Adding Wordpress On Separate Server w/ subdomain = SEO Issues?
-
I have a client that wants to setup wordpress for their business site. However, they are really concerned about the load time a wordpress install creates on their site in the root. So, they want to setup wordpress with a sub-domain on a separate server. For example:
As far as SEO is concerned with the main site, what are the advantages and disadvantages for using a separate server w/ subdomain?
-
I would be jumping to a new host right away!
-
I'm trying to decide the exact same thing - but less because of performance and more because our server cannot handle the most updated version of wordpress.
I would classify that as a performance issue. WordPress is the world's most popular CMS. Most hosting companies offer an auto-install package for the latest major version of WP. When you say your server "can't handle" WP, I presume it requires an update of PHP to meet the minimum requirements. If that is the case simply ask your host to update the server.
I am not aware of any major host who's server hardware cannot easily handle WordPress. If the software can't handle the latest version, it is usually a very fast, simple and free to update to the latest software versions required for WP. In the unlikely event your host is not willing to comply, change hosts.
-
I'm trying to decide the exact same thing - but less because of performance and more because our server cannot handle the most updated version of wordpress. It seems like keeping the blog on the main domain is best for SEO. Better for gathering incoming links, ect.
Are there any benefits at all to keeping the blog on a subdomain?
-
With respect to the performance issue, it comes down to a few possibilities:
-
something went wrong in the installation process
-
an independent issue arose with your server or host whose timing coincided with the WordPress install
-
there is an issue with the server itself which needs to be fixed
I would suggest troubleshooting the issue, determine the root cause and fix it rather then giving up on the idea.
To respond to your primary question, I first need to emphasize that whether you decide to locate the sub-domain on a separate server or the same server is completely irrelevant to SEO.
The subdomain would be it's own independent site. The main site would not benefit from links to the subdomain.
-
-
I would get a new host.
-
Thanks for responding. The client placed the WP blog on a test site within the same server and witnessed poor performance with the rest of the site. So, their concern is that will also happen with the main site.
The content on the blog most likely won't be considered 'high-value'. However, I want to make sure that the main site (root) will improve domain authority from inbound links to the blog.
In your opinion, will the inbound links to the blog help the domain authority of the main (root) site if the blog is in a subdomain on a separate server?
-
Thanks for the quick response.
The client has set up a wordpress install in a subfolder on a test site within the server. They noticed a fairly significant delay in load times with the rest of the test site.....that is their primary issue.
I guess my primary question is, will the main site (root) improve domain authority from inbound links to the blog if the blog is set up in a subdomain on a separate server?
-
With respect to SEO, the physical server involved makes no difference. I am making basic assumptions such as the other server is with the same host, does not have any major performance issues, etc.
In general you have the following advantages / disadvantages to consider when deciding whether to go with a subdomain vs a folder on your primary domain:
-
Any acquired links add value to your primary domain
-
Your blog would benefit from your primary domain's current Domain Authority
-
cookies and other data can be passed much easier within your current domain
-
many licenses apply on a domain basis and extra fees or licenses may be required for the subdomain
-
will this blog be used to cover topics directly related to the business? If so it would make more sense to have it on the primary domain. If this blog will cover personal topics or may branch into areas not related to the business, it would make more sense to separate it from the business site.
Wordpress can be installed in it's own directory so it's URL would be domain.com/blog. What specific performance concerns does your client have? It sounds like he may have had a bad experience once, or have heard some information that may not apply to his current situation. A properly configured wordpress install should not lead to load time issues for his existing site.
Further reading on the topic: http://www.seomoz.org/blog/understanding-root-domains-subdomains-vs-subfolders-microsites
-
-
If the wordpress site is going to be used for low-value content then a subdomain is probably OK. However, if the wordpress site will contain high value content that has the potential of attracting links then I would not place it in a subdomain. The reason: if the high value content is in a folder then the links into it will give strong benefit to the entire site, but if it is on a subdomain then those links will be of very little benefit to the main site.
If this was my site I would try two things.... First, I would place the WP blog in a folder and see exactly how it performs. You might be surprised. Second, if that does not work I would look for higher quality hosting.
Another thought... if the wordpress blog is not performing well there might be problems with the code or problems with the amount of processing that the host will allow. Wordpress blogs generally work well. Hosts are sometimes known to throttle processing.
I have a wordpress blog in a folder of my site. It is a very busy blog with thousands of posts and lots of traffic. Thousands of visitors per day. No issues in five years.
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 Question
Having a difficult time on our site and looking for some advice. Our site pages are indexed perfectly, however, we have a subdomain where we have all of our images and PDF's. We only have the main domain set-up in Search Console with our sitemap. We can't seem to get any of our images indexed by Google that are in the subdomain however all the PDF's are indexed. My thought is to add the subdomain to SC and create a new sitemap that is just for the subdomain. Assuming we are not blocking any folders or files with our robots.txt can anyone think of any other reasons why the images wouldn't get indexed.
Technical SEO | | cbathd
Thanks0 -
Domain Mapping - International Config - WP Multisite - Problems/issues experienced ?
