsbot-Google
Disallow: /ajax/
Disallow: /map/
Disallow: /signup/
Disallow: /auth/
Disallow: /merchant/
Disallow: /redirect/
Disallow: /ads/
Disallow: /profile/
Disallow: /partner/
Disallow: /local/
Disallow: /neighbor/
Disallow: /neighbors/
Disallow: /quotes/
Disallow: /vehicleimages/
Disallow: /wp-admin/
Disallow: /wp-includes/
Disallow: /wp-content/plugins/

User-agent: Googlebot-Image
Disallow: /ajax/
Disallow: /map/
Disallow: /signup/
Disallow: /auth/
Disallow: /merchant/
Disallow: /redirect/
Disallow: /ads/
Disallow: /profile/
Disallow: /partner/
Disallow: /local/
Disallow: /neighbor/
Disallow: /neighbors/
Disallow: /quotes/
Disallow: /vehicleimages/
Disallow: /wp-admin/
Disallow: /wp-includes/
Disallow: /wp-content/plugins/

User-agent: Googlebot-Mobile
Disallow: /ajax/
Disallow: /map/
Disallow: /signup/
Disallow: /auth/
Disallow: /merchant/
Disallow: /redirect/
Disallow: /ads/
Disallow: /profile/
Disallow: /partner/
Disallow: /local/
Disallow: /neighbor/
Disallow: /neighbors/
Disallow: /quotes/
Disallow: /vehicleimages/
Disallow: /wp-admin/
Disallow: /wp-includes/
Disallow: /wp-content/plugins/

User-agent: MSNBot
Disallow: /ajax/
Disallow: /map/
Disallow: /signup/
Disallow: /auth/
Disallow: /merchant/
Disallow: /redirect/
Disallow: /ads/
Disallow: /profile/
Disallow: /partner/
Disallow: /local/
Disallow: /neighbor/
Disallow: /neighbors/
Disallow: /quotes/
Disallow: /vehicleimages/
Disallow: /wp-admin/
Disallow: /wp-includes/
Disallow: /wp-content/plugins/

User-agent: Slurp
Disallow: /ajax/
Disallow: /map/
Disallow: /signup/
Disallow: /auth/
Disallow: /merchant/
Disallow: /redirect/
Disallow: /ads/
Disallow: /profile/
Disallow: /partner/
Disallow: /local/
Disallow: /neighbor/
Disallow: /neighbors/
Disallow: /quotes/
Disallow: /vehicleimages/
Disallow: /wp-admin/
Disallow: /wp-includes/
Disallow: /wp-content/plugins/

User-agent: Teoma
Disallow: /ajax/
Disallow: /map/
Disallow: /signup/
Disallow: /auth/
Disallow: /merchant/
Disallow: /redirect/
Disallow: /ads/
Disallow: /profile/
Disallow: /partner/
Disallow: /local/
Disallow: /neighbor/
Disallow: /neighbors/
Disallow: /quotes/
Disallow: /vehicleimages/
Disallow: /wp-admin/
Disallow: /wp-includes/
Disallow: /wp-content/plugins/

User-agent: yahoo-mmcrawler
Disallow: /ajax/
Disallow: /map/
Disallow: /signup/
Disallow: /auth/
Disallow: /merchant/
Disallow: /redirect/
Disallow: /ads/
Disallow: /profile/
Disallow: /partner/
Disallow: /local/
Disallow: /neighbor/
Disallow: /neighbors/
Disallow: /quotes/
Disallow: /vehicleimages/
Disallow: /wp-admin/
Disallow: /wp-includes/
Disallow: /wp-content/plugins/

User-agent: psbot
Disallow: /ajax/
Disallow: /map/
Disallow: /signup/
Disallow: /auth/
Disallow: /merchant/
Disallow: /redirect/
Disallow: /ads/
Disallow: /profile/
Disallow: /partner/
Disallow: /local/
Disallow: /neighbor/
Disallow: /neighbors/
Disallow: /quotes/
Disallow: /vehicleimages/
Disallow: /wp-admin/
Disallow: /wp-includes/
Disallow: /wp-content/plugins/

User-agent: yahoo-blogs/v3.9
Disallow: /ajax/
Disallow: /map/
Disallow: /signup/
Disallow: /auth/
Disallow: /merchant/
Disallow: /redirect/
Disallow: /ads/
Disallow: /profile/
Disallow: /partner/
Disallow: /local/
Disallow: /neighbor/
Disallow: /neighbors/
Disallow: /quotes/
Disallow: /vehicleimages/
Disallow: /wp-admin/
Disallow: /wp-includes/
Disallow: /wp-content/plugins/

User-agent: ScoutJet
Disallow: /ajax/
Disallow: /map/
Disallow: /signup/
Disallow: /auth/
Disallow: /merchant/
Disallow: /redirect/
Disallow: /ads/
Disallow: /profile/
Disallow: /partner/
Disallow: /local/
Disallow: /neighbor/
Disallow: /neighbors/
Disallow: /quotes/
Disallow: /vehicleimages/
Disallow: /wp-admin/
Disallow: /wp-includes/
Disallow: /wp-content/plugins/

