Moz's official stance on Subdomain vs Subfolder - does it need updating?

[randfish]

UPDATE: I filmed a Whiteboard Friday video specifically on this topic, with a few examples, that's likely worth checking out.

Hi James - I would still strongly urge folks to keep all content on a single subdomain. We recently were able to test this using a subdomain on Moz itself (when moving our beginner's guide to SEO from guides.moz.com to the current URL http://moz.com/beginners-guide-to-seo). The results were astounding - rankings rose dramatically across the board for every keyword we tracked to the pages.

I've had the opportunity to see many dozens of other sites do the same, almost always with similarly positive results (assuming they're moving from a subdomain without much other content/link signals to the subdomain that has those signals).

I think the important word you used in describing Matt's video is "implied." He's very careful not to speak in specifics, and often, I think the truth is buried in that non-specific language, rather than in the broader implied phrasing. That said, I do agree with you that after all these years, it seems odd that Google is still behaving in this fashion and that moving from one subdomain to another can have such a dramaticly positive impact on rankings.

p.s. Yes, for devblog, we put it there due to technical limitations. We plan to eventually get it moved to the main site.

[James77]

Thanks Rand - that's great information.

When you talk about rankings rising, did you see them rise for the KW's associated with http://moz.com/beginners-guide-to-seo or are we talking about rankings for other Moz pages ? - IE did adding http://moz.com/beginners-guide-to-seo contribute to a rise in rankings across the whole domain or just that subfolder.

I hope you consider making this into one of your WBF's / Posts, as I think it would be fascinating to see the "What you did", "What were the results" etc, and also get feedback from what others have experienced.

Many thanks

[randfish]

We only measured rankings on the pages inside the guide, but didn't look broadly across the entire moz.com domain. I think that would have been much harder to observe since there's so many things that can affect it.

Thanks for the nudge on the WB Friday - will consider that for the future!

[OlegKorneitchouk]

Yep, had a similar case when we moved a clients blog from blog.domain.com to domain.com/blog. Not only did rankings for blog terms increase, so did the rankings for the pages on the main site. Glad to see this holds true in other scenarios.

I'm glad I stuck to my guns when clients asked whether they should move. I was skeptical after MC released that video that basically said there is no difference.. but you need to read between the lines. He would make a great politician haha.

[tdawson09]

With my company, which has several major domain sites and a mother-ship root domain, we've had this ongoing discuss of moving all our subdomains to subfolders. Our concern is the pain of the transition in losing valuable traffic until the subfolders gain value and traffic. So we have the following subdomains:

boatcovers.iboats.com

boatpropellers.iboats.com

biminitops.iboats.com

forums.iboats.com

And all our other products are listed under iboats.com. Is there a painless way of making the switch to move our subdomains into subfolders and not get killed on traffic?

[TVape]

This post is deleted!

[randfish]

Hi Nima - that seems like a big swing for a move. I might double-check that all the redirects are correct and that engines are indexing the new pages properly. Google Webmaster Tools may be helpful there, too.

As far as timeframes for seeing traffic dip and recover, yes, we have observed that - it ranges from 1-4 months. You can see more about that here: https://moz.com/blog/rebrand-or-redirect-my-site-consolidate-multiple-sites-whiteboard-friday and in the comments.

Wish you all the best!

[ciznerguy]

Hello

any change on this subject of sub domains since Google shared they treat all as one?

thanks

Guy C

[randfish]

Nope. We still don't believe them and still have overwhelming evidence that Google doesn't consistently treat all pages on multiple subdomains the same way they do URLs on the same subdomain. They've said for years that it doesn't matter, but the evidence and data are clear. Putting content on multiple subdomains will almost certainly cause it to perform worse in Google than keeping it all on the same subdomain.

The comments here show some nice examples of folks who have moved their content to a single sub/root domain and seen big traffic bumps from search as a result: https://moz.com/blog/subdomains-vs-subfolders-rel-canonical-vs-301-how-to-structure-links-optimally-for-seo-whiteboard-friday

[sankar789]

So, this means, there will be no sub-domains in future?

[BetterAnalytics]

Hi Rand,

I am working with a bank that would like to rank as many parts of the company site as possible for the company name. While I understand the results on subdomains vs. subfolders, the question is, if we go with subfolders, will google rank multiple parts of a site within the top 10 results thinking that preference is giving 1 spot to the named URL.

it is better to structure this as:

Using subfoldersamericanbank.comamernicanbank.com/careersamericanbank.com/reviews

or  (use subdomains)

americanbank.comcareers.americanbank.comreviews.americanbank.com

or (set up new domains)

americanbank.comamericanbankcareers.comamericanbankreviews.com

Thanks for your perspective.

