Risks of Migrating tld's to sub folders
-
Hi Guys,
I am thinking of migrating our .co.nz and our .co.uk websites into sub folders on our .com website (eg: .com/uk and .com/nz). Do you think this is a risky strategy in regards to our performance in the localised search engines or should the centralisation of all these websites and their link authority into the .com help us move up the rankings? We are thinking of doing this in the next week, we have some really good rankings for the local googles, however we also have plenty of phrases sitting just on page 2 and I was hoping this might help boost them onto page 1?
Has anyone else had experience migrating tld sites to sub folders on a .com and if so what was your experience of the impact on search rankings in the local googles and the timeframe that these changes took to have an effect? Did you have any negative results?
-
Thanks Jane - much appreciated. I think we will bring our .co.nz into the .com under a new sub folder, wait and see what the results are and then base a decision off that for our .co.uk - have a great holidays and thanks once again.
-
Hi Conrad,
Sorry for the late reply on this. I hope it is still helpful.
In general, this is always what we recommend, unless the ccTLDs (or whatever is being redirected) has a substantial history that makes it so strong that it can survive well on its own. If you're languishing in the SERPs or need a boost, this can certainly provide it. Keep in mind that you don't take 100% of the link equity from one site to another during a 301, but you take a large portion, and the added strength from the domain should more than make up for this.
There is absolutely no guarantee that you will get positive results, or won't get negative results - the most likely scenario is that you'll see a dip in rankings and traffic as Google acknowledges the redirects, but that original rankings will return within a matter or days or weeks. After that, your ascent through the SERPs should be faster than when the content was on a ccTLD as opposed to a subfolder.
Where I would not do this, again, is where substantial effort has been put into the ccTLDs and they are climbing steadily on their own. This, to my mind, is always a move to be made when other options do not appear to be making a lot of difference.
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
-
What's the Best Strategy for Multiregional Targeting for Single Language?
I have a service based client who is based in the US but wants to expand to audiences in Australia, Canada, and the United Kingdom. Currently, all the content is in American English with international targeting in Google Search Console set to the US. I know that is going to have to change, but I'm unsure of the best strategy. Right now there are a few basic strategies in my head. Remove International Targeting in GSC and let her rip Remove International Targeting in GSC, install copies of the site on subfolders /au/, /ca/, and /uk/, add hreflang tags, and add canonicals pointing back to original Remove International Targeting in GSC, install copies of the site on subfolders /au/, /ca/, and /uk/, add hreflang tags, and risk duplicate content Have independent writers overcharge for English translations into different dialects and add hreflang tags It's hard to come up with a perfect solution for content differentiation by region in order to implement hreflang tags with a region (en-au, en-ca, en-gb). Remove International Targeting in GSC and let her rip This one is pretty simple. However, I am completely unsure of its effectiveness. Remove International Targeting in GSC, install copies of the site on subfolders /au/, /ca/, and /uk/, add hreflang tags, and add canonicals pointing back to original The point of adding canonicals is to avoid the duplicate content, but then my new subfolders do not get indexed. I'm unsure of what type of exposure these URLs would receive or how they would be valuable. Remove International Targeting in GSC, install copies of the site on subfolders /au/, /ca/, and /uk/, add hreflang tags, and risk duplicate content High risk of a penalty with duplicate content, but my targeting will be the most efficient. Have independent writers overcharge for English translations into different dialects and add hreflang tags This is probably the safest bet, takes the longest, and costs the most money. However, how different will the content actually be if I change truck to lorry, trunk to boot, and optimization to optimisation? Maybe I'm missing something, but this conundrum seems extremely difficult. Weighing the cost, time, and possible result is challenging. Hit me with your best answer and thanks for taking a look at someone else's problem.
International SEO | | ccox12 -
Getting pages that load dynamically into the SE's
SEO'ers, Am dealing with an issue I cannot figure out the best way to handle. Working on a website that shows the definitions of words which are loaded dynamically from an open source. Source such as: wiktionary.org When you visit a particular page to see the definition of the word, say; www.example.com/dictionary/example/ the definition is there. However, how can we get all the definition pages to get indexed in search engines? The WordPress sitemap plugin is not picking up these pages to be added automatically - guess because it's dynamic - but when using a sitemap crawler pages are detected. Can anybody give advice on how to go about getting the 200k+ pages indexed in the SE's? If it helps, here's a reference site that seems to load it's definitions dynamically and has succeeded in getting its pages indexed: http://www.encyclo.nl/begrip/sample
International SEO | | RonFav0 -
Why would a site lose rankings in U.S while maintaining rankings in other English locations (Canada & Australia)
What would cause a site to lose ranking in the U.S while maintaining top (1st page) positions in other English results countries such as Canada or Australia? Is this purely penguin related because of location of backlinks or are there other significant factors that could be in play? Would this rule out Panda as a cause because it's simply an "English language" targeted algo and not location dependent like backlinks (penguin)? Appreciate any insights
International SEO | | ResumeGenius0 -
Thai Characters in URL's
Does anyone have experience with non-Latin characters in URL's? We've launched a website in Thailand and picked Thai characters for URL's. However, when you copy it, it turns into something like this: http://www.imoneythailand.com/บัตรเครดิต Can it impact our website's crawlability? Also, is keyword in URL a ranking factor for non-Latin languages? Thanks in advance for help!
International SEO | | imoney0 -
Dynamic Google search snippet text based on user's language
On Google search results page, I want to show search snippet text (of my webpage) in Hindi language if user is user is using Google in Hindi language. If user chose another language on Google search page, my snippet text should be shown in that language. Is this possible? How?
International SEO | | Avinashmb0 -
.US VS .COM TLD Domains
Hi there! I have a spanish client who wants to enhance its online presence on the US. US is their most potential country. Its ok to create a .US website (and geolocalizate in GWT to the USA) and a .COM domain for the rest of ther word (without orientation) with the same content? Thank you so much. Jabi
International SEO | | overalia0 -
Subdomain vs folder vs TLD
We are launching in a number of international markets and I am trying to figure out if I should be launching them as folders, e.g.: /es (spanish), /br (brazil), /in (india) or whether they should be subdomains, e.g. es.mysite.com, br.mysite.com, etc. In brazil we managed to secure the tld (.com.br) but not in other regions. Whats the best strategy for us? I was thinking of doing folders as I understand that this strengthens the main domain, while subdomains are considered as separate sites. For Brazil, should we also use a folder, or launch on the .com.br? I assume that using the .com.br means we will have to build up authority from scratch, and in addition, the authority we build up on the .com.br will not help to grow the .com In addition, is there value in interlinking between verions (the versions will have the same content but in different languages)? Thanks!
International SEO | | medico0 -
Est ce qu'on peut poser des questions en français ?
(can we ask questions in a language other than English?) Pour le SEO est ce qu'il faut mieux un domain avec les tirets ou sans ? Les américains aurait tendance a faire les domaines sans tirets
International SEO | | NeilInFrance
Par exemple goodseoconsultants.com Et bcp disent qu'utiliser les tirets fait "spammy" ; En France il y a plus tendance à mettre les tirets mais est ce qu'il y a une risque négatif pour le sites qui le font ? Par contre il y a plus de chances que les moteurs et les humaines comprennes les mots avec ; good-seo-consultants.com Qui a raison ? Neil0