I have done a local 4 page website for a landscape gardening client and he would now like another 4 page website to tackle the London market (unique content for each page, some different images but the same design). In SEO terms, am I right in thinking that he is better having a new website where EACH page is all about landscape gardening in London and the website is totally themed around London - rather than just having a London page on his local website? Obviously building up two sets of backlinks would be costly for him (time and or money). Has anyone got any experience as to which solution works best?
To be honest 1 single site with geo targeted landing pages would be alot more cost effective, as you say with added costs of extra domain/domains, web development, marketing multiple sites ect. If the niche was very competative and you had a large budget I would maybe be advising differently as you could have a geo targeted domain name such as www.landscape-gardening-london.co.uk then have the sites content all aimed at london landscape gardening and related terms, which would work great. But as budget is low and niche is not that competative would not advise such a tactic at all.
Many thanks johneva - if the customer's budget allows, would you say that the two websites would work better than 1 website given multiple locations (and unique content)???? Is there anything in Google's rules to say you can't do this? He wants the London website to be for his"London company" so the company name will be different. I'm not currently sure whether he wants to run this London brnach with a friend or not.
Yeah it would work great if the budget is there to promote multiple sites and cover costs of development and further redesigns ect further down the road. Aslong as the content is different and the site is aimed in the way you explained then Google will have no issues with it.
if it is within the same niche, then your client can have additional page targeting different cities. i have clients that offer their services nationally and have separate pages for each major city which is better than having separate site for each city. not only this is cost effective, works better also in terms of seo
Comes down to the mullah, the money, if you have it then be my guest and go for it but if you don't then don't starve yourself over a swollen goat.
If his comanies are doing the exact same business, I'd buy the 2 domains but have them pointing to a third one with all his services gathered in one place.