I have a site which ranks #1 for its main and some secondary keywords. Now I plan to expand the site so my question is which is better, use the same top ranking page to add more articles, sort of like a long wikipedia page or add multiple new pages ? Thanks
one long page can contain many links with sufficient information , but many small pages can contain much information seperately than one long page
Whatever is better for you users. The quality of the user experience with your content will ultimately determine the success of your website. This is true for 90% of websites I would guess. Make sure your website follows a (preferably 3) Tiered structure to not confuse the search engines and visitors alike.
Its a fairly subjective query as it depends on what the page is about and what the additional content is that you want to add. If the content you want to add is specifically centered around the main keywords of that page then you can add them to that same page as it keeps good quality and relevant content on the page that is ranking well for those terms. If the content is targetting more varied keywords then i would suggest putting them on their own pages that are optimised for those keywords specifically. This would also keep good browsing structure for the site visitors and you are not giving them long pages with irrelevant content that they weren't looking for. It also means you don't dilute the keyword strength of your current main page and risk losing ranking on that page.
agree with petes1980 :"its a fairly subjective query as it depends on what the page is about and what the additional content is that you want to add. " So i suggest have required pages only which help users also have optimized content for better result.
Typically, you want each page on your site to target a different keyword phrase. If you're adding content to rank better for the same keyword then adding to the same page might be an option (although I generally avoid having pages w/ more than 500-1000 words of content on them). But if you're trying to target some new keyword phrases, you are better off having a separate page for each keyword phrase you target. This gives you a whole new set of on-page SEO elements (<title>, <h1>, <h2>, content) that can be laser focused on that one keyword phrase that you want the page to rank for. Also other pages on your site can link to that page with the keyword phrase you want it to rank for. It's VERY difficult to make a single page rank for lots of different keyword phrases. To do so, you have to rely almost exclusively on inbound links to rank for most of those keyword phrases. You can't take advantage of the on-page SEO elements and on-site interlinking to help the page rank. It's always easier to make 100 pages each rank for a different single keyword phrase than it is to make a single page rank for 100 different keyword phrases.
Many small pages means many backlinks to each of them. You will get advantage in search engines but your promotion efforts increases with the number of page.
Thanks guys, and good point petes. I was making a new page for my site which was doing very good for a highly searched keyword but very poor for long tail searches. So basically I am diversifying the traffic. I was working on about 10-15 keywords when I came across numerous keywords which I could target pretty easily and effectively which made me think of why not expand even more as the effort was minimal. So I guess, i'll go for the multiple page approach. p.s. any one know exactly how statcounter counts? Is it required on just the index page or all the pages to work properly. I am talking about a static html site.
I just dealt with your issue today. I was trying to get this keyword phrase and my page was approaching 3000 words. Since most of my revenue is based on adsense from organic traffic getting to #1 on google is important, but out of the 3000 words the only high traffic keywords is the one I'm doing the page for. So in my case it's pretty much worthless taking apart the 3000 word page to make a smaller one, unless, that is, I think it would be better for my users.... I'm not sure, you can see what I mean, here is the currently large under construction page... http://askthetrainer.com/exercising-with-a-personal-trainer.html
First of all congratulations! Not many can have the #1 spot for main keyword like yours. If in your cases, I would suggest go for quality compared to quantity. Get high PR dofollow backlinks from quality contents and I suggest to approach some .edu or .gov sites It may help you beat your rising competitors.
I see what you mean, but I'll look at the from the users point of view considering the kind of page that is. Your page is actually very long and part of the reason is that the article moves into areas which can be made a different page but isn't due to the way it is written. Then again, there is the SEO to care for.