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seomoz

Subdomains vs. subdirectories for SEO

by Tim on December 14, 2011

in Blogging, E-commerce, Marketing, Strategy

A reader, Zen, emailed a couple of weeks ago about using subdomains for blogs and said:

“I have a blog that has been sitting on WordPress for about 3 years. (The URL format is CompanyName.Wordpress.com) and I want to know if it’s true that, for SEO purposes, you are way better off having your blog reside on your website because WordPress is a subdomain so you will never receive the true benefits of SEO for your company… I’m considering changing my blog’s URL to a personal domain like CompanyNameBlog.com or CompanyWebsite.com/blog.”

Now, first off, I am a huge fan of small business blogs, both for their SEO benefit as well as for providing valuable information to customers. But Zen’s question really asks two things:

What, if any, SEO benefits exist in hosting your blog outside your domain?
What brand benefits exist when you host your blog outside your domain?

The first question gets into a hairy bit of technical SEO while the second relates more to brand strategy. Today we’ll look at the SEO side and tomorrow we’ll explore brand implications.

Let’s dive right in, shall we?

Are Subdomains Bad for SEO?

What is a Subdomain?

When looking at blogs, or any other content on a website, you’ll usually run into one of four common domain options. The question is, which works best for you on an SEO basis:

www.YourBrand.com/YourBlog
YourBlog.YourBrand.com
YourBlog.SomeoneElsesBrand.com
www.YourBLOG.com

Now, without dirtying our hands with the gory details, the part of the web address URL that appears before YourBrand and SomeoneElsesBrand (either www or YourBlog in example #’s 2 and 3 above) is called the subdomain. When “YourBlog” appears after “.com,” as in example #1, it is typically called the path, folder or subdirectory. And #4 is typically called the host, hostname, or just the domain. (If you actually are interested in the gory details, see Matt Cutts’ excellent overview on the parts of a URL).

Got that? Good. Let’s jump into the meat of the discussion then.

Subdomains and SEO

So, to answer Zen’s initial question, do subdomains hurt your company from an SEO perspective? The answer, as with most things SEO-related, is a bit tricky.

A blog hosted on a subdomain, as in examples #2 and #3 (as well as in Zen’s initial question) will receive SEO benefit the same as any other site. No research I could find suggests that subdomains are any better or worse in terms of their own ranking on search engines (whether they’re a good idea for your business is another matter; more on that in a moment). As long as the subdomain offers substantially distinct content, Google and the other search engines index and rank subdomains the same way they would any other website. In fact, according to a survey on SEOmoz, having strong keywords in a subdomain can improve your SEO rank for that keyword phrase.

However, there are several arguments against using subdirectories:

Search engines treat subdomains as though they are a separate entity from your primary domain. This one’s a biggie. In Zen’s question, using Wordpress to host your blog isn’t a bad thing and doesn’t hurt the SEO opportunities for the blog. However, that SEO benefit doesn’t accrue to your primary domain, which is typically what you want. By this standard, option #2 isn’t great (you’re benefiting the blog, but not YourBrand.com) and #3 is particularly bad: you’re benefiting SomeElsesBrand.com and not yours.
Managing subdomains can be a beast. Do you know what DNS and CNAME records are? Do you want to? Yeah, me neither (I already know far more than I want to about ‘em). Unless you’re ready, willing, and able to take on the management overhead, subdirectories often prove more trouble than they’re worth.

For these reasons, I don’t usually recommend subdomains for your small business blog (there are a couple of caveats I talk about below). But if you have the option, using a folder (option #1 above), is usually best.

So, When Are Subdomains a Good Idea?

While a few use cases exist where subdomains might be the right answer, there are two typical scenarios where you’ll run into them:

Highly localized content. Companies that offer content to specific languages or local areas often use subdomains targeted at those linguistic/geographic markets. For example, if I were to begin offering content in French for customers in Montreal, I might use fr.timpeter.com to distinguish the content from the rest of my site. By the same token, “hyper-local” news site, such as Patch.com, often use individual subdomains to build the local brand independent of the larger, “parent” brand (see peekskill.patch.com or bradenton.patch.com for real-world examples).
Your hosting company prevents you from installing blogging software. Sometimes using a third-party blogging platform and a subdomain may be your only choice from an operational/technical standpoint. If you lack the skills/expertise/funds/desire to manage your hosting platform, then setting up a blog on Wordpress, Tumblr, Blogger.com or TypePad using their subdomain may be your best option. You can always assign these blogs a subdomain using YourBrand or YourBlog.com (options #2 and #4 above) at a later date if you need to.

What About Folders/Subdirectories?

Folders/subdirectories (option #1 above) eliminate most of the challenges associated with subdomains and provide direct SEO benefit to your domain in most normal cases. For that reason, I recommend them and use them for almost everything I do.

What’s the downside? Well, like anything, subdirectories come with their own challenges. For one, you typically have to install blogging software on your host and manage it yourself (or pay IT professionals to do it for you). Happily, many hosting companies offer one-click installs and upgrades to streamline the process (it’s one of reasons I use Dreamhost [affiliate link]).

