Why host more than one domain?

5 replies
Hello everyone,
I own a few domains, one for each "muse" I've got my hands in. I've done this just because it seems to be what everyone else does, but I was thinking...

Why not just get one domain with a relatively neutral sounding name (IE. FastMind.com, as opposed to SuperlongkeywordforSEOoptimization.com) and then use a subdomain for each individual project?

If you're in the weight lifting niche, you use Fastmind.com/weightlifting.
If you're in the justin beiber niche, you use Fastmind.com/justinbeiber.

Catch the drift?

So my main question here is this- Will it effect SEO? If each subdomain gets backlinks for a specific group of keywords, it will still rank on google even though it also has keyword SEO for justin beiber products right?
(These are 2 random examples btw)

Even if this some how destroys any possibility of SEO, it should still work with PPC adds right?
#domain #host
  • Profile picture of the author Alex Blades
    Nothing wrong with using one domain, establish an authority site with it.
    Signature
    " I knew that if I failed, I wouldn't regret that.
    But I knew the one thing I might regret is not ever having tried. "

    ~ Jeff Bezos

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  • Profile picture of the author WillR
    First of all a subdomain is what comes BEFORE the main domain.

    So whatever.yourwebsite.com is an example of a subdomain. The examples you have given above are simply folders on the same domain, not subdomains.

    Most search engines look at your website, it's structure and content, and come up with a theme for your website. This helps in ranking your website. If your website has a hole heap of unrelated topics on it, it then becomes very hard for a search engine to give it any meaningful theme and will be harder to dominate specific markets. On the other hand if you just have the one website that is all about Justin Beiber the search engines are going to more easily see that and it should help with your rankings.

    Subfolders should really only be used to separate your content into logical sections. So if you had a website about weightloss then you might have subfolders or categories like 'weight lifting', 'diet plans', 'exercise equipment', etc. All of these are subtopics of your websites main theme.

    If you wanted to instead use the one domain for different and unrelated themes, that is when it would make more sense to use subdomains such as food.yourwebsite.com and dance.yourwebsite.com, etc.

    Just remember that the easier you make it for the search engines to figure out the theme of your website, the better. If you have a domain name with justin beiber in it and all the content on your site is justin beiber related, it tells the search engines that website is very relevant for anyone searching information about justin beiber. If you instead have a website with a heap of different topics and a generic domain name then it makes it harder for the search engines to categorize that site and they see the site as less relevant to all those topics.

    Obviously there are exceptions to the rule such as news sites and other authority sites but they are the exception to the rule and they do take years and years to build up that authority.
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    • Profile picture of the author Donowhy
      Originally Posted by WillR View Post

      First of all a subdomain is what comes BEFORE the main domain.

      So whatever.yourwebsite.com is an example of a subdomain. The examples you have given above are simply folders on the same domain, not subdomains.

      Most search engines look at your website, it's structure and content, and come up with a theme for your website. This helps in ranking your website. If your website has a hole heap of unrelated topics on it, it then becomes very hard for a search engine to give it any meaningful theme and will be harder to dominate specific markets. On the other hand if you just have the one website that is all about Justin Beiber the search engines are going to more easily see that and it should help with your rankings.

      Subfolders should really only be used to separate your content into logical sections. So if you had a website about weightloss then you might have subfolders or categories like 'weight lifting', 'diet plans', 'exercise equipment', etc. All of these are subtopics of your websites main theme.

      If you wanted to instead use the one domain for different and unrelated themes, that is when it would make more sense to use subdomains such as food.yourwebsite.com and dance.yourwebsite.com, etc.

      Just remember that the easier you make it for the search engines to figure out the theme of your website, the better. If you have a domain name with justin beiber in it and all the content on your site is justin beiber related, it tells the search engines that website is very relevant for anyone searching information about justin beiber. If you instead have a website with a heap of different topics and a generic domain name then it makes it harder for the search engines to categorize that site and they see the site as less relevant to all those topics.

      Obviously there are exceptions to the rule such as news sites and other authority sites but they are the exception to the rule and they do take years and years to build up that authority.
      Thanks for the detailed post,
      But if the traffic is coming through advertisement, then this should work fine, correct?
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      • Profile picture of the author WillR
        Originally Posted by Donowhy View Post

        Thanks for the detailed post,
        But if the traffic is coming through advertisement, then this should work fine, correct?
        If you are just using the site for paid traffic then yes, you can setup the site however you like. But if you are going to the trouble of building a site for paid traffic why not also make it SEO friendly so you can attract some organic traffic.

        I guess it depends on what the site is about and what content you plan to put on the site.
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  • Profile picture of the author Donowhy
    I figure if I can get someone to the website (via seo or paid traffic) they might also be interested in some of the other niche products I have to offer, that are on the same website. Plenty of people have multiple hobbies, in the case of my previous example- Maybe its a bodybuilding Justin Bieber fan lol..

    Or would it just be easier to have different domains, one for each muse, but they also link to eachother through buttons
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