Jeff

[randfish]

If you don't mind the loss of ranking signals between the subdomains/domains, and are simply seeking to dominate the search results through owning multiple positions, separate domains are the best way to go. Subdomains can work for this, too, but are less consistently treated as separate sites, and Google may change that in the future.

[BetterAnalytics]

Thanks Rand, appreciate the quick response.

[GreenDot]

Rand,

I'm in the midst of a conversation with web security folks who state that a sub-directory (e.g. website/blog) that points to a blog like WordPress via a reverse proxy bypasses the "same-origin policy" and puts the site at "high risk".

If we take the standard security "hardening" measures like quality managed hosting with blog files kept separate from customer information, regular updates, trusted themes, vetted plugins, backups, etc., shouldn't we mitigate that risk?

[randfish]

Yeah - my blog - moz.com/rand has the Wordpress install on Moz's site, on the same servers as the rest of our domain, and we've implemented security protocols that make it very hardened. There's lot of WP security stuff out there that can help, and a talented sec-engineering team should be able to set it up with a minimum of problems. Many of the world's biggest companies run Wordpress, so there's lots of pre-existing protocols.

[Piotr_Stopa]

hi,

I saw that MOZ is treating equaly the Domain Authority score for root domain and subdomains. Is it entirely truth? So far you were desciribing the change for the content (blog, forum), but how the situation is different when the case is about localization?

I was compering two types of site localization. One under uk.domain.com and the other at domain.co.uk. In MOZ the subdomain uk.domain.com and domain.com have the same value for the Domain Authority. And whenever compared domain.com to local domains (co.uk, de, fr) their DA is always lower. Is it then MOZ algorithm assumption or is there higher value to put localizations under subdomain? It would be first time I hear that subdomain has higher authority than local domain.

[randfish]

Our scores for DA are only calculated on the root domain, but that doesn't mean different subdomains inherit all the ranking abilities of the root domain they're on. In fact, quite the opposite is true, which is why we still strongly suggest using a single subdomain on your root domain to host all the content, rather than splitting things up on multiple subdomains.

[Piotr_Stopa]

Thanks Rand for detailed answered.

[Shop-Sq]

Hi, Rand - 1 year later. Do you still recommend strongly folder over subdomain?

I have three separate websites that I have planned on merging into one. I recently acquired a strong domain ( stronger than my existing ones ) & after much deliberation, I have decided to move them together into one domain.

Site 1) 1 Forum - Around since 2007 - Originally VBulletin, last year migrated to discourse.

Site 2) E-commercece Magento Site - Around since 2010

Site 3) WordPress - Blog & Articles - Around since last year - Currently using the new ( Main Domain I want to use )

After a lot of research and White Board Fridays, I was thinking this would be my best bet:

• newdomain.com  - Merged WordPress & Magento CMS Page.
• newdomain.com/ forum <-- Will move my forum content & Install to the new domain.
• newdomain.com/ store <-- Will move my Ecommerce content & Install.

Between my developer and I, we have our heads around how to handle the technical aspect of the move, 301s to the new location etc.

But one area we want to research before pulling the trigger ( we haven't found much data on this )

My Main Question:   What is the possible penalty coming for shopping websites vs. content-driven websites, and possibility that forum-based content hosted on the same domain might cause another penalty to be applied to the other content on the domain.

My Developer Says: In recent years, we noticed that forum content had been penalized in favor of editorially reviewed content when this is identified by search engines.     
What big hiccups would / could we encounter from  combining these 3 types of platforms into one site?     Many thanks for any direction or insight.

[randfish]

Hi Shop-Sq,

A) I think merging the domains is almost definitely the right move, so long as you do it right (get the redirects nailed, don't have any performance issues, update the links correctly, etc).

B) I don't believe there's any penalty coming for shopping sites that also happen to host forum content or blog content. The only risk is if a lot of the site becomes (or is) cruft, meaning low-engagement/low-value content Google doesn't want in its index or searchers never click on/stay on.

C) We have not seen what your developers describe. Some forums haven't done well, others have done quite well (e.g. Moz's Q+A has benefited a lot over the last few years). I don't believe any hiccups you encounter will be because the types of content are unique, but rather because of technical issues, missteps, or content that doesn't help searchers and doesn't perform in Google (and all three should be avoidable).

D) Yes. We/I still recommend subfolders over subdomains. More strongly than ever actually. We've got some new evidence that Google judges content on a subfolder level, hence subdomains may not inherit all the rankings abilities of subfolders/other subdomains on the same domain.