Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Multiple websites for different service areas/business functions?
-
I'm wondering what the implications are for having multiple domains for different service areas of a company?
I realize having multiple domains for one company can be troublesome because of the possibility of duplicate content, keyword cannibalization, and linkbuilding to multiple domains. But when the domains are for very different service offerings/unique business functions that each serve their own purpose (and have different positionings), is there a downside to having more than one domain?
Any thoughts would be appreciated!
-
If they serve two very different functions I could see the advantage. Does your client already have the the multiple websites? Or are you looking at splitting up their current site?
-
I think it could be easier for a site's design to have them separate if it serves two very different functions. And you could position them as separate which would create less user experience confusion (or more if the sites are designed poorly).
I agree about domain authority - it would be harder to link build to multiple sites and the secondary site(s) would probably have a lower authority.
-
Besides the things you mentioned it seems like one of the biggest downfalls would be creating more work for yourself. Optimizing one site is a lot easier the 2 or more. Seems like having it all on one would also help with domain authority. Is there any upside to having multiple domains?
-
Hi Travis - Actually not referring to local businesses but a national firm with different business functions. An example would be Marketing Profs, who has their main site and then a MarketingProfsU domain. I've also noticed some people separate their blog from the rest of their site on their own domain. Any thoughts there?
-
Are we talking ACME Haberdashery and ACME Cobblers, or is this more of an ACME Plumbing and ACME Drain Cleaning situation? I gather that we're talking about local businesses, which comes with it's own bit of fun. I'm just trying to gauge if the difference in service offerings merit the effort.
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
-
What is the best way to handle annual events on a website?
Every year our company has a user conference with between 300 - 400 attendees. I've just begun giving the event more of a presence on our website. I'm wondering, what is the best way to handle highlights from previous years? Would it be to create an archive (e.g. www.companyname.com/eventname/2015) while constantly updating the main landing page to promote the current event? We also use an event website (cvent) to handle our registrations. So once we have an agenda for the current years event I do a temporary redirect from the main landing page to the registration website. I don't really like this practice and I feel like it might be better to keep all of the info on the main domain. Wondering if anybody has any opinions or feedback on that process as well. Just looking for best practices or what others have done and have had success with.
Web Design | | Brando161 -
Duplicate content on websites for multiple countries
I have a client who has a website for their U.S. based customers. They are currently adding a Canadian dealer and would like a second website with much of the same info as their current website, but with Canadian contact info etc. What is the best way to do this without creating duplicate content that will get us penalized? If we create a website at ABCcompany.com and ABCCompany.ca or something like that, will that get us around the duplicate content penalty?
Web Design | | InvoqMarketing0 -
Multiple Local Schemas Per Page
I am working on a mid size restaurant groups site. The new site (in development) has a drop down of each of the locations. When you hover over a location in the drop down it shows the businesses info (NAP). Each of the location in the Nav list are using schema.org markup. I think this would be confusing for search robots. Every page has 15 address schemas and individual restaurants pages NAP is at the below all the locations' schema/NAP in the DOM. Have any of you dealt with multiple schemas per page or similar structure?
Web Design | | JoshAM0 -
B2C directory website adding B2B ecommerce sub-domain
Hey fellow Mozzers, Just got back from Mozcon and enjoyed getting to know a handful of you. I do in house SEO for a B2B wholesaler. We have a B2C website directory for homeowners to locate contractors to work on their home. On the site we have a products section which includes tech specs but not pricing. Our contractors have been asking us to add the ability to purchase their items online, so we are wanting to add a B2B sub-domain (store.domain.com) to our website for the contractors to purchase products online. We do not want consumers to be able to purchase the items and will have pricing behind a log in. I have a few questions that I'm hoping you might be able to answer: 1. What would be the best practice to not have duplicate content errors with products that are listed on both sites? Should we rel-canonical items shown on both domains or do something else?
Web Design | | AC_Pro
2. We are not against having the new site be crawled, but will Google be upset/ding rankings because pricing is behind a log-in? Are there certain best-practices for B2B ecommerce sites?
3. Do you know of any other sites that have done this/do you have any recommendations on how to best implement this?0 -
Website Redesign - Will it hurt SERP?
Hi - I am planning to redesign my blog and I was wondering if this will affect my rankings? The new website template (custom designed) is much more user and seo friendly. The content, url structure, internal linking structure, meta tags, and site structure will remain exactly the same, but the visual design will be different (new sidebar widgets, and slightly different layout on inner pages). The current website is ranking very well (mostly top 5), has a healthy backlink profile, strong social media presence, and great traffic. I have heard that switching to a new template will dramatically hurt the rankings. Is this true? Are there any exceptions? Any ways I can prevent the rankings from dropping? Would really appreciate your input. Thanks in advance. Howard
Web Design | | howardd0 -
Redirects (301/302) versus errors (404)
I am not able to convincingly decide between using redirects versus using 404 errors. People are giving varied opinions. Here are my cases 1. Coding errors - we put out a bad link a. Some people are saying redirect to home page; the user at least has something to do PLUS more importantly it does NOT hurt your SEO ranking. b. Counter - the page ain't there. Return 404 2. Product removed - link1 to product 1 was out there. We removed product1; so link1 is also gone. It is either lying in people's bookmarks, OR because of coding errors we left it hanging out at some places on our site.
Web Design | | proptiger0 -
URL structure for multiple cities?
Hi, i am in the process of setting up a business directory site that will be used in a number of cities, though i am initially launching with only one city. My question is, what is the best URL structure to use for the site and should i start using this URL structure from day one? At the moment i am using www.mysite.com.au as my primary website where it contains all listings for the the one initial launch city. Though to plan for the future i was considering this URL structure: www.mysite.com.au/cityname so for example, if i launch in the city Sydney initially then all website traffic that goes to www.mysite.com.au would simply be redirected (302 temp redirect?) to www.mysite.com.au/sydney. When i expand to other cities www.mysite.com.au would simply be a "select your city" screen that then redirects to the city of choice (similar to www.groupon.com page). How would doing a 302 redirect from www.mysite.com.au to www.mysite.com.au/city impact on SEO for the initial launch? Or should i just place this on the root domain since no other cities exist at the moment?
Web Design | | adamkirk0 -
How do search engines interpret <hgroup>...</hgroup> tags?
Hi there. I'm building an HTML 5 site and through research of new HTML 5 elements I've seen little conclusive information about the interpretation of the new <hgroup>tag, in terms of SEO application and interpretation. In particular does Google interpret the nested heading tags as individual elements or does it combine them into one entity? For example, say I have: <hgroup> # Article Heading ## Article Sub-heading </hgroup> How is this interpreted by Google and what would be some good SEO best practices regarding the <hgroup>tag in HTML5: Is it interpretted as a single tag (" Article Heading: Article Sub-heading ") or two separate heading tags (one and one )? Also, how much does the ordering of the tags matter (say for example I wanted something like the following for visual purposes? <hgroup> ## Article Sub-heading # Article Heading </hgroup> One last thing: is it safe to assume that it is indeed OK to have multiple tags on a single page (as referenced by Matt Cutts a while back in a Webmaster Video)? Thanks! </hgroup> </hgroup>
Web Design | | LMDNYC2