Skip to content
    Moz logo Menu open Menu close
    • Products
      • Moz Pro
      • Moz Pro Home
      • Moz Local
      • Moz Local Home
      • STAT
      • Moz API
      • Moz API Home
      • Compare SEO Products
      • Moz Data
    • Free SEO Tools
      • Domain Analysis
      • Keyword Explorer
      • Link Explorer
      • Competitive Research
      • MozBar
      • More Free SEO Tools
    • Learn SEO
      • Beginner's Guide to SEO
      • SEO Learning Center
      • Moz Academy
      • MozCon
      • Webinars, Whitepapers, & Guides
    • Blog
    • Why Moz
      • Digital Marketers
      • Agency Solutions
      • Enterprise Solutions
      • Small Business Solutions
      • The Moz Story
      • New Releases
    • Log in
    • Log out
    • Products
      • Moz Pro

        Your all-in-one suite of SEO essentials.

      • Moz Local

        Raise your local SEO visibility with complete local SEO management.

      • STAT

        SERP tracking and analytics for enterprise SEO experts.

      • Moz API

        Power your SEO with our index of over 44 trillion links.

      • Compare SEO Products

        See which Moz SEO solution best meets your business needs.

      • Moz Data

        Power your SEO strategy & AI models with custom data solutions.

      NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic
      Moz Pro

      NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic

      Learn more
    • Free SEO Tools
      • Domain Analysis

        Get top competitive SEO metrics like DA, top pages and more.

      • Keyword Explorer

        Find traffic-driving keywords with our 1.25 billion+ keyword index.

      • Link Explorer

        Explore over 40 trillion links for powerful backlink data.

      • Competitive Research

        Uncover valuable insights on your organic search competitors.

      • MozBar

        See top SEO metrics for free as you browse the web.

      • More Free SEO Tools

        Explore all the free SEO tools Moz has to offer.

      NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic
      Moz Pro

      NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic

      Learn more
    • Learn SEO
      • Beginner's Guide to SEO

        The #1 most popular introduction to SEO, trusted by millions.

      • SEO Learning Center

        Broaden your knowledge with SEO resources for all skill levels.

      • On-Demand Webinars

        Learn modern SEO best practices from industry experts.

      • How-To Guides

        Step-by-step guides to search success from the authority on SEO.

      • Moz Academy

        Upskill and get certified with on-demand courses & certifications.

      • MozCon

        Save on Early Bird tickets and join us in London or New York City

      Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints
      Moz API

      Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints

      Find your plan
    • Blog
    • Why Moz
      • Digital Marketers

        Simplify SEO tasks to save time and grow your traffic.

      • Small Business Solutions

        Uncover insights to make smarter marketing decisions in less time.

      • Agency Solutions

        Earn & keep valuable clients with unparalleled data & insights.

      • Enterprise Solutions

        Gain a competitive edge in the ever-changing world of search.

      • The Moz Story

        Moz was the first & remains the most trusted SEO company.

      • New Releases

        Get the scoop on the latest and greatest from Moz.

      Surface actionable competitive intel
      New Feature

      Surface actionable competitive intel

      Learn More
    • Log in
      • Moz Pro
      • Moz Local
      • Moz Local Dashboard
      • Moz API
      • Moz API Dashboard
      • Moz Academy
    • Avatar
      • Moz Home
      • Notifications
      • Account & Billing
      • Manage Users
      • Community Profile
      • My Q&A
      • My Videos
      • Log Out

    The Moz Q&A Forum

    • Forum
    • Questions
    • Users
    • Ask the Community

    Welcome to the Q&A Forum

    Browse the forum for helpful insights and fresh discussions about all things SEO.

    1. Home
    2. SEO Tactics
    3. Intermediate & Advanced SEO
    4. Can subdomains avoid spam penalizations?

    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.

    Can subdomains avoid spam penalizations?

    Intermediate & Advanced SEO
    3
    8
    1487
    Loading More Posts
    • Oldest to Newest
    • Newest to Oldest
    • Most Votes
    Reply
    • Reply as question
    Log in to reply
    This topic has been deleted. Only users with question management privileges can see it.
    • fablau
      fablau last edited by

      Hello everyone,

      I have a basic question for which I couldn't find a definitive answer for.

      Let's say I have my main website with URL:

      www.mywebsite.com

      And I have a related affiliates website with URL:

      affiliates.mywebsite.com

      Which includes completely different content from the main website. Also, both domains have two different IP addresses.

      Are those considered two completely separate domains by Google? Can bad links pointing to affiliates.mywebsite.com affect www.mywebsite.com in any way?

      Thanks in advance for any answer to my inquiry!

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • fablau
        fablau @Vijay-Gaur last edited by

        Sure, I understand, that makes sense. Thank you for your help!