User-agent: ia_archiver
Disallow: /ajax/
Disallow: /map/
Disallow: /signup/
Disallow: /auth/
Disallow: /merchant/
Disallow: /redirect/
Disallow: /ads/
Disallow: /profile/
Disallow: /partner/
Disallow: /local/
Disallow: /neighbor/
Disallow: /neighbors/
Disallow: /quotes/
Disallow: /vehicleimages/
Disallow: /wp-admin/
Disallow: /wp-includes/
Disallow: /wp-content/plugins/

User-agent: bingbot 
Disallow: /ajax/
Disallow: /map/
Disallow: /signup/
Disallow: /auth/
Disallow: /merchant/
Disallow: /redirect/
Disallow: /ads/
Disallow: /profile/
Disallow: /partner/
Disallow: /local/
Disallow: /neighbor/
Disallow: /neighbors/
Disallow: /quotes/
Disallow: /vehicleimages/
Disallow: /wp-admin/
Disallow: /wp-includes/
Disallow: /wp-content/plugins/

User-agent: DuckDuckBot
Disallow: /ajax/
Disallow: /map/
Disallow: /signup/
Disallow: /auth/
Disallow: /merchant/
Disallow: /redirect/
Disallow: /ads/
Disallow: /profile/
Disallow: /partner/
Disallow: /local/
Disallow: /neighbor/
Disallow: /neighbors/
Disallow: /quotes/
Disallow: /vehicleimages/
Disallow: /wp-admin/
Disallow: /wp-includes/
Disallow: /wp-content/plugins/

User-agent: rogerbot
Disallow:

User-agent: dotbot
Disallow:

User-agent: *
Disallow: /

Sitemap: https://www.merchantcircle.com/articles_index.xml
Sitemap: https://www.merchantcircle.com/blog_index.xml
Sitemap: https://www.merchantcircle.com/business_index.xml
Sitemap: https://www.merchantcircle.com/directory_index.xml
Sitemap: https://www.merchantcircle.com/question_index.xml
Sitemap: https://www.merchantcircle.com/review_index.xml
Sitemap: https://www.merchantcircle.com/sitemap_blogs.xml
#Sitemap: https://www.merchantcircle.com/bulletins_index.xml
#Sitemap: https://www.merchantcircle.com/coupon_index.xml
#Sitemap: https://www.merchantcircle.com/domainhub_index.xml
#Sitemap: https://www.merchantcircle.com/lists_index.xml
#Sitemap: https://www.merchantcircle.com/neighbor_index.xml
#Sitemap: https://www.merchantcircle.com/neighborhood_index.xml
#Sitemap: https://www.merchantcircle.com/newsletter_index.xml
#Sitemap: https://www.merchantcircle.com/pictures_index.xml
#Sitemap: https://www.merchantcircle.com/product_index.xml
#Sitemap: https://www.merchantcircle.com/promotion_index.xml
#Sitemap: https://www.merchantcircle.com/shoutout_index.xml
#Sitemap: https://www.merchantcircle.com/static_index.xml
#Sitemap: https://www.merchantcircle.com/vanity_index.xml
#Sitemap: https://www.merchantcircle.com/autos_index.xml
sitemap.xml 200 OK
Type Sitemap Index URLs 2 entries Valid XML Yes
Child Sitemaps:
B
URL Variants
www/non-www, trailing slash, HTTP→HTTPS
REVIEW
www/non-www, trailing slash, HTTP→HTTPS
Critical::
Both www and non-www versions serve content
Got: Both variants return 200 Expected: One variant 301-redirects to the other
Info::
HTTP correctly 301-redirects to HTTPS

www / non-www

200https://www.merchantcircle.com/
200https://merchantcircle.com/

Inconsistent — duplicate content risk

HTTP → HTTPS

301http://merchantcircle.com/ → https://merchantcircle.com:443/

Consistent

B
TLS Certificate Expiry & Recommendations
208 days until leaf cert expires — 4 issues to address
REVIEW

Certificate validity

208
days left
0d 30d 60d 90d+

Recommended actions

  • Prefer TLS 1.3 — TLS 1.2 is acceptable but TLS 1.3 removes RSA key exchange and improves latency
  • Enable HSTS: Strict-Transport-Security: max-age=31536000; includeSubDomains
  • Enable DNSSEC on your domain for DNS spoofing protection
  • Enable OCSP stapling on your TLS server to remove a CA roundtrip and protect user privacy
A+
DNS Records
2 A records, 54 ms lookup
PASS
2 A records, 54 ms lookup
Info::
Resolves to 2 IPv4 address(es)
Got: 3.101.197.204, 54.183.92.210
Info::
No IPv6 (AAAA) records
Info::
4 nameserver(s) configured
Got: ns-899.awsdns-48.net, ns-1120.awsdns-12.org, ns-327.awsdns-40.com, ns-1793.awsdns-32.co.uk
Info::
5 mail exchanger(s) configured
Info::
CAA records not checked
CAA record lookup requires a specialized DNS resolver. This check will be available in a future update.
Info::
SPF record present in TXT
Info::
DNS resolution time: 54 ms
Got: 54 ms
A3.101.197.204, 54.183.92.210
AAAA—
CNAME—
NSns-899.awsdns-48.net, ns-1120.awsdns-12.org, ns-327.awsdns-40.com, ns-1793.awsdns-32.co.uk
MX
10 aspmx.l.google.com
20 alt1.aspmx.l.google.com
20 alt2.aspmx.l.google.com
30 aspmx2.googlemail.com
30 aspmx3.googlemail.com
TXT
botify-site-verification=sDDptQdaXKTDAWNUTIWLEFWvPDnTeluu
google-site-verification=8IEaIntVz2mmWBQ6gQYj5IvKEBsHVaQEa1UghEnYy6Q
SPF v=spf1 mx ip4:173.209.245.52 ip4:72.19.136.167 ip4:173.209.240.44 include:_spf.g...
CAALookup not available with standard resolver
Resolved in 54 ms

