Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Where is the best location for your blog?
-
This is one querstion I've been thinking about for a while: where is the best location for a blog on your website for SEO purposes? In this case I'm thinking the blog as part of a commerical website.
Sub domain: You could put it on a subdomain such as blog.mydomain.com which seems quite popular (blog.kissmetrics for example) but surely this is giving the blog.mydomain sub domain the SEO value and not the www.mydomain sub domain. The one value I see here is that you could host this on another server and so any links to my main website would be from a different IP address. You could also point the sub domain to a WordPress.com blog.
Internal: There are two ways the blog could be run internal to the website: 1) if the website is a WordPress.org installation you could just use one category as the blog or 2) a fresh WordPress.org installation in a sub folder such as www.mydomain.com/blog. The benefits I see with #2 is that any guest posters would only have access to the blog and not the main company website and you could make the look and feel of the blog to be more "bloggy" than the main commerical website.
External: TBH I don't think there is any benefit to running a blog completely external to the commerical website (such as a WordPress.com blog) unless the company provides online services so that if the main website goes down, the blog will still be running.
So, from the above, which is the best way to run a commerical site blog? Or have I missed some other options?
-
OK, thanks for the info.
So going with the "mydomain/blog" setup, would there be any SEO benefit to using mod_rewrite to redirect the "/blog" to a different server?
The thinking being that any links back to the site would be coming from a different IP address.
-
I also would recommand putting it in /blog but you could also want to build it on another domain if you want to get a plan B if you 1st domain lower is rankings.It's a longer work to build linking and authority but when done you also get longer benefits.
-
domain.com/blog is current best practice for hosting a blog to benefit your domain from content freshness and linking. A subdomain will be seen as a seperate site.
There are commerical reasons why you would want an external blog such as for customer service issues or a branding exercise, but if you want the benefits of the links and content a blog will generate host it on your domain root.
-
Hi Sacha,
This was recently asked here: http://www.seomoz.org/q/blogs-are-best-when-hosted-on-domain-subdomain-or
I agree with Alan and Todd in that thread, you should go for www.domain.com/blog
Thanks
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
-
Best Directories to Get Listed On?
Hello, I'm looking for a list of the best, most trusted, SEO friendly directories to list my company on. Can you guys please provide some directories that you have seen help increase your rankings and also drive targeted traffic? No Black Hat directories, only high quality ones. Thanks!
Branding | | Prime850 -
1 Website, 2 Business Names, 2 Locations
I took on a dentist office as an SEO client. They have 1 website, 2 business names and 2 locations. Each location has it's own business name. They are both within the same city as well. I'm not exactly sure where to start with them since they have 2 different business names. If it were 1 name with multiple locations I would just create a Contact Us page for each one, but is that the best thing to do when the location names are different? Should I create a different website for each location or is that smart because then they are competing against each other? Any help from the community on the direction I should take would be appreciated. Thanks in advance!
Branding | | SilhouetteBS0 -
Commentluv enabled blogs for inbound links?
Question 1: What is the general consensus on gaining links through blog comments on blogs with CommentLuv enabled? Backstory: I was studying our competitor's links and tripped upon something I haven't seen before. There were a number of blog comments created in 2011 by an individual who was probably an SEO hired at least partially for the purpose of making blog comments to gain inbound links for the competitor. I haven't dug deeply enough to find if there are any more recent than 2011. The interesting part was the name/link of the company for this individual which was not the company's actual name but a URL crafted from a main keyword. It obviously has a redirect to the actual competitor's website which is where the link took me AND a link to this individual's "most recent blog post". This blog post on the company site was written by someone else entirely. Question 2: Clearly some manipulation to build links- would these links be considered unnatural? Question 3: Would it be smart for me to find blogs with CommentLuv to gain links to my blog?
Branding | | gfiedel0 -
Best Press Release Distribution Services
I am looking for a Press Release Distribution Service, I know PRweb is a good one but as an Agency we launch constant press releases for our client. Just wondering if someone can tell me about a good PR Distributions services that provide unlimited Pr distribution and which are best for getting your Pr into Google News and easy to use. Also has anyone user http://www.sbwire.com
Branding | | conversiontactics0 -
Best to have separate private and the business twitter accounts?
Just starting to use twitter and can see its potential but I have a personal account, one my holiday letting business and one for my CCTV installation business. Obviously the problem is I have to login to each account separately and post relevant tweets. I like the idea that people following because they're interested in the subject but the downside obviously is that I have to split my time and my total followers across three accounts. What do you do with your twitter presence focus on one account or have separate accounts?
Branding | | whitbycottages0 -
Changing a "city" or "town" location in google maps
Hello Mozinators! I have a client I currently work with doing SEO that has a rare problem that I have not come across before nor have I been able to find any information on how to make changes for it. The problem being that the city/township is more of a community that has yet to officially be labeled as a city, yet is still marked as a town on google maps. This is a great step in the right direction however the google maps location is over the wrong place. I have attached screenshots of the google maps for this location. In the top is a place called "Lakewood Ranch" and it is not in the correct spot. Lakewood Ranch should instead be in the bottom corner of the overview screenshot, where the town center is and the medical center off of the "University PKWY" exit. I have absolutely no idea on where to start to get these changes put in place, nor if they can even be put in place. Please let me know! Thank you so much in advance! a86TM.png u1ipV.png
Branding | | jbster130 -
Dental Office With Two Locations And Same Practice Name
Dentists buy other practices all the time. Sometimes they change the name of the practice and other times they keep the name. I am working with a dentist on a new website because their old one is riddled with flash (and is ugly too) She has two practices but they have the same practice name. One of them caters to half English speaking and half Spanish speaking patients. I'm thinking I should create a separate website for each practice mainly because we may want to design the graphics and text for the appropriate patient language probably with a English/Spanish translation button on the website? For localization, wouldn't it be better to have a url for each physical site? Suggestions?
Branding | | Czubmeister0 -
Best Way To Get Twitter Followers
What does the forum think the best way to get Twitter Followers is? I'm talking from the perspective from a fairly unknown brand where there's no obvious reason for someone to follow.
Branding | | PeterAlexLeigh0