Questions
-
Should I Split Into Two Websites?
Hi There, Good question! Short answer here is: no, a Local SEO is seldom going to suggest a multi-site approach to represent different services a business offers. Here are some of the reasons why: You will only be able to build local business listings for the main business at the physical location, so there is no local pack ranking advantage to having two different websites, as you can't build additional listings for one of the services offered - this would violate Google's guidelines. Simultaneously, what you worry about with the multi-site approach isn't so much a duplicate penalty/filter (unless you duplicate content between the two sites) but, rather, the accidental creation of duplicate listings. If Google (or another local business index) gets confused by finding shared partial NAP (name, address, phone) on two different websites, it can confuse them and lead to the accidental duplicate listings being created, which can then sap the strength of the main listing for the main business. It can also confuse consumers. The way to reduce the likelihood of this would be to be sure that the physical address isn't on the second website and that you either have a) a unique phone number for the second website or b) put the phone number in image text. Even so, these things can get referenced off the website and pulled in that way, so it's not really foolproof, but it is a best-effort attempt. Finally, a major drawback of the multi-site approach is that, instead of every marketing effort you make adding to the strength of the brand, and therefore all aspects of what the brand offers, you are dividing this in half while doubling the management efforts that have to be expended trying to market two websites, instead of pouring all of that marketing goodness into a single entity. This really matters when it comes to your organic rankings. If you have an absolutely awesome website with high authority, you should be able to get your pages that surround the topic of this particular service the business offers to rank very well. With a second website, you'll be starting from scratch, trying to rank an unknown newcomer instead of simply building on the strength of the existing website by building great content and earning links to it, all under the umbrella of a single brand. So, hopefully these are points you can bring to the company to help them see why in both organic and local marketing, a single site approach is generally preferred. Particularly as we've moved into the era of RankBrain, the ability to become an authority in a certain topic has become a central marketing mindset. You might even show the client this website (Moz.com) as an illustration of how a brand can become associated with a topic (SEO) that then helps it to rank for a multitude of related facets (linkbuilding, on-page SEO, local SEO, content development, etc.). Rather than creating a website for each of these areas, there is just one Moz, and that has helped the brand to become known, overall, for all of these things. Please, let us know if you have any further questions!
Local Strategy | | MiriamEllis0