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
      • SEO Q&A
      • 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. WordPress Sub-directory for SEO

    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.

    WordPress Sub-directory for SEO

    Intermediate & Advanced SEO
    wordpress subdirectory domain authority
    5
    7
    5243
    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.
    • HimalayanInstitute
      HimalayanInstitute Subscriber last edited by

      Hi There,

      I'm working on a WordPress site that includes a premium content blog with approx 900 posts.

      As part of the project, those 900 posts and other membership functionality will be moved from the main site to another site built specifically for content/membership.

      Ideally, we want the existing posts to remain on the root domain to avoid a loss in link juice/domain authority.

      We initially began setting up a WordPress Multisite using the sub-directory option. This allows for the main site to be at www.website.com and the secondary site to be at www.website.com/secondary.

      Unfortunately, the themes and plugins we need for the platform do not play nicely with WordPress Multisite, so we started seeking a new solution, and, discovered that a second instance of WordPress can be installed in a subdirectory on the server. This would give us the same subdirectory structure while bypassing WordPress Multisite and instead, having two separate single-site installs.

      Do you foresee any issues with this WordPress subdirectory install? Does Google care/know these are two separate WordPress installs and do we risk losing any link juice/domain authority?

      nmiletic 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • BlueprintMarketing
        BlueprintMarketing last edited by

        @himalayaninstitute said in WordPress Sub-directory for SEO:

        WordPress can be installed in a subdirectory

        I have done this a lot and I mean a lot what you want to do is set up a reverse proxy on your subdomain and this will allow you to not only bypass having to use multisite for subfolder but if you want to power it separately you can you do not have to it all. You should probably use your same server and power through Fastly our CloudFlare

        alt text
        alt text

        once you set this up it is super easy to keep it running in your entire site will be much faster as a result as well

        my response to someone else that needed a subfolder
        https://moz.com/community/q/topic/69528/using-a-reverse-proxy-and-301-redirect-to-appear-sub-domain-as-sub-directory-what-are-the-seo-risks

        please also look at it explained by these hosting companies is unbelievable easy to implement compared to how it looks and you can do so with Fastly or cloudflare in a matter of minutes

        • https://servebolt.com/help/article/cloudflare-workers-reverse-proxy/

        • https://kinsta.com/blog/reverse-proxy/

        • https://support.pagely.com/hc/en-us/articles/213148558-Reverse-Proxy-Setup

        • https://pantheon.io/product/advanced-global-cdn

        • https://wpengine.com/support/using-a-reverse-proxy-with-wp-engine/

        • https://thoughtbot.com/blog/host-your-blog-under-blog-on-your-www-domain

        • https://crate.io/blog/fastly_traffic_spike
          *https://support.fastly.com/hc/en-us/community/posts/4407427792397-Set-a-request-condition-to-redirect-URL

        • https://coda.io/@matt-varughese/guide-how-to-reverse-proxy-with-cloudflare-workers

        • https://www.cloudflare.com/learning/cdn/glossary/reverse-proxy/

        • https://gist.github.com/LimeCuda/18b88f7ad9cdf1dccb01b4a6bbe398a6
          I hope this was of help
          tom

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • HimalayanInstitute
          HimalayanInstitute Subscriber @nmiletic last edited by

          @nmiletic The content section of the site requires a unique UI Design and other robust functionality, so having a separate theme/plugins in its own directory is going to be the way we go here. Thanks for your assistance!

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • nmiletic
            nmiletic @HimalayanInstitute last edited by

            @himalayaninstitute Have you thought about adding a page and making all of this new content a subpage? Or changing your permalink structure to include a category in the URL? You can then add all of these posts under that category and have the URL show up as www.example.com/category/page-or-post-name

            HimalayanInstitute 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • HimalayanInstitute
              HimalayanInstitute Subscriber @Danny_Exxa last edited by

              @danny_exxa @amitydigital

              The website at the subdirectory will be an online learning platform with a blog, online courses, memberships, gated content, etc. The content currently lives on the main site, so, it's great that we can move it into the subdirectory without taking a hit from Google.

              Since these are fundamentally two separate websites, we're not concerned about needing to manage them independently.

              Thanks again for your input and advice, we greatly appreciate it!

              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • Danny_Exxa
                Danny_Exxa @amitydigital last edited by

                @amitydigital said in WordPress Sub-directory for SEO:

                Google will view it as one site so you shouldn't have any issues from that perspective. The Google bot is just looking at pages and won't know/care that the underlying CMS that is running some pages is a different install than other pages. The downside is you now have two websites to maintain, two themes, two sets of files, etc... That may result in a bit of a headache in the future.

                As @amitydigital put it, the issue with your approach would be repetitive tasks. You will not loose any DA nor PA (being that you implement a correct 301 redirection). What is going to be on the subdirectory?

