Dual website strategy
-
We have two websites (different businesses) in the technology sector that sell the same products on the same platform (OSC) but have different branding. We have tried to make the static content different and the user generated content is different. SEO as largely different. But the one site has much better rankings than the other.
Whilst the under performing site is not responsive yet, I need to decide whether to merge the two businesses into one or continue on the two separate websites approach. I would only pursue the latter approach and invest further time and effort into this under performing website if I knew I was "on the right" track.
My SEO knowledge is not extensive and so I would be interested in any views the community has?
I note that kogan.com.au and dicksmith.com.au have a similar dual website approach (same company) and they are both major brands in Australia.
I thank you in advance for any thoughts you may have.
-
Thanks Nigel for your very generous response and thanks Egol for your confirmation as well.
We do have a small team and we are not dominating rankings in our sector yet, so your point is well made. From what you are saying, it seems there are no technical limitations in terms of search engines penalising the under performing site (originally it was a copy of the main site). It seems to come down purely to a well constructed, designed and marketed site.
So thanks again for your really wise words - it has been an enormous help
Marc
-
Nigel has provided a comprehensive answer and was very generous to put so much effort and time into it. I agree with his assessment.
I am always tempted to "start another website". However, if I do that I must take my efforts away from websites that are already successful and put that effort into websites that are starting with zero content, zero fans, zero visibility, zero resources of any kind.
If you can afford hire and toss another team of high quality people at improving the sluggish site then maybe you can pull it off, but if your primary website is not dominating the SERPs in your area, then I would probably put that same team to work on the primary site.
I would not start a second website or put resources into a secondary website unless my main website is dominating the SERPs and then I would still be working to raise the bar to fend off anyone out there who is getting any ideas about coming after my turf.
-
Hi Marc,
The answer to this question really depends on just how much effort you want to put into the two websites and frankly what your resources are. There are many companies that successfully run different operations, Zappos and 6pm is one example.
The upsides:
1. Different target market - allows for different branding appealing to separate segments of the market
2. Different pricing strategy - allows for one site to be a 'marketplace' and the other, a full price site.
3. Different locations - One may target England, say, the other Wales & Scotland.
4. Dominate Google - Both sites may appear at the top of SERPS if enough SEO is thrown at them - therefore increasing real estate in top 10.So there are definite upsides to having a dual site approach.
The Downsides:
1. The work involved in building and maintaining two websites. You have already said that one of them is not responsive, so I assume that is the case because you either didn't have the time or the funds to make it so.
2. Ongoing operational operations - uploading of content and rewriting for the two sites, banners, product photographs, ALTs, promotions - keeping everything separate will be a daily challenge.
3. NAPS - presumably the name & address is identical for the two sites, what about the host and IP addresses?
4. Maintaining a balance of attention to the two operations and serving the niches they are targetted at.
5. Marketing costs associated with two separate sites and brandings.
6. Marketplace links to Amazon, Ebay etc and associated costs.
7. Socials - maintaining two separate groups of Social Media accounts.I ran an online shoe store for many years and we set up a 'sister' site which focused purely on Women's fashion. I quickly found that we lacked the resources to run two websites and ended up redirecting all of the second site links back to the first - just because of all the headaches involved.
If I were you and reading the 'non-responsive' comment, I would can that site and focus all of your attention on to the one main site:
1. 301 redirect the whole site page by page to the main website so that you preserve any backlink juice that may be pointing to it.
2. Write great original content 300+ words at brand and category level.
3. Write great original content 150+ words at product level.
4. Make sure ALL support pages are fully written, and optimised.
5. Make sure all META is optimised in terms of character length and relevance.
6. Make sure your site speed is as good as it can be.
7. All image Alts are filled in
8. Merge SocialsFrankly without going on, just make sure you cross all the Ts and dot all the i's when it comes to SEO and I am pretty sure that the combined effort of running one great site will far outweigh the schizoid way you are doing it now!
There are of course other issues, resources - do you actually want two brands? along with all the marketing costs? is that sensible from a business point of view?
I hope that helps to give you some encouragement.
Regards
Nigel
Carousel Projects
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
-
Rebranding with the same website
Hello, I like to rebrand my site for the same URL - How can i do this?
Local Website Optimization | | signsny
Example: My site URL is www.signsny.com and i used "SignsNY" as brand name and citations and after the website redesign, i decide to go with "Signs NY" so i change the citations and pick the word as Signs NY to use but in google i lost the site links and knowledge graph on **Signs NY **keyword.......... Can you suggest me what to do and how to change the things for better results? Thanks,
Abie0 -
What's the best international URL strategy for my non-profit?
