Are sub domains considered completely different than the root domain?
-
We have a project that is going to generate duplicate content. If we move the new content to a sub-domain (E.g. product.domain.com) will it still be considered duplicate content to the root domain? Or is it like having two completely different domains?
Thanks!
-
Cyrus is right!
-
Unfortunately, it doesn't work this way. See my comment above.
-
In the case of duplicate content, you always have to tell the search engines which is the canonical (the authoritative version). It doesn't matter if they are on the same website, different sub-domains, or completely different websites.
If you leave it up to Google to choose, often the ranking power of both pages is diminished, and if you have too much duplicate content, your entire site can suffer.
Either choose the page you want to rank, and send the appropriate signals to search engines, or create different content for different pages.
-
Yes they do
Just so you know , when you add a rel canonical the duplicate pages will drop from the SERPs eventually ( assuming google accepts the rel canonical , they don't always do it )
http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=139394
-
Thanks Saijo,
That is exactly what we are going to do. We are going to use the canonical tag on the new duplicate pages referencing the existing pages that have achieved rank. Quick question on that, do you know if "juice" is transferred through a canonical tag? The new pages will be getting some pretty great links but not enough to rank highly. Will this juice be passed to the existing pages through the canonical tag?
-
There is not enough information here to give you the right answer, but here is my 2 cents on the topic
Say you need these duplicate pages to exist for some reason and do NOT want them to be indexed . You can noindex them and have them in the subdomain. So they do not appear in the SERPs and are not duplicate content because Google ignores them. ( Think of it this way : you are telling google , these are duplicate pages and its not meant for the search results )
Say you need these duplicate pages to be indexed , then you use rel canonical on the duplicate pages all tell Google the main page you want to be indexed. ( Think of it this way : you are telling google , these are duplicate pages and you want importance to go to the main one ) FYI : over time this means the other pages will fade away in SERPs
What you don't want to do : put duplicate pages up on sub domain and making no effort to advise the bots they are duplicate .. They will figure it out and that is when they dont like it .
Hope that clears up your doubts , if you need a more specific answer . We will need more info on what exactly you are trying to achieve .
-
Thats perfect. Thank you.
The only issue I have is that in this scenario I am going to have to use close to duplicate title tags, h1's and URL's. Since each page is going after the exact same keyword. But if you are saying that Google has no problem with ranking these 2 pages because one of them is on a sub-domain than that solves at least one problem.
-
Google treats sub domains as a different site in a sense.. and hardly ever passes any benefit of the root domain to the sub domain. Usually, your root domain would rank higher than the sub domain.. naturally.. unless your sub domain has better seo on/off site.
If both pages were equal it would show both. but would have to choose which one would receive the better ranking.
-
Do not create exact copies of the site.
Google will not choose they will just "punish" your site and have it dropped.
If you must create a copy of the site, make it unique.
It is very important
-
I guess I should explain a little more. I realize that it is going to be duplicate content but would Google have to choose between the two pages as which one to show or would the sub-domain page be allowed to rank as well as the root domain page? All thing being equal of course.
E.g. A tractor re-seller sells John Deere Tractors. They have since signed a white label deal to be the official reseller of John Deere Tractors. They have a page for the riding model x at www.example.com/riding-mower-x that ranks very well. But they also have a new white label page now for the exact same mower. They want both pages to rank and not force google to choose which page to show. Would Google look at the sub-domain page of ridingmowerx.example.com as a completely different site so that it would not have to choose and could rank both pages?
-
short answer is yes as long as the content is available for crawl that will be duplicaed content.
please elaborate of he goal of this duplication so I can try to tackle this problem
-
It is duplicate content either way across the world wide web. For example.. a blog posts an article, I take that article and post it to my blog.. that is considered duplicate content. Use this post by rand to help determine when to use sub domains!
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
-
When creating a sub-domain, does that sub-domain automatically start with the DA of the main domain?