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • Vijay-Gaur
          Vijay-Gaur @fablau last edited by

          Hi Fabrizo,

          As answered by Joshua Belland in above answer, you will need to be careful with how you plan it out.

          The IP and DNS need to be on a different server.

          Be careful about how prtovide link for these with each other.

          Regards,

          Vijay

          fablau 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • fablau
            fablau @signet_int last edited by

            Sorry guys, I wasn't enough clear with my first question above, it was actually too generic.

            To cut to the chase, I am talking about our main website:

            www.virtualsheetmusic.com (IP 66.29.153.48)

            and our affiliate website which is:

            affiliates.virtualsheetmusic.com (IP 66.29.153.50)

            They have 2 different IPs, but they are on the same server and same network, of course their are on the same IP block.

            And I'd like to know to what extent the activity/status of one site can affect the other, but from what you are asking, I guess they could affect each other to some extent. I mean, Google could understand that they are part of the same "network" and then associate them anyway... right?

            Vijay-Gaur 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • signet_int
              signet_int last edited by

              Are these subdomain properties on different A class ip blocks or different C class ip blocks?

              It think this all depends. If the IP addresses are in the same neighborhood or on the same subnets as each other then I would say yes. But beyond that you have to think about several other foot prints to look for:

              • Are the nameservers the same?
              • Are these ip addresses assigned to different regions?
              • Are you interlinking these web properties?
              • Even the fact that the subdomain is still associated with the domain makes nervous and only because that is easy for Google to track. If you think about how may other data points they use to find footprints in their algorithm, I don't see why that wouldn't be one of them.

              I would be careful with RankBrain continuously evolving and seeing how much turbulence there has been in the serps lately. Personally, my small PBN is completely on separate A Class IPs, with custom name servers, different hosts, and I only put premium content on it. It's not great for quick affiliate gigs, but it certainly helps sustain long term growth.

              fablau 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • Vijay-Gaur
                Vijay-Gaur @fablau last edited by

                Hi Fabrizo,

                Yes, they would be treated as different entities, as a precaution, I would recommend the geographical location of the server IP to be far off and not from the same IP block.

                Thanks,

                Vijay

                1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                • fablau
                  fablau @Vijay-Gaur last edited by

                  Thank you Vijay for your extensive answer, but as I wrote above, each sub-domain has its own separate IP address. So... if each sub-domain has its own IP address, are they treated as two completely different websites?

                  Vijay-Gaur 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                  • Vijay-Gaur
                    Vijay-Gaur last edited by

                    Hi Fabrizo,

                    A subdomain is treated a different entity, however since it comes from the same IP, it's risky to create backlinks to main the site and subdomain. Let me try to answer your question by giving you an example, where we experimented with the idea of subdomain and main site linking , it would help you understand how google treats them as different entities.

                    We had a client who runs one of his donation campaign for his project from his subdomain and used the main domain for commercial purpose.

                    He was linking both domains in reciprocal links to send traffic to donation subdomain from the main site and vice versa. The results were shocking as the donation website was ranking far better on even commercial keywords better than main website. We did a deeper analysis and found out the donation website was out-performing main website in terms of high authority contextual backlinks. After some time, the main site started dipping more on the organic traffic and results, we analysed and concluded it was reciprocal linking that was the source of the problem.

                    We had to make a choice either to remove reciprocal backlinks or test the subdomain on a separate IP. First, we removed the reciprocal links (even if the client was not ready easily) just to prove to the client that it was subdomain links that were causing the problem, the results were good as the main site recovered the ranks and traffic (we also implemented our planned off-page for both the sites) .

                    Now, this helped us conclude that same IP + subdomain was an issue but we were not sure whether moving to another server would help (not only IP, we had made clear that we wanted a separate location for server IP from hosting company). We shifted the IP first and then watched the results , the donation site was steadily improving on donation related keywords and dipping on commercial keywords, on the other hand, the main website crept up slowly in ranks on commercial keywords (they were medium-high competition keywords).

                    We made it clear to the client, that this time the links won't be reciprocal and he has to decide his priority about which site he wants to give follow and no follow links. The client wanted the backlinks from donation to the main site with do-follow links, so we created the same. This further helped our commercial website rank to improve, we are still running the websites in the same mode and the results are good.

                    I hope this answers your query and would help you have a decision. if you have further questions, please feel free to respond and ask.

                    Regards,

                    Vijay

                    fablau 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                    • 1 / 1
                    • First post
                      Last post

                    Got a burning SEO question?

                    Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.


                    Start my free trial


                    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.