But, unless you’re dealing with the “highly localized scenario” outlined above (or fall into the rare case where you need the specific benefits of a ccTLD as outlined below), subdirectories are usually a good choice until you’re fully confident another option’s benefits outweigh its downsides. Matt Cutts made a similar recommendation a few years ago and I’ve yet to see him contradict it.

What about YourBlog.com?

Ah… now this is a juicy one. But, it gets into questions of branding more than SEO, so let’s tackle that tomorrow, OK?

Conclusion

Any choice you make regarding domains, subdomains, or subdirectories has some consequence from an SEO standpoint. When in doubt, I recommend subdirectories because they drive all the SEO value to a single domain. Unless you have a case where you don’t want that to happen, they’re usually the right choice (at least until Google changes its algorithm again).

Whew… that was a handful, huh? Curious about what domains do for your brand? Check back tomorrow for part 2.

ccTLD Note: The specific example used here generally only makes sense when you’re offering languages within a market, say Spanish-language content for Spanish-speaking customers living in the United States or French-language content for Francophones in Canada. When you’re targeting customers in a specific country, using a separate ccTLD (that’s country code Top Level Domain), is often a better approach. So, if you’re targeting customers in France, for example (as opposed to French-speaking customers in another country), using the domain YourBrand.fr can provide better SEO results than YourBrand.com/fr/. Your mileage may vary, of course, and the operational overhead of offering a fully localized site is non-trivial (to say nothing of the fact that some ccTLD’s, such as China, can require significant operational expertise in the market). Unless you’re actively trying to build business in a given market, don’t stress about it too much. And if you are actively trying to build business in a given market, drop me a line to learn how I can help.

Are you getting enough value out of your small business website? Want to make sure your business makes the most of the local, mobile, social web? thinks helps you understand how to grow your business via the web, every day. Get more than just news. Get understanding. Add thinks to your feed reader today.

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Tim Peter & Associates helps companies from startups to the Fortune 500 use the web to reach more customers, more effectively every day. Take a look and see how we can help you.

Technorati Tags: blogging, blogs, domain hosting, domain selection, hosting, hosting solutions, search, search engine marketing, search engine optimization, seo, SEOmoz, strategy

Tagged as: blog, blog writing, Blogging, blogs, search engine, search engine optimization, search strategy, SEO, seomoz, subdirectories, subdomains

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The 2011 E-Commerce and Online Marketing All Stars: The Top 9 E-commerce and Online Marketing Blogs

by Tim on July 12, 2011

in Blogging, E-commerce, Marketing

Today is the MLB All-Star Game. But, I’m lucky. I have access to the greatest team of All Stars out on the web every day. Each of the folks listed below makes me better at what I do every day. I can’t imagine going a day without reading one of these blogs or going a week without reading all of them. With that, I’m thrilled to announce The 2011 Thinks E-commerce and Online Marketing All Stars:

The RKGBLOG—Leading off, we’ve got George Michie and the RKG team. Their RKBLOG is thoughtful, insightful and colorful. Need proof? Check out their recent piece on attribution modeling and see if you don’t want them on your team, too.
Search Engine Land—Want to know everything going on in the land of search engines? Listen to Danny Sullivan and his team. One of the first sites I read every day, Search Engine Land covers all the news you need to know about the search marketing business, along with insights to help you put that information to work. For example, their coverage of the aftermath of the Google/Twitter split not only offered headlines. It offered clarity.
GetElastic—Of course, there’s more to life than just search engines. Linda Bustos (@roxyyo on Twitter) and the rest of the GetElastic blogging team look at e-commerce best practices and share what they’ve learned in a way both useful and engaging. With posts like “Is Multichannel E-commerce Dead”, GetElastic offers thought leadership and practical advice for online business.
Dan Zarrella—Billing himself as “The Social Media Scientist,” Dan Zarrella separates fact from fiction about your fans, friends and followers. For instance, in “Tweet Lots of Links to Get Followers”, Dan doesn’t just offer opinion. He backs it up with data. And for walking the walk as well as talking the talk, Dan Zarrella earns the clean-up spot in the All Star lineup this year.
Occam’s Razor by Avinash Kaushik—Did I just mention data? Avinash Kaushik lives, breathes and sleeps data. Some guys count sheep to fall asleep. I suspect Avinash counts them, segments them and determines the ROI of each. Offering posts both brilliant and funny like “11 Digital Marketing Crimes Against Humanity”, Avinash earned his roster spot among this group of All Stars.
SEOmoz blog—Where do I begin with SEOmoz? Rand Fishkin has built an amazing organization out in Seattle to help SEO practitioners get better and to help businesses find better SEO practitioners. Whether offering innovative ideas like using Google’s new search by image for link building or original research into how tweets affect search engine rankings, SEOmoz remains one of my top destinations and a key contributor to my All Star team.
Mike Moran – Biznology—How many IBM Distinguished Engineers do you know? How many Chief Strategy Officers? How many entrepreneurs? OK. How many do you know contained within one individual? That’s right. One guy: Mike Moran. Mike and Biznology’s bloggers (full disclosure: I am one of them. And am humbled by the opportunity), crank out hit after hit after hit. With folks like Mike, Frank Reed, Aaron Kim, and Chris Abraham, Biznology is practically an All Star team in its own right. And it remains one of the best marketing blogs on the Web, even after adding me.
ProBlogger—Darren Rowse was one of the first bloggers I read when I started this blog some 6 years ago. And I still read him today. With great insights on creating and marketing content such as “5 Ways I’m Using LinkedIn to Drive Traffic, Build Community, Generate Sales and Build Influence”, Darren (and his dozens of guest bloggers) prove an excellent addition to the team.
Duct Tape Marketing blog by John Jantsch—No E-commerce and Online Marketing All Star Team would be complete without the great John Jantsch. John’s Duct Tape Marketing (possibly my all-time favorite business name), helps businesses large and small solve all kinds of problems as quickly and inexpensively as a roll of… well, something useful, quick and inexpensive. Check out his thoughts on why everything you’ve heard about Google+ is wrong, for one example of why John will make my All Star team every season.