Hi, I have a non-profit organization that advocates for mental health education and treatment. We are considering creating regional chapters of the non-profit in specific countries - France, UK, Russia, etc. What's the best long-term foundation for global organic growth? Should we simply internationalize our content (.org/uk/)? Or create a custom site for each ccTLD (.org.uk, etc.? Since it's an educational site, the content for each country would not be particularly unique, apart from: Language (regional English nuance for UK and AUS, or other languages altogether) Expert videos and potentially supporting articles (i.e., hosting videos and a supporting article for a UK Doctor versus a US Doctor) Offering some regional context when it comes to treatment options, or navigating school, work, etc. Any thoughts would be much appreciated! Thanks! Aaron
Local Website Optimization | | RSR1 -
More pages on website better for SEO?
Hi all, Is creating more pages better for SEO? Of course the pages being valuable content. Is this because you want the user to spend as much time as possible on your site. A lot of my competitors websites seem to have more pages than mine and their domain authorities are higher, for example the services we provide are all on one page and for my competitors each services as its own page. Kind Regards, Aqib
Local Website Optimization | | SMCCoachHire0 -
Is this website optimized? Parallax web design for SEO.
Friends, I'm hoping to get some feedback on optimizing a website. It's a parallax web design so there's really only one title tag and meta description. I don't want to stuff the on-page content with keywords that don't flow with the copy/branding. What are some additional opportunities to optimize this website? It's not ranking in SERPs and has a low DA. Here's the URL, please take a look and let me know what I could be doing - https://saintst.com/ Thanks!
Local Website Optimization | | GarrettDenham0 -
URL and title strategy for multiple location pages in the same city
Hi, I have a customer which opens additional branches in cities where he had until now only one branch. My question is: Once we open new store pages, what is the best strategy for the local store pages in terms of URL and title?
Local Website Optimization | | OrendaLtd
So far I've seen some different strategies for URL structure:
Some use [URL]/locations/cityname-1/2/3 etc.
while others use [URL]/locations/cityname-zip code/
I've even seen [URL]/locations/street address-cityname (that's what Starbucks do) There are also different strategies for the title of the branch page.
Some use [city name] [state] [zip code] | [Company name]
Other use [Full address] | [Company name]
Or [City name] [US state] [1/2/3] | [Company name]
Or [City name] [District / Neighborhood] [Zip Code] | [Company name] What is the preferred strategy for getting the best results? On the one hand, I wish differentiate the store pages from one another and gain as much local coverage as possible; on the other hand, I wish to create consistency and establish a long term strategy, taking into consideration that many more branches will be opened in the near future.1 -
Should I open a new domain and website for a new location under one company?
Hi my name is Gina and I wanted to ask for some advice. I'm thinking opening a diff location and was thinking if its a good idea to open up a new domain and new website? And why that may be a good idea and why or a bad idea and why?
Local Website Optimization | | LittleDog0 -
UK website to be duplicated onto 2 ccTLD's - is this duplicate content?
Hi We have a client who wishes to have a site created and duplicated onto 3 servers hosted in three different countries. United Kingdom, Australia and USA. All of which will ofcourse be in the English language. A long story short, the website will provide the user 3 options on the homepage asking them which "country site" they wish to view. (I know I can detect the user IP and autoredirect but this is not what they want) Once they choose an option it will direct the user to the appropriate ccTLD. Now the client wants the same information to appear on all 3 sites with some slight variations in products available and English/US spelling difference but for the most part, the sites will look the same with the same content on each page. So my question is, will these 3 sites been seen as duplicates of each other even though they are hosted in different countries and are on ccTLD's? Are there any considerations I should pass onto the client with this approach? Many thanks for reading.
Local Website Optimization | | yousayjump
Kris0 -
How slow can a website be, but still be ok for visitors and seo?
Hello to all, my site http://www.allspecialtybuildings.com is a barn construction site. Our visitors are usually local. I am worried about page speed. I have been using Google Page Insight, and Gtmetrix. Although I cannot figure out browser leveraging, I have a 79 / 93 google score and for gtmetrix 98/87 score. Load times vary between 2.13 secs to 2.54 secs What is acceptable? I want to make sure I get Google love for a decent page speed, but for me these times are great. Bad times are like 7 seconds and higher. I have thought about a CDN, yet I have read horror stories too. I have ZERO idea of how to use a CDN, or if I need it. I just want a fast site that is both user and Google speed friendly. So my question is, what is a slow speed for a website? Is under 3 seconds considered ok? or bad for seo? But any advice is greatly appreciated.
Local Website Optimization | | asbchris0