                    • See all categories

                    Related Questions

                    • Markbwc

                      New Subdomain & Best Way To Index

                      We have an ecommerce site, we'll say at https://example.com. We have created a series of brand new landing pages, mainly for PPC and Social at https://sub.example.com, but would also like for these to get indexed. These are built on Unbounce so there is an easy option to simply uncheck the box that says "block page from search engines", however I am trying to speed up this process but also do this the best/correct way. I've read a lot about how we should build landing pages as a sub-directory, but one of the main issues we are dealing with is long page load time on https://example.com, so I wanted a kind of fresh start. I was thinking a potential solution to index these quickly/correctly was to make a redirect such as https://example.com/forward-1 -> https:sub.example.com/forward-1 then submit https://example.com/forward-1 to Search Console but I am not sure if that will even work. Another possible solution was to put some of the subdomain links accessed on the root domain say right on the pages or in the navigation. Also, will I definitely be hurt by 'starting over' with a new website? Even though my MozBar on my subdomain https://sub.example.com has the same domain authority (DA) as the root domain https://example.com? Recommendations and steps to be taken are welcome!

                      Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Markbwc
                      0
                    • WhoseNo

                      My website is penalized from google with no message in GWT.

                      On 26 of October 2018 My website have around 1 million pages indexed on google. but after hour when I checked my website was banned from google and all pages were removed. I checked my GWT and I did not receive any message. Can any one tell me what are the possible reasons and how can I recover my website? My website link is https://www.whoseno.com

                      Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | WhoseNo
                      0
                    • LindsayE

                      Can you index a Google doc?

                      We have updated and added completely new content to our state pages. Our old state content is sitting in a our Google drive. Can I make these public to get them indexed and provide a link back to our state pages? In theory it sounds like a great link building strategy... TIA!

                      Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | LindsayE
                      1
                    • Webdeal

                      How Google Adwords Can Impact SEO Ranking ?

                      Hi SEO Gurus, I have a question. How Google Adwords Can Impact SEO Ranking ?
                      Positive , negative or neutral impact? I will appreciate if you will provide detailed answer Thank you for your time webdeal

                      Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Webdeal
                      0
                    • qdigi

                      Can Google read my backlink in Javascript??

                      Hi SeoMoz community! I have a software product, which our clients implement onto their websites. It is like a pop up box. I know that backlinks are very important for SEO ranking, and I really want to give our clients 2 options of product: 1. you can get the free/cheaper option if you use the code which has a keyworded backlink to our site on it 2. you can pay small fee if you don't want to use the version with a link to our site on it Now, the problem is that the product is written entirely in Javascript, and I don't think that Google crawls this, do they? Is there a way around this? Thanks for your help!

                      Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | qdigi
                      0
                    • SEOTGT

                      Is it bad to host an XML sitemap in a different subdomain?

                      Example: sitemap.example.com/sitemap.xml for pages on www.example.com.

                      Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | SEOTGT
                      0
                    • AWCthreads

                      Can Affiliate Links Harm Your Rank?

                      Does Google interpret Affiliate links as paid links? If so, can Affiliate links harm your rank if they are not properly tagged with a no-follow? Thanks.

                      Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | AWCthreads
                      0
                    • julienraby

                      Redirect a subdomain to a subdirectory for SEO purposes.

                      Hi, I have a site on wordpress and I want to add eCommerce to it. We want to go with Shopify but Shopify only allows to host their platform on a subdomain. I like to have it on a subdorectory, so my question is: Would it make sense to redirect the whole subdomain to a subdirectory (move everything from shop.domain.com to domain.com/shop) for SEO purposes? Would Google see these pages as if they were part of the main domain? Thanks! Julien

                      Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | julienraby
                      0

                    Get started with Moz Pro!

                    Unlock the power of advanced SEO tools and data-driven insights.

                    Start my free trial
                    Products
                    • Moz Pro
                    • Moz Local
                    • Moz API
                    • Moz Data
                    • STAT
                    • Product Updates
                    Moz Solutions
                    • SMB Solutions
                    • Agency Solutions
                    • Enterprise Solutions
                    Free SEO Tools
                    • Domain Authority Checker
                    • Link Explorer
                    • Keyword Explorer
                    • Competitive Research
                    • Brand Authority Checker
                    • Local Citation Checker
                    • MozBar Extension
                    • MozCast
                    Resources
                    • Blog
                    • SEO Learning Center
                    • Help Hub
                    • Beginner's Guide to SEO
                    • How-to Guides
                    • Moz Academy
                    • API Docs
                    About Moz
                    • About
                    • Team
                    • Careers
                    • Contact
                    Why Moz
                    • Case Studies
                    • Testimonials
                    Get Involved
                    • Become an Affiliate
                    • MozCon
                    • Webinars
                    • Practical Marketer Series
                    • MozPod
                    Connect with us

                    Contact the Help team

                    Join our newsletter
                    Moz logo
                    © 2021 - 2025 SEOMoz, Inc., a Ziff Davis company. All rights reserved. Moz is a registered trademark of SEOMoz, Inc.
                    • Accessibility
                    • Terms of Use
                    • Privacy

                    Looks like your connection to Moz was lost, please wait while we try to reconnect.