How should I handle these links?

[PedroAndJobu]

I recently purchased a site which is in the same niche as my personal blog. MANY of the keywords which I want both sites to rank for, they are already ranking well for (Eg I rank #1 with one site and #5 for the other). I haven't started linking the two sites to each other yet (waiting to announce the acquisition before I do).

I have 2 questions for you all...

How powerful do you think linking between these sites could be?

How do you think I should handle the linking between these two sites?

[JSOC]

I think the amount of link juice that will flow from the acquired site will be a function of:

1. How conspicuous your link building becomes

2. Where the sites are hosted

If your acquired site is hosted on the same server as your current site my opinion is that you won't experience much value from the additional links as the search engines can identify ownership information as well as websites that exist for the sole purpose of linking to one another. Consider hosting on different servers, hence different IP addresses, and even this may not stop Google from eventually realizing that you own both sites.

Similarly, 100 new links from your acquired site will raise red flags and won't do much to advance your existing site.

I'd link the two sites strictly where it will benefit your readers (i.e. where a reader of the acquired site will benefit from or be interested in content on your existing site). Bottom line: don't overdo it and link for your readers.

Just my opinion

[PedroAndJobu]

Cool, I wasnt planning on going nuts.  I was just curious if I could possibly bump up my rankings.  In a way, it would make sense that two sites in the top 10 for a keyword, would give credibility to the other no?

Also, my new site is hosted on volusion, the other hostmonster.  So it's a different IP.

[RobertFisher]

Bondtana,

First, Power of a link is relative to the Domain Authority/Page authority of the site that is linking to you and to the number of links originating from that page. By having reciprocal links between the two sites, you are going to negate most if not all of the link juice. So, make a choice. Link from one to the other and not between the two. Also, if you are wanting to operate the two as separate sites, why would you want to announce the acquisition at all? Yes, being hosted on different servers is helpful, but if you are shown as the owner of both, sooner or later the search engines will know it. Again, a loss of "power."

So, if you are wanting to acquire more customers, readers, etc. Maybe you are better off not announcing and then utilizing the sites as separate entities. Or, if site A is the one you really want to rank for and site B has a massive DA, PA maybe you would be better doing a 301 redirect from urls on B to A.

As with most things SEO, it is always relative to some other issue or standard. If one site ranks because it is highly informational and the other is highly optimized to bring customer conversions, you will be served to understand that and utilize the informational to in some way drive traffic to the customer site.

So, no easy answers. But, a lot to think on.

Best

[PedroAndJobu]

Thanks for the advice.

Site A is my personal blog, which I never monetized.  Site B is an ecommerce site which sells products pretty much anyone who reads my blog can use.

I'm considered an authority in my niche, so announcing the acquisition will absolutely drive sales on site B.  And letting people know about site A on site B, will definitely boost the credibility of Site B's brand.