Best geotargeting strategy: Subdomains or subfolders or country specific domain

[Dan-Lawrence]

How have the relatively recent changes in how G perceives subdomains changed the best route to onsite geotargeting i.e. not building out new country specific sites on country specific and hosted domains and instead developing sub-domains or sub-folders and geo-targeting those via webmaster tools ?

In other words, given the recent change in G perception, are sub-domains now a better option than a sub-folder or is there not much in it ?

Also if client has a .co.uk and they want to geo-target say France, is the sub-domain/sub-folder route still an option or is the .co.uk still too UK specific, and these options would only work using a .com ?

In other words can sites on country specific domains (.co.uk , .fr, .de etc etc) use sub-folders or domains to geo-target other countries or do they have no option other than to develop new country specific (domains/hosting/language) websites ?

Any thoughts regarding current best practice in this regard much appreciated.  I have seen last Febs WBF which covers geotargeting in depth but the way google perceives subdomains has changed since then

Many Thanks

Dan

[nvs.nim]

Some time ago I struggled with the same problem, and after reading articles on the seomoz blog and questions posted here I went for subdirectories.

subdirectories still give you the ability to add those folders to Google Webmaster Tools and set regio for that folder. You can go with country specific domains as well, but you will have to build links for every domain, whereas you only have to do it once when you choose subfolders.

[jgohil]

I would go for subdirectory approach if the site has a generic TLD like .com.  Link building becomes much easier.  However if you have  country TLD like .co.uk then I would not go for a subdirectory approach.  www.xyz.co.uk/de may be perceived a UK site for a German user from a site conversion point of view.

[Dan-Lawrence]

Thank you all for your helpful comments !!

So to summarise - all fine to go sub-directory route for generic domains like .com, .net etc but if you have country specific domain such as .co.uk then forget it and start afresh with a domain/language/hosting for your target country.

Just to throw a cat amongst the pigeons - if you have a .uk.com domain is that considered as a genuine uk focused tld or a .com ?  So for .uk.com domains can you geo-target using sub-directories since ultimately considered as .com,  or not ?

All Best

Dan

[Hannah_Smith]

Hi Dan,

uk.com is the domain - but your site is effectively sitting on a subdomain - i.e. yourdomain.uk.com

As such I'd expect that technically speaking you could geo-target something like yourdomain.uk.com/fr/ via webmaster tools, but I wouldn't recommend it.

Partially because I don't think it will actually work - overall you're giving off a really mixed signal, but also from a user experience perspective - I don't think French users will want to transact with a uk.com site - it just looks like a site for people in the UK.

Thanks

Hannah

[Dan-Lawrence]

Many Thanks Hannah !

Cheers

Dan

[Dan-Lawrence]

Sorry 1 more question re my client with the .co.uk who wants to Geo-target content to france.

They do have the .com version of their domain too.  If the site was new I would recommend changing this round so they can geotarget france via the sub-directory on the .com and would still like to but since the site is well established I fear changing from the .co.uk to the .com will lose alot of its existing history/authority/rankings etc etc.

Is this a valid concern or should swapping the site over to sit on the .com, rather than the existing .co.uk, and then 301'ing the .co.uk pages to the .com deal with this ?

Many Thanks

Dan

[Hannah_Smith]

That isn't a domain at all - it's a sub-domain - what you've purchased there is yourdomain.uk.com - so your site is actually on a sub-domain of the domain uk.com

I'm guessing that in theory you could geo-target via Webmaster Tools, however I think that in reality you might struggle to get the site to rank. It would also make for some pretty mixed up looking URLs - yourdomain.uk.com/fr/ - the UK in there might mean lower click through rates as the site looks primarily UK focused.

I hope this helps,

Hannah