Subdomain vs subdirectory for store
-
Hello,
The following services site
has a store at
Would the store be stronger if it was at
(in a subfolder) and included in the main navigation? The moz bar suggests not but I just want to make sure.
Thanks.
-
Yes, this is a great video by Matt Cutts. But I think he's mostly addressing how Google perceived people were trying to abuse their system, and what changes they made as a result.
Basically, he's saying that a subdomain doesn't make a big difference to Google's search rankings, and that in the past, people would use subdomains so that they could get additional search ranking placements (one for the main domain, another for a subdomain). He's made it clear that Google has put an end to this practice.
What he doesn't discuss is whether putting content on a subdomain is going to affect how Google scores the site, and if it scores a subdomain separately.
Most of the research out there still shows that the domain ranking is set differently for a subdomain vs. a subdirectory. Perhaps this might change in the future, but the general school of thought is that if you put all of your inbound links, social media shares, and content development into one domain (www.domain.com), it will do better than splitting the effort (part goes to shop.domain.com and part goes to www.domain.com).
Thanks!!
-
Jeff, have you seen this:
is he just trying to keep it simple and subdirectories are actually better?
-
Bob-
I've answered a similar question in the past here: http://moz.com/community/q/blog-on-subdomain
But the gist of it is:
store.mydomain.com --> content on the store. is treated as a different site, and SEO efforts (content, inbound links, social media) only help the subdomain.
mydomain.com/store --> subdirectories are usually the way to go. All of the content, inbound links and social media shares will help build the overall domain authority for you.
My recommendation is to go with the sub directory (mydomain.com/store/, and there are a whole lot of articles that back this up:
http://moz.com/community/q/blog-on-subdomain-vs-subdirectory-best-practices
http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/subdomains-and-subdirectories/
http://moz.com/community/q/best-place-for-a-blog-blog-mydomain-com-or-mydomain-com-blog
Hope this helps...
-- Jeff
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
-
Should an international school have subdomains for each school in a different country?
I understand a lot of people in the SEO world think that everything should be under one site, but if a European school wants to expand its presence in the USA, the current domain authority is 30/100 for the European website. The school is thinking of opening another school in the USA, should they just create a subdomain on the same European site or have a new site for the USA because it's better for the branding?
On-Page Optimization | | marketingextra
Any SEO experts can chime in here?1 -
Subdir vs Subdomain vs ccTLD
Hello Community, I'm running a .com website with India targetted audience on Webmastertools from 2 years. Now I want to start a separate zone for US. .us domain is not available for my domain right now. So what is your suggestion for best results: 1. domain/us (Subdirectory) 2. us.domain (Subdomain) 3. new domain (separate website) I think Subdomain can work great if I will pass place a header link sitewide. Or that can reduce authority as mentioned on few blogs? Let me know your thoughts
On-Page Optimization | | sah900 -
Duplicate content issues - page content and store URLs
Hi, I'm experiencing some heavy duplicate content Crawl errors on Moz with www.redrockdecals.com and therefore I really need some help. It brings up different connections between products and I'm having a hard time figuring out what it means. It is listing the same products as duplicate content but they have different URL endings. For example:http://www.redrockdecals.com/car-graphics/chevrolet-silverado?___store=nl&___from_store=us
On-Page Optimization | | speedbird1229
&
http://www.redrockdecals.com/car-graphics/chevrolet-silverado?___store=d&___from_store=us It seems like Moz considers the copy-pasted parts in the Full Description (scrolled a bit down on product pages) as Duplicate Content. For example the general text found on this page: http://www.redrockdecals.com/caution-tow-limited-turning-radius-decal Or this page: http://www.redrockdecals.com/if-you-don-t-succeed-first-time-then-skydiving-isn-t-for-you-bumper-sticker I am planning to write new and unique descriptions for all products but what do you suggest - should I either remove the long same descriptions or just shorten them perhaps so they don't outweigh the short but unique descriptions above? I've heard search engines understand that some parts of the page can be same on other pages but I wonder if in my case this has gone too deep... Thanks so much!0 -
Redirecting deleted posts 301 vs 302
There is a category on WP where job ads are posted. when a post got deleted I would like to pass 404 error page and redirect all those deleted posts to specific category. I found WP plugin Auto Redirect 404 in 301 for Trashed Posts which does redirect deleted post to specific URL. But posts which are in the trash (not permanently deleted) will get 302 redirects. Those deleted permanently will get 301 redirects. Should I try editing this plugin or find another why? Maybe there is similar way with Redirection plugin?
On-Page Optimization | | OVJ0 -
Title Tag: Phrases vs. Keywords Separated by "|"
Hello, One of my client's old sites has all category titles of the form (for example) running shoes | running shoe | walking shoes | walking shoe including many that perform well with over 60 characters. I'm in the process of rewriting the titles into something like Running and Walking Shoes, A quality shoe at OurShoes.com The reason I'm rewriting them is for future google penalties, and to look better to possible guest post opportunities. Also to look better in the SERPS But the old style is performing very well. What are the real pros and cons of each? Thanks.
On-Page Optimization | | BobGW0 -
.us VS .com
In general from what I have experienced a location specific extension such as .co.uk geo-targeted to the same location gives the best results when ranking BUT when I look at results from the US, page after page shows results of .com, surely if my above statement is true then a .us domain extension should rank better then a .com.
On-Page Optimization | | activitysuper0 -
External vs inline for CSS menu
Which is better for search engines: external or inline menus? And which language: CSS, Javascript, or both?
On-Page Optimization | | teatable0 -
Passing value in a subdomain
Hi guys, I am planning of setting up a blog within a client's website, due to limitations to their server environment, I can only setup the blog in a subdomain, I have read in some articles saying subdomains don't pass value as well as subfolders. My questions are: Is it true that subdomains can't pass SEO value? For example, if I set up a blog (say blog.mydomain.com), will that improve long tail searches for my website (mydomain.com)? What are some recommendations for subdomains so that it passes more value back to the root domain (for example, internal linking from subdomain back to root domain) Thanks guys.
On-Page Optimization | | NextDigital510