Hi My new clients devs are setting up new client according to below domain mapping type config Is anyone aware of any probs this could cause ? or other way should be setting up ? Also will setting up an MA campaign for the root domain 'catch all' given the domain mapping aspect etc ? Cheers Dan Set up now using WP Multisite. The root domain for the network of websites we are going to roll out, is set up as "network.domain.com. This is a "parent" domain from which all languages variants will be children of this root domain name. so: "network.domain.com/uk/" - English Language
Technical SEO | | Dan-Lawrence
"network.domain.com/tr/" - Turkish Langauge
"network.domain.com/za/" - South African
etc I then will domain map domain names to each of these children, once I get DNS control of each language's settings. I have already mapped "www.domain.com" to "network.domain.com/uk/", so the english website is set up (and launched - as you know). I fully expect that "www.domain.tr" will be mapped to "network.domain.com/tr/" and so on, but depending on domain availability at the time of purchase. Any domain name can be mapped to each of these children, and the system doesn't care, or mind! I can also map one (or more) domain names to each child, and make ONE of them the primary domain name.0 -
Subdomain hosted on a different server VS Subfolder on main server
We have a website developed in ColdFusion on a server does not support PHP. We have a blog for the site using WordPress (PHP), hosted on a different server, with a subdomain as the URL. (example: blog.website.com) I've heard that search engines treat subdomains as completely different websites from the main domain, so they could actually be in competition for rankings in the search engines - is that correct? I am under the impression that the traffic to the blog will not show as traffic to the main website, because it is hosted on a different server - is that right? If I am correct, I assume the best solution would be to install PHP on our main server, and put the blog in a subfolder ... or would the subdomain be OK as long as the blog is hosted on the main server? Thanks!
Technical SEO | | vermont0 -
CSS Issue or not?
Hi Mozzers, I am doing an audit for one of my clients and would like to know if actually the website I am dealing with has any issues when disabling CSS. So I installed Web developer google chrome extension which is great for disabling cookies, css... When executing "Disable CSS", I can see most of the content of the page but what is weird is that in certain sections images appear in the middle of a sentence. Another image appears to be in the background in one of the internal link section(attached pic) Since I am not an expert in CSS I am wondering if this represents a CSS issue, therefore a potential SEO issue? If yes why it can be an SEO issue? Can you guys tell me what sort of CSS issues I should expect when disabling it? what should I look at? if content and nav bar are present or something else? Thank you dBCvk.png
Technical SEO | | Ideas-Money-Art0 -
Name Servers & SEO
We have decided to create a few blogs and will eventually be linking to some of our clients. I have domain privacy and different class C addresses for each of my domains. But the name servers area all the same. Ex: If we create an article for one client on all 5 blogs, will the name servers be a problem?
Technical SEO | | waqid0 -
Pintrest SEO
Has any testing been done to determine if Pintrest helps a website ranking?
Technical SEO | | StreetwiseReports0 -
SEO Benefit/Liability of changing URLs of a 2 year old site
I sell RV Parts online. Our organization is called The ROUTE 66 RV Network, so we brand everything around ROUTE 66. When we launched our store 2 years ago, we launched it with the domain: parts66.com We have a PR of 2, and we have been doing an SEO linkbuilding campaign ever since it has been around. Our primary keyword that we are trying to rank for is RV PARTS We also own the domain: rvparts66.com My question is: Is there a significant benefit to switching our URL to RVPARTS66.COM? Does having our primary keyword a part of our URL give us an SEO benefit? If so, what is the best way to keep any credit we have built for our original domain? We are in the process of a complete site overhaul which will launch in a couple weeks, so if there is ever a time to switch domains, the time is now. Thanks! jc
Technical SEO | | steve-2886180 -
On a dedicated server with multiple IP addresses, how can one address group be slow/time out and all other IP addresses OK?
We utilize a dedicated server to host roughly 60 sites on. The server is with a company that utilizes a lady who drives race cars.... About 4 months ago we realized we had a group of sites down thanks to monitoring alerts and checked it out. All were on the same IP address and the sites on the other IP address were still up and functioning well. When we contacted the support at first we were stonewalled, but eventually they said there was a problem and it was resolved within about 2 hours. Up until recently we had no problems. As a part of our ongoing SEO we check page load speed for our clients. A few days ago a client who has their site hosted by the same company was running very slow (about 8 seconds to load without cache). We ran every check we could and could not find a reason on our end. The client called the host and were told they needed to be on some other type of server (with the host) at a fee increase of roughly $10 per month. Yesterday, we noticed one group of sites on our server was down and, again, it was one IP address with about 8 sites on it. On chat with support, they kept saying it was our ISP. (We speed tested on multiple computers and were 22MB down and 9MB up +/-2MB). We ran a trace on the IP address and it went through without a problem on three occassions over about ten minutes. After about 30 minutes the sites were back up. Here's the twist: we had a couple of people in the building who were on other ISP's try and the sites came up and loaded on their machines. Does anyone have any idea as to what the issue is?
Technical SEO | | RobertFisher0