Question about multiple websites in same field
-
I know what most people say that it is best to only have the 1 website for focus but if we can put this to the back of our minds, if we create 2 different websites that are totally different designs (one upmarket one and one targeting the cheaper market) but in the same fields (printing) and go after 80% of the same keywords is this ok (could we be penalized).
Please note we will not be interlinking the websites, the website .will be on different servers and the names will be registered under different people (2 partners in the business).
We will however be accessing webmaster tools from the same location.
-
Nor would it help local search. This could be a major factor in deciding where to purchase heavy printed materials.
-
Hi Bob,
In Cases like this, I take a step back and think is this being deceptive, is this already occuring on the web? The answer is no its not deceptive and yes its already happening in business today. I am sure there is an example where Google themselves are trying to capture top and bottom ends of the market (insert example here), but I'll give you this one.
In Australia a company called Coles Myer have two supermarket chains Coles and Bilo which capture the mid-to-top end and budget end of the supermarket market. They are shown as two completely separate companies, but I'm sure in an obscure about us page are still listed as part of the Coles Myer group.
The moral of my story, run both but ensure almost all aspects of the site are unique. Separate themes, separate dev teams, unique content, separate hosting etc. They should be seen to have been created by two separate teams to ensure success.
Hope this helps,
Dan
-
It's not something you'll be penalized for, but you may find it naturally harder to build value for a second site. Which one do you list on your business/directory/social profiles? Which one would you refer customers to? or tell someone else to link to you with? It's easy to wind up diluting your efforts. Not saying you shouldn't do it, but just make sure you're confident it's worth your while, and obviously rewrite content and you should be fine.
-
Accessing Webmaster tools from the same location won't be an issue otherwise there are lots of agencies that would have problems when carrying out work for different clients in the same or similar niches. You are essentially operating both your sites as stand alone and there is nothing that is connecting them, so having two sites in the same niche should be fine. Just make sure that you write unique relevant content for each. Up until the end of 2012 I worked on two sites that would both rank for certain keywords and I actually acknowledged the relationship between both sites - having a link from one to the other and also having them on the same Google Account for analytics and webmaster tools. They had separate hosting but both were registered to the same company. One site was stronger than the other but there was no issue in terms of search engine rankings as the content was unique on each even if it was about the same or similar things.
Both had a legitimate reason for being there and I think Googles algorithm when it comes to things like attempted manipulation through link networks is cleverer than a lot of people give it credit for!
These are my thoughts and experience hope it is of some help...
-
Are you creating both websites under one company name or two?
The only reason I ask is that from a usability standpoint people may find it confusing.
Let's say a user visits your upmarket site, but does not contact you during that visit. Then they perform a Google search again looking for your company name and the stumble upon the cheaper market and don't find the same solution and the website now looks completely different... that might be confusing, unless you are using two different company names... and if that's the case, I would hope that the companies would actually be "legit" or it may seem deceptive.
That said... I don't think you would get penalized for creating two sites in the manner you are suggesting.
I do think it may become confusing if you rank for both pages on the same page of Google, because having different URLs, different designs, but the same company name may seem deceptive to users.
Just my thoughts.
Mike
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
-
How to answer questions when there no questions for my keyword
Hello, Let's say I want to rank on "Alsace bike tour" whatever tool I use Moz keyword explorer, google suggest , keyword.io, answer the public ... there are not questions... so... what do I need to answer ? I imagine that for google there are some questions more relevant than others ? Should I answer do I need to bring my own bike or where will I go... ? and will google give me "points " for answering those questions even though people don't have questions... For the keyword title tag, it is easy, people ask the character limit, title tag generator and so on but for may keywords like that ones I am targeting people have NO Questions ! Thank you,
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | seoanalytics0 -
Website Traffic Is Down
Hi, My Website www.financeninvestments.com is down for almost now 2 years. I was receiving the good traffic before this but now the traffic is almost down. I want to again do something to get my Traffic back with some consistent efforts. So what efforts should i do to make this back.Pls suggest.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | rahulsoni250 -
How to find the redirects on website
I want to find the complete internal redirects on website. Just internally linked. How to find such?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | vtmoz0 -
SEO Menu Question
I have a question regarding to the SEO benefits of different types of menus. Recently, I have noticed an increasing number of websites with the sort of menu like at www.sportsdirect.com, where there is only one main dropdown and then everything is a sub-menu of the sub-menus if that makes sense. Is this approach more, less or equal beneficial to what you see at http://www.wiggle.co.uk/ where there are multiple initial dropdown menus? Appreciate the feedback.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | simonukss0 -
Robots.txt question
I notice something weird in Google robots. txt tester I have this line Disallow: display= in my robots.text but whatever URL I give to test it says blocked and shows this line in robots.text for example this line is to block pages like http://www.abc.com/lamps/floorlamps?display=table but if I test http://www.abc.com/lamps/floorlamps or any page it shows as blocked due to Disallow: display= am I doing something wrong or Google is just acting strange? I don't think pages with no display= are blocked in real.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | rbai0 -
Multiple keyword optimisation
What is the best way to optimise for multiple keywords for the same product? The situation basically is I have several products which I need to optimise currently only one page, the search terms that relate to the product are in some cases very different.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | seoman100 -
Website not ranking
Firstly, apologies for the long winded question. I'm 'newish' to SEO We have a website built on Magento , www.excelclothing.com We have been online for 5 years and had reasonable success. Having used a few SEO companies in the past we found ourselves under a 'partial manual penalty' early last year. By July we were out of penalty. We have been gradually working our way through getting rid of 'spammy' links. Currently the website ranks for a handful of non competitive keywords looking at the domain on SEM RUSH. This has dropped drastically over the last 2 years. Our organic traffic over the last 2-3 years has seen no 'falling off a cliff' and has maintained a similar pattern. I've been told so many lies by SEO companies trying to get into my wallet I'm not sure who to believe. We have started to add content onto all our Category pages to make more unique although most of our Meta Descriptions are a 'boiler plate' template. I'm wondering.... Am I still suffering from Penquin ? Am I trapped by Panda and if so how can I know that? Do I need more links removed? How can I start to rank for more keywords I have a competitor online with the same DA, PA and virtually same number of links but they rank for 3500 keywords in the top 20. Would welcome any feedback. Many Thanks.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | wgilliland1 -
Optimising a Dynamic website ?
A client has bought the Nostalgia wp theme. I've installed Yoast but because the website is ajax based and the content for the pages are dynamically loaded the plugin won't work. Or at least not to my knowledge? The developer doesn't currently have a solution, which from previous expereience it will never be supported. So I need some possible solutions here. Create a mobile site? Cons more time, more money etc Create non dynamic pages linked in footer area. Cons page duplication etc. It's a small niche so having the basic elements is imperative to getting it ranking.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | StephenForde0