Subdomain vs root which is better for SEO
-
We run a network of sites that we are considering consolidating into one main site with multiple categories. Which would be better having each of the "topics / site" reside in subdomains or as a sub-folder off of the root? Pros and cons of each would be great.
Thanks,
TR
-
This might shed a little more light on the subject.
The sites are per video game. So they could be completely different from one another.
I like the way a subdomain looks and for this purpose, I've seen other sites doing it this way for a long time.
From where I sit subdomains seem to be the "right" way to go about this but if sub-dirs are going to be BETTER for SEO then I want to do that.
I don't mind SEOing multiple sites and I would somewhat prefer to keep things separated out like that.
I guess what I really want to know is, Is this a personal preference thing if workload isn't my concern? Or is one going to be objectively better than the other.
Thanks for the replies so far. Much appreciated.
-
Agree with Irving - it's better to have subfolders most of the time. The essential question is who will be controlling the SEO? If it's one person or company, use subfolders. If multiple people will each control their own content, use subdomains. Think about this like Wordpress.com does.
Subdomains are somewhat treated as a separate website. So if you split them, you end up doing the SEO work more than once. Subfolders are considered part of the domain so http://mysite.wordpress.com is separate from Wordpress.com while http://www.wordpress.com/info/index.html is considered part of Wordpress.com Make sense?
So if you use subdomains, each subdomain needs its own SEO. If you use subfolders all the work can be done to one site, which is usually much more efficient. The best use of subdomains is if you had say a franchise (boston.yoursite.com, chicago.yoursite.com, melbourne.yoursite.com) where each of the franchisees would be responsible for their own marketing or a site like Wordpress that allows you to build your own content (thus under many people's control.) That would be site.wordpress.com, site2.wordpress.com etc.
Wordpress doesn't "care" to SEO all those sites nor necessarily do they want to pass their own SEO juice onto those sites as subfolders so they've made them subdomains.
-
directories are better than subdomains. subdomains are seen as different sites, directory allows you to have one main site and pass the PR throughout the entire site to create a stronger enterprise.
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
-
Subdomain cannibalization
Hi, I am doing the SEO for a webshop, which has a lot of linking and related websites on the same root domain. So the structure is for example: Root domain: example.com
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Mat_C
Shop: shop.example.com
Linking websites to shop: courses.example.com, software.example.com,... Do I have to check which keywords these linking websites are already ranking for and choose other keywords for my category and product pages on the webshop? The problem with this could be that the main keywords for the category pages on the webshop are mainly the same as for the other subdomains. The intention is that some people immediately come to the webshop instead of going first to the linking websites and then to the webshop. Thanks.0 -
Where do we focus from an SEO perspective?
I run a digital business development consulting company. Our core has always been centered around consulting with client to develop strategy and then working with a set of vendors in a variety of different services types to implement the strategy. I'm struggling right now to determine the best approach for our own SEO. Our website is http://phase2solutions.net. What suggestions would you have on the approach here? Feel free to share your service as well as the tactical end is something we are looking to outsource. Thank you.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | phase2solutions0 -
Domain Forwarding for SEO
Hey guys, I recently created a new website for a client who was ranking #1 for the term "jupiter obgyn" but they have now dropped down to #4. This happened because their old home page was at www. instead of just jupiterobgyn.com. When you type in the www. version, it does take you to the root domain but it's not carrying the old PA! The www. version of the page had a 22 PA and the new root domain hosted page is a 1. How can I fix it so that "link juice" carries over? Is this something i need to do in 1and1 (their web host) or within Wordpress? Thanks!!!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | RickyShockley0 -
Subdomain, subfolder or separate domains?
Hi Mozzers, We're in the process of re-developing and redesigning several of our websites, and moving them all onto the same content management system. At the moment, although the websites are all under the same brand and roughly the same designs, because of various reasons they all either live on a separate domain to the main website, or are on a subdomain. Here's a list of what we have (and what we're consolidating): Main site - http://www.frenchentree.com/ Property database - http://france-property.frenchentree.com/ (subdomain) Forum - http://www.france-forum-frenchentree.com/ (separate domain) Classified ads - http://www.france-classified-ads-frenchentree.com/ (separate domain) My question to you lovely people is: should we take this opportunity through the redevelopment of the CMS to put everything into subfolders of the main domain? Keep things as they are? Put each section onto a subdomain? What's best from an SEO perspective? For information - the property database was put onto a subdomain as this is what we were advised to do by the developers of the system. We're starting to question this decision though, as we very rarely see subdomains appear in SERPs for any remotely competitive search terms. Our SEO for the property database is fairly non-existent, and only ever really appears in SERPs for brand related keywords. For further info - the forum and classifieds were under a separate brand name previously, so keeping them on separate domains felt correct at that time. However, with the redevelopment of our sites, it seems to make more sense to either put them on subdomains or subfolders of the main site. Our SEO for the forum is pretty strong, though has dwindled in the last year or so. Any help/advice would be very much appreciated. Thanks Matt
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Horizon0 -
How do you Hire someone for SEO?
What questions do you ask when hiring an SEO person? What is the most important thing in selecting a company for SEO? Should they be able to make recommendations on changes in your website for seo?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Realtor1010 -
Region specific SEO
I am doing SEO for a client in Canada. A few of his keywords are: palliative care
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | KS__
home health care
home care
respite care
senior care He wants to attract vistors only from Calgary specifically, not Canada wide. What should I do to optimize his website only for Calgary region? Should I add the word 'Calgary' to all his keywords?0 -
Victim of negative SEO
Hello, I'm one of those people that got the "unnatural links" message from google. Since i run my site from the very first day and always was a one man business i know all the ins and outs of the website.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Henkiepenkie
Basicly i have never ever used a seo company to submit my site anywhere.
Never ever i used any shady tactic to get better ranks.
The only thing i did was trading traffic/links with real active websites, being daily updated, high traffic, etc etc. So. After i got notified in webmaster tools i started digging into a list (provided by webmaster tools) to find out why i got this message (meanwhile i lost 75% of my se traffic in past 3 months) After searching for hours i found out that in the past 2 / 3 months my site has been spammed on about 150 forums (completely dead forums with nothing but spam on it) There was no logic at all since my site got linked with the most ridiculous and unlogical word phrases.
My site is adult related and all spam links contained word phrases like "bangladesh mobile" or "rock girl" or "animal abuse" or "ringtones" etc etc. if i ever would be so stupid to start spamming my 7 year old strong business i would at least use titles that would make sence. anyway.
I can't do nothing about these forums, i don't own them, i can't erase them and if there are any owners, they simply don't respond.
I made a list of all the forums and send it to google but the only response they come up with is "there are still unnatural links". I hardly believe they did anything with that list i send them. I don't know what else i can do and was hoping that somebody could advice me on what to do here besides sending google messages on a daily base. cheers0 -
What Questions to Ask in SEO Interview
Tomorrow morning I have a call with an SEO company interested in doing some work with our company. Its a larger company who do a lot of SEO work, and seem to have good feedback around the place. But we have been very very white hat in our all our our SEO work so far, and some of their wording on their site talks about "Negotiations and acquisitions of link partners".. which gives me the feel they might be a little grey hat.. What are some good questions we should ask these guys to make sure what they are doing is legit, and not going to get us stung for anything? And what sort of work should we get them to do, if we are happy to take care of content creation, on page optimisation and social media activities? Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | timscullin0