Subdomain vs Subdirectory - does the content make a difference?
-
So I've read through all of the answers that suggest using a subdirectory is the best way to approach this - you rank more quickly and have all of your content on one site. BUT what if you're looking to move into a totally new market that your current site/content isn't in any way relevant to?
Some examples are Supermarkets such as Tesco (who seem to use a mix of methods) http://www.tesco.com/groceries/, http://www.clothingattesco.com/, http://www.tesco.com/bank/ which links out from their main site to http://www.tescobank.com/ etc and Sainsburys http://www.sainsburys.co.uk/ who use subdomains - here they have their grocery offering, their bank offering, clothes, phones etc split into subdomains.
If you have a product that is totally new to your Brand and different from all the products on your current site, does this change the answer to subdirectory vs subdomain?
Would be great to hear your expert opinions on this.
Thanks
-
for the subdomain to domain issue:
From a SEO perspective a subdomain is less favorable.From a user perpective: Please explain to my father the domain zoekmachinemarketing.stramark.nl how are you going to explain that there should not be a www. in front of it? how are you going to explain the fact that it is not only stramark he has to go to, but actualy the subdomain because it has a different offer?
I think young people can adapt somewhat better, but they are very used that they do not have to think. They just search from the adres bar and need the top result.
-
I agree with what John Cross said here - multiple domains means more work. If there is a business case to justify that increase in work, then that is an easier decision. If there isn't enough business case to justify the work, then maybe from an SEO standpoint you should keep it on the same domain to get the new content ranking more quickly.
Along with SEO considerations, though, there are a few other ways to break down this question...
First, what are the user expectations? Yes, the products are different and not highly related but are the customers different? In the Tesco example, would people who are interested in groceries also be interested in banking? Or, put another way, would people who are interested in groceries (but not in banking) be offended to see that this company also offers banking services? If the users are interconnected or are (at minimum) not put off by the variety of products, then why not have everything on one domain? That way you get the strong SEO benefit of using sub-directories. This isn't always a cheap investment though, as it requires a strong architecture to keep the directories and content types/voices distinct, but totally doable and a good solution from an SEO standpoint.
Second, I'd look at this from a brand perspective. Is this all the same company delivering these goods? Is it all Tesco or Sainsburys? If it is the same brand name, then why not have everything live on one authoritative domain name (assuming you aren't going to chase away customers by showing the breadth of products offered)? Google is an example of this - look at the wide variety of services they offer mail, analytics, drive, G+, search, etc. - it is all Google, even though they offer a wide range of products to a diverse range of customers. Now, if New Product A is a different brand and a really different thing from anything else being done by the company (in Google's case - Android), then that likely justifies a separate domain and a larger business investment (not just for SEO, but for design and other types of marketing too).
Finally, you do need to look at this technically I think. Chances are that Tesco Bank has to live on a different domain just because of security considerations. Some times the technology limitations have to dictate what we do with SEO. If those are great enough, then we may have to do the work to create two distinct domains and get those domains earning rankings/traffic. In that case, the business/technical needs justify the work required.
Hope that helps!
-
To optimize SEO outcomes the short answer answer would use your current domain.
However a counter argument could be you own an exact matching domain to keywords so that maybe push you to a new URL. Big marketing budget or maybe you just want a clean start - because of pigeon or panda issues plaguing teh current site.
That said using Tesco & Sainsbury as examples both have in common "big wallets". So they would have planned multi million dollar marketing campaigns around the new products/URL's. Hence they can drive backlinks. So if the company is a monster - with a massive marketing spend for the launch you may think a new brand and URL are in order.
I am old school - a brand new domain to start from scratch - new domain, no history and no backlinks is a far harder task, but certainly not unachievable. I would steer form it. Personally I believe you should try and limit new domains as practically it increases your required SEO output in this case by double. Have to review two lost of GA and Webmaster each day... So just to keep level you need to work extra hours each week with a new domain...
They are my views but there is plenty of info on moz heading the other way.
