Different subdomains v. subdirectories?
-
Hi Moz community!
I am working with a team to launch an eCommerce project that is becoming increasingly complex.
The client has three major brands that are owned by a fourth parent company that they would like to bring together for the first time. We have done a ton of user research and have found that there is a good deal of overlap with two of the brands; the third is very distinct and the parent company is virtually unknown in America.
Because of this, we have designed different feels for each brand while making them significantly more coherent. We have also done our homework re: keyword and market research. Our goals are 1) unify and improve their brand identity, 2) create a supreme eCommerce user experience, 3) have smart SEO.
So here is my question: should the URL structure best be:
EX 1: brand1.parentco.com , brand1.parentco.com/products , brand1.paretnco.com/products/specific-product etc...
EX 2: parentco.com/brand1 , parentco.com/brand1/products , parentco.com/brand1/product
EX 3: parentco.com/brand1-products , parentco.com/brand1-products/specific-product
EX 4: brand1.com , brand2.com , brand3.com , parentco.com
Would it be best to have the brands on their own subdomain or subdirectory?
Does it make it looks like the brands aren't significant enough if they are on a subdirectory to humans and/or bots?
Are there problems with sharing cart information across subdomains?
Currently, between the three brands and the parent company there are about 8 sites that are basically copies of one another. Their domain authority is between 40-70 and 5 of the 8 sites have a significant amount of natural, high quality links. These current sites are basically like EX 4 above and are totally disconnected to one another. Regardless of the structure we chose we are going to redirect everything to keep as much of the current assets as possible.
Any insights or information would be so appreciated!
-
Thanks! I suppose we have options. I am leaning towards going with EX 1 just for consistency's sake to keep all the brands together.
Thanks again!
-
That is a lot of different variations. I suggest combining the similar ones and keeping the others on different domains.
Like brand1, brand2, brand3.
In my opinion, if you already have different domains and have significant links, that will only benefit you. Combining them would not do too much good and it might cause clutter.
Having multiple powerful and authoritative domains can be really beneficial.
Just my 2 cents.
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
-
Requiring customer agree to shipping terms at checkout
I work for an ecommerce company that has many of its shipments go by LTL freight. Our customer service team has issues with a few customers per month that aren't equipped to receive freight shipments which leads to returns and other issues. In an effort to better inform our customers, the customer service team is requesting that we add a checkbox to the checkout that requires customers to agree to our shipping and returns policy, including a link to the policy page. I am wondering how concerned people here would be that requiring the customer to check a box agreeing to those terms would lead to more customers abandoning during the checkout process. Or do you think it's not a concern? Thanks for your thoughts.
Conversion Rate Optimization | | Kyle_M0 -
We changed our domain, I used the move tool in Google Search Console and I am having our site redirected and go daddy, and now I spoke with someone who suggest we do a 301 redirect for all pages on our site and I’m not sure that’s the correct move.
We just changed our domain name after 15 years. when I bought the new domain name I called Go Daddy and they instructed me to contact my google G sweet admin account and change all of our emails over which I did and then I went into Shopify who is my host and changed my primary domain there and then I went back to Go Daddy and had my old website forwarded to my new site. since then there has been nothing but problems with Google. my product feed from my merchant center account has been suspended three or four times now, I tried to rename and move all of my Google accounts from my old domain to my new one, but I am not an SEO person... after making the changes I have started google chats with analytics department with the merchant center with Google as they all keep saying that it looks fine but I’m not convinced because the product feed keeps getting disapproved. So I posted an ad for help and the Guy I spoke with suggested I do a 301 redirect for every single page on my old site, But I’m concerned that might confuse things further? I’ve already started the move in Google Search console And in Shopify I added the old domain back into the domains section and am having it redirectEd that way too... I guess I’m just looking to know which way I should proceed, any and all advice is warmly welcome thank you in advance Maureen
Conversion Rate Optimization | | TooFast130 -
Redirect Management on Headless Wordpress w/ React Front End
Hello everyone, As Headless Wordpress becomes more and more popular, it becomes more complicated to manage and track 301 redirects. I'm reaching out for advice on this. Our main issue right now, is that after migrating from Drupal to a Headless Wordpress/React platform we lost the ability to track, manage, and view traffic analytics for users hitting those redirects. This was something we were able to do in Drupal. Example: If we have a redirect in place we could see how many times in the past x number of days that redirect was hit by users attempting to access the old URL. Unfortunately, Yoast Premium, has been helpful with other SEO needs, but this is one that it is not able to manage. Anyone have any ideas, experience, or thoughts on this issue? Thanks for your time
Conversion Rate Optimization | | culturefoundry1 -
Partial Website Translation - Strategy Debate
Hi We have a travel site with over 3000 pages in English. Of these around 200 relate to products and the rest are content articles, most of which with very low traffic. Certain products and pages appeal directly to users in different languages (around 20-30 out of 200 for each language). We are debating how to go about translating these pages... If we did "oursite.com/es/product", "oursite.com/de/product", etc then users entering the site on these translated pages from Google would be limited to seeing a very cut down site, bearing in mind most speak English and would also be able to interact with our English language content we are probably losing out. Also, if we detected user language on entry, we would show effectively hide most of our product and content from users. Any suggestions or ideas about how to go about this without losing engagement/conversions/creating a mess?
Conversion Rate Optimization | | ben100010 -
Reducing Negative Impact of Webpage Login Form
Our real estate website (www.metro-manhattan.com) now requires visitors to login in if they want to search our listing database. The result is that. 9 out of 10 visitors leave without searching; they simply refuse to set up an account. I have attached images of the search bar and login form. Is there a way to increase the percentage of visitors that login? We have tried to make it as simple as possible, allowing visitors to login by Facebook, Google or by providing their email address. We do not send any verification email. We are forced to. keep this login unfortunately. But is there anything we can do to reduce the visitor bounce rate? Thanks,
Conversion Rate Optimization | | Kingalan1
Alan TF0tlVe i79OEg5 i79OEg52 -
Email Campaign Tracking within Domain & Subdomains
What is the best process to track conversions/visits in Google Analytics when running an email campaign that links to both a sub-domain and then the main domain? To elaborate further, we have an email marketing campaign that directs users to a subdomain (e.g. promos.website.com) within the subdomain we include our products. Once a user clicks on the promos, they are taken to our main website (e.g website.product1.com). What is the best process to track conversions from this email campaign that leads users to the sub-domain first, then to the main site (where the conversions take place)? We have URL tagging in the Email Campaign - but not able to see the true conversions show up in Analytics on the main site. Any ideas would be greatly appreciated. Cheers!
Conversion Rate Optimization | | SEO5Team0 -
Is it possible to set a Goal conversion tracking from a subdomain to a root domain?
Hi Mozzers, Here is an issue I am going through: I have a root domain(www.example.com) that is the core website where you are able to schedule a service I have a subdomain (sub.example.om) that is part of content strategy offering free tips and follows a different branding strategy. There are internal links from sub to root domain I have a GA subdomain tracking code installed on every page for both domains I would love to set goal tracking on GA for visitors coming to my subdomain, then going to root domain and then schedule a sevices? Is this possible? If it is, can someone show me a How To because I tried it anddidn't work? Thanks mozzers!
Conversion Rate Optimization | | Ideas-Money-Art0