CAA record lookup requires a specialized DNS resolver. This check will be available in a future update.

Why this matters

Informational: CAA (Certification Authority Authorization) records weren't checked in this scan.

A+
Domain Intelligence
merchantcircle.com — via GoDaddy.com, LLC, 21 years, 10 months old, hosted on AWS
PASS
merchantcircle.com — via GoDaddy.com, LLC, 21 years, 10 months old, hosted on AWS
Info::
Domain registered until Sep 28, 2026 (5 months remaining)
Info::
DNSSEC is not enabled
DNSSEC protects against DNS spoofing attacks. While not required, enabling DNSSEC adds an additional layer of security. Contact your DNS provider to enable it.
Info::
Registrar: GoDaddy.com, LLC
Warning::
Registrar lock is NOT enabled
The domain can be transferred without an unlock step. Enable registrar lock (clientTransferProhibited) in your registrar's control panel to protect against unauthorized or accidental transfers.
Info::
Hosting: AWS
Got: AS16509
Domain expiry

104 days

September 28, 2026

SSL certificate

208 days

Issued by Amazon

Domain age

21 years, 10 months

Registered September 28, 2004

DNSSEC

Not enabled

Protects against DNS spoofing

Hosting

AWS

ASN AS16509

3.101.197.204

Registrar

GoDaddy.com, LLC

Unlocked 4 NS records
Expiry timeline
Today
+1 year
Domain expiry SSL expiry Danger zone (≤30 days)
Recommended actions
  • Enable DNSSEC to protect visitors from DNS spoofing
  • Enable registrar lock (clientTransferProhibited) to block unauthorized domain transfers
Registrar GoDaddy.com, LLC
Created September 28, 2004 (21 years, 10 months ago)
Expires September 28, 2026 (5 months)
Last Updated November 17, 2024
Name Servers ns-1120.awsdns-12.org, ns-1793.awsdns-32.co.uk, ns-327.awsdns-40.com, ns-899.awsdns-48.net
DNSSEC Not enabled
Hosting
IP Address 3.101.197.204
ASN AS16509 (AMAZON-02 - Amazon.com, Inc., US)
Provider AWS
Data source: rdap (0.3s)

DNSSEC protects against DNS spoofing attacks. While not required, enabling DNSSEC adds an additional layer of security. Contact your DNS provider to enable it.

Why this matters

Without DNSSEC, an attacker who can poison your DNS can hijack your domain — and SSL certs alone don't stop them.

Learn more ▾

DNSSEC adds cryptographic signatures to DNS records, preventing forged responses from poisoning resolver caches. Without it, an attacker who controls the network path can redirect your domain to a malicious server before any HTTPS handshake happens. Most modern registrars (Cloudflare, Google Domains, Route 53) enable it with one toggle.

Source: ICANN / RFC 4033

The domain can be transferred without an unlock step. Enable registrar lock (clientTransferProhibited) in your registrar's control panel to protect against unauthorized or accidental transfers.

Why this matters

Without registrar lock, an attacker who phishes your registrar credentials can transfer the domain in minutes — total brand hijack.

Learn more ▾

Registrar lock (clientTransferProhibited, clientUpdateProhibited, clientDeleteProhibited) requires extra verification before any transfer/update/delete. Every major registrar offers it free. Combined with 2FA on your registrar account, it's the strongest defense against domain hijacking.

Source: ICANN / domain-security best practice

A
HTTP Probe Timing
Total 686 ms — DNS, TCP, TLS, TTFB, content transfer breakdown
PASS
DNS Lookup DNS Lookup — time to resolve the domain name to an IP address.
51 ms
TCP Connect TCP Connect — time to establish a TCP connection to the server.
158 ms
TLS Handshake TLS Handshake — time to complete the HTTPS encryption handshake.
318 ms
Time to First Byte Time to First Byte — how long the server takes to respond with the first byte of data.
686 ms
Total Time Total request time from DNS lookup through full response.
687 ms

Connection waterfall

DNS Lookup 51 ms TCP Connect 158 ms TLS Handshake 318 ms Server Processing 159 ms Content Transfer 0 ms
All checks on this page are automated. Results are estimates - run targeted manual reviews when the score affects a release decision.

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