                HimalayanInstitute 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                • amitydigital
                  amitydigital last edited by

                  Google will view it as one site so you shouldn't have any issues from that perspective. The Google bot is just looking at pages and won't know/care that the underlying CMS that is running some pages is a different install than other pages. The downside is you now have two websites to maintain, two themes, two sets of files, etc... That may result in a bit of a headache in the future.

                  Danny_Exxa 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                  • 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

                  • RejinKayastha

                    Moz API Spam Score - Backlinks

                    wordpress backlinks website optimization

                    Hi, everyone I am trying to get my website DA up. I have analyzed my competitors and thanks to Moz I have idea and insights of how my competitors get backlinks. But, some of them are old school techniques. Also my website has some PBNs no follow backlinks does it affect my website ranking? Their spam score is 10-40. But other competitors has them as well. Does anyone know indepth on this topic?

                    Link Building | | RejinKayastha
                    1
                  • rashedkhalaf1991

                    Unsolved SEO Domain Authority

                    domain authority

                    https://aljoodservices.com
                    I am working on improving this site now, but while searching, I found a site that allows me to create a blog and the site ranks high 77. If I create a blog for us and direct it to this site, will I get a high domain authority through this site? I don't know if the domains are spam or something like that.

                    Moz Tools | | rashedkhalaf1991
                    2
                  • Arek_W

                    Unsolved Why Did My Site's DA Go Down After Adding New Links?

                    domain authority link building website optimization

                    Hi Moz Community, I've noticed my website's DA https://clean4u.org fell from 12 to 11 after adding a few links. I thought these were quality links, so I'm puzzled about the drop. Has anyone experienced something similar or knows why this could happen? Any advice or insight would be great! Thanks!

                    Link Building | | Arek_W
                    0
                  • LisaBabblebird

                    Domain Authority dropped 10 points and I don't know why

                    domain authority optimization

                    In my latest site crawl, the domain authority dropped 10 points for no apparent reason. There have been no changes to the site. The only change I have made this month is to block referral spam to the site. My competitors' DAs have stayed the same too. website name: https://knowledgefront.co.uk/ Any ideas?

                    Technical SEO | | LisaBabblebird
                    0
                  • seotrafilea

                    Get DA/PA Bulk Mode

                    domain authority

                    Hi, everyone. I want to know if you know any way to get DA & PA metrics with any software (not Netpeak Checker please, is very low) or any add-on for Google Sheet or Microsoft Excel (like Majestic has for Google Sheets). Up today any software works always and sometimes the results are not really. Please, team of MOZ and Community, help me. And team of MOZ, the SEOs around the world need a solution for this. We scrapped many domains every day for build our privates blogs networks and also for search opportunities for link our sites. Please, provide us anyway (software, tool in your suite, I don't know) for this essential function in the SEO World. Thanks!

                    API | | seotrafilea
                    0
                  • fablau

                    Robots.txt: how to exclude sub-directories correctly?

                    Hello here, I am trying to figure out the correct way to tell SEs to crawls this: http://www.mysite.com/directory/ But not this: http://www.mysite.com/directory/sub-directory/ or this: http://www.mysite.com/directory/sub-directory2/sub-directory/... But with the fact I have thousands of sub-directories with almost infinite combinations, I can't put the following definitions in a manageable way: disallow: /directory/sub-directory/ disallow: /directory/sub-directory2/ disallow: /directory/sub-directory/sub-directory/ disallow: /directory/sub-directory2/subdirectory/ etc... I would end up having thousands of definitions to disallow all the possible sub-directory combinations. So, is the following way a correct, better and shorter way to define what I want above: allow: /directory/$ disallow: /directory/* Would the above work? Any thoughts are very welcome! Thank you in advance. Best, Fab.

                    Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | fablau
                    1
                  • knielsen

                    SEO value in multiple backlinks from same domain and from various sub-domains.

                    A site has a link to my site as one of their main tabs, which means whenever a user clicks through to another page within the site, my link - being a main tab - is there. This creates thousands of links from this site. How does Google treat this? Do we have a rough formula estimate. In other words, assume it creates 1,000 backlinks would the SEO value be around the same as if I had just 2 link total as a main tab, but on 2 different non-related sites? Or, does it actually count fully as 1,000 links? Links from various sub-domains. Several .EDU's are linking to my site. Different schools within the overall same university. Example: nursing.abc.edu links to my site, but so does business.abc.edu. For SEO does that count as much as if I had links from complete non-related universities, or would Google evaluate that these links are related (since same main domain) and that will discount any links more than 1 to some extent? If discounted, then what do we estimate the discount to be? thank yoyu

                    Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | knielsen
                    1
                  • kashyaplakkad

                    What should I cover in a SEO proposal ?

                    What should I cover in a SEO proposal? Is there any sample SEO Proposal template in SEOMoz?

                    Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | kashyaplakkad
                    1

                  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.