There you have it, Big Thinkers. Your 2011 Thinks E-commerce and Online Marketing All Star Team. Check ‘em out and see if your game doesn’t improve.

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Alison Zarrella, analytics, Avinash Kaushik, blogging, blogs, Dan Zarrella, Data-Driven Marketing, Duct Tape Marketing, E-commerce, e-commerce, E-commerce strategy, e-marketing, ecommerce, getelastic, Google, google, internet business, internet marketing, John Jantsch, leaders, leadership, metrics, mike moran, objectives, online marketing, ppc, ppc marketing, Rimm-Kaufmann, search, search engine marketing, search engine optimization, sem, seo, SEOmoz, social commerce, social marketing, social media, social search, social strategy, strategy, success

Tagged as: all-stars, avinash kaushik, blog, bloggers, Blogging, dan zarrella, duct tape marketing, get elastic, getelastic, john jantsch, linda bustos, mike moran, problogger, rimm-kaufman, rkg, search engine, search engine marketing, search engine optimization, search marketing, search strategy, sem, SEO, seomoz

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Social and search and… steaks? (Small Business E-commerce Link Digest – June 3, 2011)

by Tim on June 3, 2011

in E-commerce, SEO, Search, Social Media, social strategy

A couple of weeks ago, I talked about us living in an era of social search. I’m increasingly convinced. Search engines need social data to continue to improve their results. Otherwise, they risk losing market share to consumers using social media—and, let’s face it, right now that means Facebook—to simply ask their friends. At the same time, social drives increased search activity, as social media users try to find more information about the things their friends talk about. For instance, a friend of mine told me about a great steak restaurant the other day and not five minutes later, I was searching for their website.

Anyway, here are a number of juicy morsels that should satisfy your hunger for search and social success:

While it’s been a couple of months since Google announced its +1 feature, Search Engine Land has the full details on Google’s (now live) +1 for websites. If Google’s +1 makes you think of Facebook’s “Like button,” you’re not alone. And the fact that Google wants these all over the web should indicate exactly how serious a challenger they think Facebook represents.
While we’re on the topic of +1, I’ve got to give you my thoughts about Steve Rubel’s latest activity. Steve is a smart guy. I have met him, think very highly of him and think he’s almost always worth listening to. However, Steve took his regard for +1 and social sharing a little too far this week, blowing up his entire web presence in favor of a single blog on Tumblr. I promise next week to tell you why this was a bad idea. But it was. At the same time, it underscores that a.) social search is a really big deal and b.) that even the best minds out there make mistakes now and again.
Now +1 isn’t the only way to integrate with the big boys. Among other tools, Facebook provides a Comments plug-in for your website. Unfortunately, those comments can’t be crawled by Google. Or can they? As it happens, Roy Peleg has an (admittedly geeky) post on SEOmoz on how you can make Facebook Comments crawlable on your site.
Of course, Facebook and Google +1 aren’t the only games in the social/search space. Twitter introduced a new tool, called “Web Intents,” too. And Distilled has a great post on tracking Google’s +1 and Twitter’s “Web Intents” in Google Analytics
Speaking of analytics, Mike Moran takes a look at the importance of running your marketing by the numbers and which metrics you should show your boss.
Of course, one metric that comes up again and again in my work is conversion rate, both for individual sites and across industries. The second of those is slightly complex, which is why I answered the question, “what is an industry average conversion rate anyway?”. Quick hint: the answer isn’t what you think it is.
Most looks at social these days only relate to “free” activities (ignoring the cost of time and labor for a second). Well, John Jantsch takes a look at paid social optimization. And, it’s worth a look from you, too.
Finally, none of this matters if your search and social activities don’t lead to sales. Fortunately, Facebook has taken Danny Sullivan inside their numbers, which he shares, showing how Facebook Likes help websites.

C’mon, admit it. Pretty meaty list of links, eh? Fortunately, you’ve got all weekend to chew on ‘em. Me? I’m going out to get a nice, medium-rare ribeye.

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Tim Peter & Associates helps companies from startups to the Fortune 500 use the web to reach more customers, more effectively every day. Take a look and see how we can help you.

Technorati Tags:
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