Subdomains

Does anyone have any opinions as to the benefit of using subdomains for a very large website? Also with all the comments going around about search engines and subdomains do you feel it is valid. Will the use of subdomains possibly hurt you in the search engines.

I am considering creating a very large website and personally feel that subdomains will allow us to manage our large site better not to mention make it a little easier for optimization. Opinions?...thanks in advance.

 

Subdomains, as in subdomain.domain.com are treated as a different website, so use them with care. They are a great way of doing it though if you plan it all right.

 

When you say doing it right are you referring to the navigation and linking structure from the main domain to the subdomains? If so you have any thoughts on that please.

 

Questions:

1. Does Google Sandbox apply to new subdomains as it applies to new domains?

2. Would the creation of new subdomains be better than buying new domains? I am thinking of having a domain name like about.com and than just add subdomains on different topics as totally different websites. Would this approach be more beneficial?
The two advantages I can think of are that it is cheaper that way (one doesn't have to buy new domain names) and the subdomain names are always available.

Thanks.

 

From my understanding subdomains are treated age wise as the primary domain. As for being cheaper I dont know if this is the reason behind my decision to create a large site with subdomains but I feel they help manage a larger website easier.

 

how large is large?

 

Counting the dynamic pages about 150k to 200k pages.

 

and how many subdomains do you need to cover that?

depends on the subject...and how diverse the subdomains would be.

it would probably be easier to promote just one site, no one really likes linking to a subdomain...do they?

 

About 20 subdomains so far is calculated as being needed for that many pages. As for linking to a subdomain I dont know that I would have a problem with it.

These subdomains will make it easier for our clients to navigate our site. Also it would make it a lot easier for us to manage this real estate site and maintain a more stable site structure.

 

it pretty much sounds like you have already decided on them,
there is not any real difference between using folders or subdomains..


no real benefit..or loss....however
folders allow you to just promote one site....one brand

i think massachusettsproperty.realestatesite.com is a mouthfull
compared to realestatesite.com ....and navigate the rest.

subdomains are great...if you don't really need them..like for a forum or something.

 

I can not see a reason to use subdomains as a neccessity for a real estate site, unless it is a massive diverse site. I can see that using subdomains for marketing might be good e.g buffalo.realestateus.com forwarded to the folder realestateus.com/buffalo is certainly a help for ease of memory etc and for personalising the Marketing efforts. I wouldn't have the stuff on a subdomain though, I would prefer to have it all on the main domain in folders.

You say for ease of navigation, ask yourself this simple question. If there was no such thing as a subdomain, would it be practical to have multiple domain names and to send your traffic from one domain to another? This is exactly what you are doing with a subdomain.

Another thing to consider is directory submission. I certainly would not allow multiple subdomains that could easily be subfolders into a directory.

 

I am still debating about the subdomains. I know that the amount of dynamic pages that will be created are so numerous that a subdomain would be required. My problem right now is whether or not this could hurt me in the serps. With targeting so many cities I do not understand how I could target that many with one domain. The use of subdomains means in all reality one site to manage instead of 50.

 

I am looking at a similar problem, except at the moment I am looking at targeting 6 different cities. Basically every city will have the same website, just different content and different images.

Does anyone agree or disagree with this comment???