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Wordpress Multisite - Subdomains or Subfolders?

by mwright
5 replies
Does anyone know the advantages of setting up Wordpress Multisite using subdomains or subfolders?

My goal is to set up a membership site, and giving everyone their own page.
#multisite #subdomains #subfolders #wordpress
  • Profile picture of the author MarketingTorch
    Go with subdomains. Then your site will look more like other member sites such as Blogspot or LiveJournal. If the Wordpress site has existed more than a month, you have to use subdomains anyway (unless you want to recode a workaround), because that's the default configuration. A new Wordpress installation will let you do it either way. But a membership site just looks cleaner with subdomains, in my opinion.
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  • Profile picture of the author Poirot
    Originally Posted by mwright View Post

    subdomains or subfolders?
    Subdomains are often treated as a separate domain by directories etc, so I suggest definitely subdomains. With subdomains you can also have separate Google analytics accounts, and a lot more.
    A subdomain also like a whole separate site, rather than an internal page to most users.
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    • Profile picture of the author mwright
      Thanks for the replies.

      I'll go with subdomains, and set it up so members would have something like "theirpage.mydomain.com".
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      • Profile picture of the author garymac101
        Hey MWright,

        I'm just learning multisite myself, but in asking the same question, i was told about domain mapping. Apparently, you can get a plug-in that will allow you to map the subdomain you used as an example of a members' site to an actual domain they own. Yes, they can of course point that domain they've bought at the subdomain on your site, but when you enter the domain mapping through the plug-in, it allows the url to show as the customers / members domain w/sub-folders instead of as a subdomain. The SERPS and wordpress still see the subdomain format and treat it the same, but to the visitor, it's just like they are on their own hosting and domain.

        The negative, is you get no more free url advertising for your service, so believe this is strong reason many membership sites don't offer it. Is a nice up-sell for the customer and possible competitive advantage over others then though???

        If you are running seo software as you surf the web, you've probably seen small sites that appear to be at their own domain, but the number of monthly visitors and SEMrush #'s are just way too high right?, this is a result of domain mapping. It looks like a small few page site or sniper site on self hosting, but is really on multi or member of some kind, but with domain mapping to hide / cloak it, so the numbers you're seeing are for the entire multi site :-)

        Hope this helps and best of luck with the multisite / membership adventure!

        Garymac101
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  • Profile picture of the author ishwar
    Do you guys still need help with WPMU let me know.
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    Ishwar
    Always looking for few good affiliates
    Ask me how I built 100 games

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