Another SEO question

Is it better to have a subdomain (www.whatever.abc.com) or make a folder (www.abc.com/whatever), in terms of SEO?

 

currently I don't think it matters.

however, google IS aware of "subdomain abuse" and it's possible they may take countermeasures against it in the future.

right now I use subdomains on my trusted sites to avoid the sandbox. eventually I may need to move to directories... not looking forward to that. so much less organized.

 

Agreed. Subdomains are better.

 

There are different pros and cons using subdomains and subfolders, depends on your goal: search rankings, branding, maintenance, etc.

Personally I see not much difference for SEO.

 

There is a big difference in regards to SEO. Sub-domains are seen as a completely different website. So, a subdomain will not benefit from the "global link popularity" like a directory would.

 

so you recommend using a directory instead of subdomains?

 

IMO it doesn't affect much in SE results but I would suggest to use a subdomain. First it will give a better look for your site than subfolder and considered as a different site.

 

when I use subfolders, its considered one big site?

 

While there's a lot of speculation about this topic, I think that BILZ is right, the engines seem to treat subdomains as a whole new site, so if you want to get the link love for your main site, you'd have to 301 your subdomains, in which case, why not just put your content in a directory and save yourself the trouble?

 

subdomains have higher value than the folders. Google will give some more weitage to the subdomains than the flders. Intially we were using the folders for various channels in our company[ channels lke Movies, blogs, classifeids etc.,] Once we switched to subdomains it has lots of benifts in both SEO and Analysings the website. So If you want to do more research on your perticular area its better to have it as subdomain.

 

I agree with you inorganicseo
however, wouldnt it be better to SEO just one site (using subfolders), instead of trying to SEO many pages (using subdomains). Its alot easier.

 

Google also appears to track a sites topic. When you look at the tools provided by Google, it lists the most frequent words in the site and the most frequent words in the link text pointing to the site.

If your new directories off the main topic it will dilute the keywords. Seems better to me to have subdomains for anything that will focus on a different aspect of you business so that you can concentrate the keywords for each subject.

To me the question is, should you have a separate domain or use a subdomain. If you have more content that is on topic for the site, then put it in a folder.

If you want to tie a separate topic to the main site then use a subdomain.
IMHO

 

What tool are you talking about?

 

Subdomains are better because you can effectively control all 10 spots on the first page of the SERPS for your keyphrase if you do it right. As stated above, this is because they are treated as seperate sites. With folders, your site could only be listed twice max on the SERPS page. Be careful about duplicate content though - make sure the content is unique across subs. I am still experimenting with subdomains myself, making sure I don't screw myself - you have to be careful.

If you're looking to apply subdomains to a wordpress blog, you can download the plug-in from webguerilla here: tools.webguerrilla.com/wordpress-subdomain-plugin/

Good luck.

 

Type "Google" into Google and see what you get. Someone using subdomains to take up a whole page of rankings.

 

I'd also suggest you to use a subdomain. And as far as the issue about link popularity and PR is concerned, you can easily give a link from your main site to your sudomain to get PR for the new subdomain.

 

i think it depends on your site goals. there are only subtle differences and it actually comes down to preference. if you have a lot of content and you feel that you need to have them in a separate site, then use subdomains. When you use folders, the more subsections you have, the more search engines like it.. because it means more content. And if you have useful important inbound links back to your site, folders will be good too. Bottomline, just be wise in determining what your site really needs.

 

if it's not about the same topic I would make a subdomain. If not a folder would be much better in terms of SEO.

Size matters, and a subdomain will be treated as a whole new website

 

I don't think it's realy matters. The main idea is that you have your keywords in URL. And this could be both as subdomain or subdirectory

 

Subdomains are better because it gives a greater percieved weight but folder are easier to maintain