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
-
Subdomain cannibalization
Hi, I am doing the SEO for a webshop, which has a lot of linking and related websites on the same root domain. So the structure is for example: Root domain: example.com
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Mat_C
Shop: shop.example.com
Linking websites to shop: courses.example.com, software.example.com,... Do I have to check which keywords these linking websites are already ranking for and choose other keywords for my category and product pages on the webshop? The problem with this could be that the main keywords for the category pages on the webshop are mainly the same as for the other subdomains. The intention is that some people immediately come to the webshop instead of going first to the linking websites and then to the webshop. Thanks.0 -
Sitemap Indexed vs. Submitted
My sitemap has been submitted to Google for well over 6 months and is updated frequently, a total of 979 URLs have been submitted by only 145 indexed. What can I do to get Google to index them all?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | moon-boots0 -
Different rankings for same keyword in different geo locations
I am listed at # 11 in google.com.pk for a same keyword but listed 4th when I use &gl=us in the same query or use a US ip address. Could this be because google's recent update and maybe they are taking time to push the update towards other countries or something else? In any case I see decent rankings when I use the query in google.com or when I use gl=us, but lower quality results in google.com.pk so please guide what is going on. Thanks in advance for guidance (y)
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | hpk0 -
Odd Results Moving Subdomain Content onto Main Domain
Hi forum! On Thursday night (12/6/12) we moved a page (and all the linking product pages) from our subdomain, mailing-list.consumerbase.com, to our main domain, www.consumerbase.com/mailing-lists.html Shockingly, today I search for "mailing lists" (our #1 target keyword) and we're on the first page! This page never has not ranked well for this keyword in the past. The problem is, the link displaying on Google is our old mailing-list.consumerbase.com subdomain URL. Did moving this content from the new subdomain to our old, well-established domain cause it to appear better in search? Or, since the URL is on the subdomain, did Google just finally get around to indexing that page? Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Travis-W0 -
Is SEOmoz.org creating duplicate content with their CDN subdomain?
Example URL: http://cdn.seomoz.org/q/help-with-getting-no-conversions Canonical is a RELATIVE link, should be an absolute link pointing to main domain: http://www.seomoz.org/q/help-with-getting-no-conversions <link href='[/q/help-with-getting-no-conversions](view-source:http://cdn.seomoz.org/q/help-with-getting-no-conversions)' rel='<a class="attribute-value">canonical</a>' /> 13,400 pages indexed in Google under cdn subdomain go to google > site:http://cdn.seomoz.org https://www.google.com/#hl=en&output=search&sclient=psy-ab&q=site:http%3A%2F%2Fcdn.seomoz.org%2F&oq=site:http%3A%2F%2Fcdn.seomoz.org%2F&gs_l=hp.2...986.6227.0.6258.28.14.0.0.0.5.344.3526.2-10j2.12.0.les%3B..0.0...1c.Uprw7ko7jnU&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.r_qf.&fp=97577626a0fb6a97&biw=1920&bih=936
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | irvingw1 -
Subdomain or subdirectory
We're a big social networking site with over 1 million indexed pages and over 4 million visits a month. Our PR is 7. We're about to acquire and rebrand the content of a large reviews website, current PR 3. The new content will be treated as a 'site within a site' with different navigation and interface. With these factors in mind I think we need to create a new subdomain for the reviews site but I need to factor in the SEO implications, bearing in mind that new advertisers are going to be looking closely at our stats. Migrating the content to a new subdomain I understand will be easier than siting it in a new folder. Any advice appreciated
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | CecilyP0 -
Expired Content
Hi We have a listing website that has a huge amount of listings.These listings are changing all time, they become passive or deleted. We would like to choose the response code for the passive for deleted pages. Which response type must we use ? Redirect to last category with 301 Give 410 Gone response code Give 404 Response code which option would we choose ? and any ideas ?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | SEMTurkey0 -
Pros and Cons of new subdomain and redirecting old subdomain?
Hi guys, I am thinking about redirecting the ranking subdoman to a new subdomain which has my main keyword within it. I am trying to outrank an exact match competitor and don't seem to be able to do so. For example: page.example.com would be my existing ranking URL which is very powerful, and I am thinking about redirecting this to a new URL being keywordpage.example.com What are your thoughts on do this? Thanks B
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | HaymarketMediaGroupLtd0