We have a website with a high DA and we are considering sub-folder or sub-domain. One of the great benefits of a sub-folder is that we know we get to keep the high DA, is this also the case for sub-domains? Also if you could provide any sources of information that specify this, I can't see to find anything!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Saba.Elahi.M.0 -
International Domains for SEO
My company is international and we have websites for each country with Country Code Top Level Domains (ccTLD). I am in the US and I am seeing that other countries such as Costa Rica and Germany are ranking above us in search results. I thought Google automatically geo-targeted users by default and therefore I should only get .com or US results. Any idea why other countries would rank above our site?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | fastlaneus0 -
High Quality Domains and what to do with them
Hi, I rus a travel photography business. The primary function of the website is to sell prints, though I blog about my travels on the same domain name as well as a few pieces of content that are helpful to users interested in some of the places I travel to. I do okay with it, but obviously, I am always looking for a way to increase visibility and sales of prints. I own a couple of high quality keyword domain names, that I've been trying to figure out what to do with. One of which is for a city that my prints of my photography are probably best known for. The domains I'm really trying to decide what to do with are basically a www.citystatephotography.com and www.citystatephotos.com, where the city and state are the ones I'm targeting. The question is, what do I do with it? I've seen various ideas from other photographers that have various levels of success. Here are the options I'm considering: Just redirect it to the photo gallery of photos that I'm trying to rank highly for. From what I read on various blogs, this doesn't really do much of anything, but maybe I've read wrong? Create a website or microsite with some quality content related to the city that also links back to my photography website on various places and possibly once in the navigation. I do have quality content I could put up that would be helpful to people from the city besides just trying to get sales. But there's always a chance this will cannibalize my original domain without helping sales, I assume? Spam my photo galleries across two domains. Most of my photography galleries would stay on my main domain that I already run, but the photo galleries that are key to that city would be hosted on that citystatephotography.com domain name. I've seen a photographer from Colorado do quite well with this method. (www.imagesofrmnp.com and www.morninglight.us) He's heavily known for his images of Rocky Mountain National Park and that seems to be his main brand, but all of his non-RMNP travel photography goes on the other site. The two sites look almost identical, though they link back and forth fairly extensively. There doesn't seem to be much in the way of duplicate content either. I've considered this method, but I'm nervous I'll kill what I've already built up if this were to fail. Do nothing with the domains. Seems wasteful, as these domains, particularly the citystatephotography.com domain seems useful in some way. Any thoughts? Thanks in advance!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | shannmg10 -
Domain Forwarding? Beneficial?
Good Morning! My father asked me about Domain Forwarding yesterday and it's impact on SEO. The example he gave was if he had website xyz.com and it was an educational website that sold anger management programs would purchasing the domain socialskills.com and pointing that domain at xyz.com help rank for social skills? My immediate answer was no it would not simply because Google doesn't associate any content with that domain, and Domain Forwarding is different that a redirect, which would apply if a website is already established. Am I correct in my thinking? Thanks guys!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | HashtagHustler0 -
What is Considered Over-Optimization?
Apart from keyword stuffing, what is considered by Google as over-optimization? For instance, if I link from a subdomain to a page on my main domain with a keyword-rich anchor text, does it qualify as over-optimization?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | sbrault740 -
How can i redirect my site to other domain ?
I have been running an eCommerce site since 2008 and have a PR3 with mostly have an authority link from reputed sites, how can I transfer my existing eCommerce site to the new domain so in the new domain i get SEO value from the old domain. Please advice.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | chandubaba0 -
Purchased a high ranking domain and want to transfer my site to the new domain
I recently purchased a highly ranked domain. The link profile is very good and I don't want to lose to many links however I want to transfer my site to that domain. What is the best way of doing this without losing the current rank on search engines? Also how much does the transfer of registrar information impact my SEO?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | ydop0 -
Recovery during domain migration
On average, how long does it takes to recover 80% of the rankings if two high authority domains are combined without chaging any content? I totally understand that each domain is different and search engines can treat them differently but if all the steps are followed to the T what are the chances?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | ninjamarketer1