Does using a sub-domain lessen the effectiveness of your main domain?
-
For example a website without a blog and is a simple html site with no blogging capabilities. We go out to Blogger or Wordpress and set up the blog portion of the website using something like blog.yourdomain.com. Does this make a difference SEO wise? Is is more effective to be sure that you are using the main domain and not a sub-domain? I have heard both sides before but can't seem to find the concrete answer. Thanks for any advise out there.
-
Actually it's a bit more complex than Rafi explains.
If the main site is an ecommerce site (sells products), it's okay to have the blog on the main site unless you end up with a high volume of content on the blog that can weaken the "purchase" intent of the main site. In that case, the blog on a sub-domain is actually somewhat better because it separates the "informational" intent out and can in turn build up a stronger authority signal as "informational" as a sub-domain. But only if you drive a lot of traffic, engagement and links to the sub-domain.
If the topic is isolated to a niche topic not generally strong on the main site, that's another valuable reason for the sub-domain path. Again, by isolating it within a sub-domain you're preventing dilution of the topical focus of the main site. That also applies if you have products or services that you can build up enough content within that niche to justify an entire sub-domain.
If the main site is informational and the blog is informational, and there is a lot of cross-topical relationshps, it's best to keep the blog as a folder/directory within the main site - in this scenario you get more value by going this route because of the commonality of intent and topical focus.
-
Hi there,
Nothing makes a difference from an SEO standpoint unless you have good content in it. So, if you host a blog on your domain with good and relevant content that complements or goes hand-in-hand with your domain's theme or line of business, it would definitely add up to the strength of your domain overall going forward. Though its a sub-domain, treat it such that it is an entirely different domain, optimize it the way you would do any other domain. Personally, I would host the blog on my domain itself so that I don't run in to the weird world of cross linking problems especially when its hosted on the same IP address that my domain is hosted on. So if its a business need to have your blog separately, its better to go with a dedicated IP and also make sure it belongs to a different class C IP. We faced issues related to cross linking no matter how clean we tried to maintain them both. Please note that this is purely out of my experience.
Best regards,
Devanur Rafi.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Why some domains and sub-domains have same DA, but some others don't?
Hi I noticed for some blog providers in my country, which provide a sub-domian address for their blogs. the sub-domain authority is exactly as the main domain. Whereas, for some other blog providers every subdomain has its different and lower authority. for example "ffff.blog.ir" and "blog.ir" both have domain authority of 60. It noteworthy to mention that the "ffff.blog.ir" does not even exist! This is while mihanblog.com and hfilm.mihanblog.com has diffrent page authority.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | rayatarh5451230 -
Redirect to new SSL Domain
Hi Experts; How to redirect https://old-domain.com to https://new-domain.com without buying new SSL? I have one GoDaddy SSL and I want to use it for a new domain. Its currently use for old domain
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | cafegardesh0 -
Old Sub domain removal and deletion of content
There are two questions here. I have waited for over 2-3 weeks now and they are still not resolved till now. An old sub-domain is still indexed on Google (blog.nirogam.com) of which all pages have been redirected or 404'd to main domain. There is no webmasters, no authority of this old sub-domain. Hosting of the same might be there. (this has been deleted and does not exist - we own main domain only) How do I de-index and remove them for good? _(Around ~1,000 pages)_I am trying this public tool - any better approaches?Even after removing pages and submission on the tool, 600 pages are still indexed after 2-3 weeks! We deleted a lot of thin content/duplicate pages from the domain (nirogam.com) in Wordpress - All these pages are still in Google's index. They are in Trash folder now. This is causing an increase in 404s in the webmasters etcI have served a 410 header (using wordpress plugin) on all these pages as these should not be directed to anything. However, Google does not always fully understand 410 properly and it still shows up in webmasters as read in this detailed post.All these pages are still indexed.How do I de-index these pages? Any other approach to stop the 404s and remove these pages for good?Any feedback/approach will be highly appreciated.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | pks3330 -
Primary Domain or Redirect?
We are starting a new travel guide for a resort town. I have bought an expired domain with decent related links and PR (which seems to have survived the transfer (4 months ago). Beofre we launch the new site I am trying to decide if we should use this expired domain as the primary URL for the new site or just do a permanent redirect and buy a new domain that better matches the theme of the site. I am obviously concerned with starting from scatch with a new domain. I am confident we can build some good rellevant links in a short time but this space is very competetive. Any input would be greatly appreciated.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Locals0 -
Two pages on same domain - Is this a proper use of the canonical tag?
I have a domain with two pages in question--one is an article with 2,000 words and the other is a FAQ with 300 words. The 300 word FAQ is copied, word-for-word and pasted inside of the 2,000 word article. Would it be a proper use of the canonical tag to point the smaller, 300 word FAQ at the 2,000 word article? Since the 300 word article is identical to a portion of the 2,000 word article, will Google see this as duplicate content? Thanks in advance for any helpful insight.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | andrewv0 -
How does a competing website with clearly black hat style SEO tactics, have a far higher domain authority than our website that only uses legitimate link building tactics?
Through SEO Moz link analysis tools, we looked at a competing websites external followed links and discovered a large number of links going to Blog pages with domain authorities in the 90's (their blog page authorities were between 40 and 60), however the single blog post written by this website was exactly the same in every instance and had been posted in August 2011. Some of these blog sites had 160 or so links linking back to this competing website whose domain authority is 49 while ours is 28, their Moz Trust is 5.43 while ours is 5.18. An example of some of the blogs that link to the competing website are: http://advocacy.mit.edu/coulter/blog/?p=13 http://pest-control-termite-inspection.posterous.com/\ However many of these links are "no follow" and yet still show up on Open Site Explorer as some of this competing websites top linking pages. Admittedly, they have 584 linking root domains while we have only 35, but if most of them are the kind of websites posted above, we don't understand how Google is rewarding them with a higher domain authority. Our website is www.anteater.com.au Are these tactics now the only way to get ahead?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Peter.Huxley590 -
7 years old domain sandboxed for 8 months, wait or make a domain change?
Hello folks The questions is, if a domain, 7 years old being sandboxed due to "notice of unnatural links to website" does it make sense to make a domain change (301 permanent redirect and make a "domain change" under google webmaster tools) to another, aged(!) domain name?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Ferray
Website being sandboxed for over 8 months already and there is no chance to do anything with those "unnatural" links to website... Any suggestions?0 -
Do any of you regularly use expired domains?
I know there has been discussion on using expired domains in the past. This is not so much a question as to how to do it or whether it works, but rather I would love to see how many of you use this in your backlink strategy. I have a domain in a low to moderately competitive niche that ranks really well, mostly on the power of a couple of expired domains. I bought the domains, created a quick wordpress site and pointed some anchor texted links to the site. It took some time for the expired domains to regain their PR, but when they did, the benefit was great. I'm considering whether I want to do this with another domain of mine. On one hand, it's a relatively inexpensive way to get some good quality anchor texted links. But, on the other hand, something in it feels "immoral" or "sneaky" to me. What do you think?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | MarieHaynes0