Which is better for Wordpress multisite SEO? Subdomains or subdirectories
-
Hi,
I've always used subdomains when setting up a WordPress Multisite + Buddypress website. But which is better for SEO?
Now I'm thinking this may not be a "one size fits all" websites decision:
Case 1: The subsite blog owners need/want/pay/ to advertise their own business using their subsite. Subdomains are perfect because they can SEO their own site seperate from other client sites, yet reap benefits from the home buddpress site SEO.
Case 2: The subsite blogs are for hobbyists so they are not promoting their own site with SEO, at least they don't need to. However, using subsites subdirectories will enhance the content and SEO for the main Buddypress site by treating them all as content of the main site.
I would appreciate hearing from those with more expertise.
Regards,
Larry
.
-
Hi Larry,
Ah, the age old question of subdomain or subdirectory. You are right, there really isn't a one-size-fits-all answer to this question. From what I've seen, I think the subdirectory is usually a better answer for SEO but I don't think the subdomain is a horrible answer.
A subdomain is really a different site with only limited connections. It might have a different branding or a different focus than the main site. If your point is to create a really separate website, then using a subdomain makes sense. However, if it really is a separate site altogether, I'd opt for a separate domain so you can make that intention of treating these as different sites crystal clear.
If the sub-site is a part of the same site (same company, same brand, it connects to content on the rest of the site), then I would opt for the subdirectory. This makes it easier to keep all the content connected within the site and any links or social activity you get to pages in that subdirectory is more likely to help other parts of the site. So, for that reason I would opt for a subdirectory instead of a subdomain.
I hope that helps. Thanks,
Matthew
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
-
Question about pruning your website/blog for SEO
Hey all, So I checked out "The What, Why, and How of Pruning Your Website for SEO" and recently read ahrefs well known article on seo strategy and both really focused on the idea of removing poorly performing pages on your site for an SEO boost. I've asked this question in a few different ways before but I was hoping to get some more insight into this. If my company's blog has thousands of posts going back 5 years, 99% of which only really had pageviews on the day of their release and then after that receive no traffic, direct or organic, am I better off getting rid of (301) 99% of these posts and only sticking to/improving important/performant posts? Does anyone know how other blogs/sites deal with these sorts of issues. Where one function of the blog is to provide informative articles and the other function to post little tidbits (with barely any copy and rapid relevancy decay rate) meant to promote interaction with the blog community (like polls or one line contest winner announcements). Is this an issue of misusing the blog? For example, should the blog just be used for articles and all contests etc. be moved to social media? Thanks in advance for your insights, Roman
Social Media | | Dynata_panel_marketing0 -
Will Facebook traffic hurt our SEO? Should we put our blog on the core domain or sub domain?
We are concerned that social traffic could hurt our SEO. What do you think... Our average time on site from organic search traffic is 7 minutes. Facebook traffic has an average time on site of 1 minute. Both traffic sources are going to different pages. If we generate 3 times as much traffic from Facebook as we do from google this will pull down our overall average time on site and engagement levels big time. Should we put our blog on the core domain or a subdomain? Right now we are holding back on promoting on facebook because we are concerned it could hurt our SEO, what do you think? Should we try to get as much traffic as possible from Facebook even though the engagement is much lower? Should we put our blog which is generating the low engagement traffic from facebook on the core domain or a subdomain?
Social Media | | rvshare0 -
Google + and SEO
Hello, A couple of competitors that I keep an eye on over the last couple of months have been really going for the Google + links and according to Opensite explorer they have over 200 social page metrics for Google +. I was just wondering if there has been an update that I have missed that gives follow links for Google + or does Google + affect Domain authority? And if so can I just use my own Google + account to create these social page metrics or does it depend on someone else sharing my posts? Many thanks
Social Media | | mblsolutions0 -
Suggested Social Stream Solution for Wordpress
Hi, I was looking for some ideas on Wordpress for social streaming. What I am looking for is to show my activity in the right sidebar of a blog. I would like to capture this in an attractive way. My site has a lot of pictures so visual is very important. Now having some some searching there are a thousand "share this" type plugins. My need is different in that I want to show the activity of what I am sharing in: FB, Pinterest, Twitter, YouTube and Instagram. I found this plugin below that has several nice formats. Since the column is 325 wide I can easily use one of the longer streaming looking options. http://codecanyon.net/item/wordpress-social-stream/full_screen_preview/2201708 http://codecanyon.net/theme_previews/2201708-wordpress-social-stream?index=1&url_name=wordpress-social-stream Let me know if you have some other suggestions. One thing I don't want to to is tank page load speed. In this I could not elect to rotate. Nonetheless, this is what I am hoping for so I would welcome your feedback. Thanks,
Social Media | | will21121 -
Best way to create content in Google Plus to help SEO
Hi, I would like to know what is your experience about how to create content for Google+ in order to improve your SEO. I mean, tips like content length, opitmization, links, hashtags, and so on... What do you think? How would you integrate this strategy with the other ones (facebook, twitter, blogs, etc.) Thank you.
Social Media | | teconsite0 -
Merge Facebook profiles for SEO?
We are considering merging facebook profiles for our three stores. If we do this, users will not be able to "check in" at a location, but wouldn't it be better to have 4,000 fans on one profile than to have 2,500, 1,000, and 500 fans on the three profiles? The main site for these stores is also an ecommerce site.
Social Media | | EugeneF0 -
What are current SEO Treads to improve your ranking
What are current SEO Treads to improve your ranking and increase the website Au What are the factors impacting SEO and how?
Social Media | | diyawards
How do you win over these Factors to ensure you get good results?
How do you measure these Factors (tools you use)?0 -
If I move my blog from subdomain to root, will my blog lose all of its authority? Social signals?
Moving my blog from blog.site.co.uk to site.co.uk/blog and just wondered if all the social data for each post will be lost including the blog authority which has been built up over time? Is 301 redirects enough to keep any of it?
Social Media | | SDOwner0