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Domain structure question

by RB
3 replies
I'm confused on how to setup multiple domains.

First, are they add on domains or sub domains? What is the difference in hierarchy and structure?

Second, in either case how many should be under a parent domain?

Third, do the topics of each domain need to be related?

Thanks!

RB
#domain #question #structure
  • Profile picture of the author larry50
    Sounds like you are using Hostgator, you want to use addon domains, this allows each domain to be its own world to the internet, but they reside physically under your first domain.

    You can have different topics for each domain without penalty.

    How many is a topic of debate, some say only 1 domain per account, I have 5 or 6 on my account and don't have any trouble. It all just depends on traffic and how much you have going on, the good thing with addon domains is if you do get too many on an account, you can always open another account and move the domain (well and your web site -- so there is some work to do it).
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    • Profile picture of the author garyisonline
      Add-on domains are those added to your hosting account where the server is configured to listen for traffic from those domains and then route it to either the main public directory, or another sub-directory within the account.

      Fortunately most hosting accounts provide you with your control panel (e.g. CPanel) where you can easily specify both the add-on domain and the folder you want its traffic to land in. Email addresses would all need to be set up for those domains also. You can bulk forward those if you want.

      Each one of these add-on domains would act as completely different websites (good), unless you had them route to a directory of a domain already in the account. Then it would just be the same site as the existing domain (not so good).

      Sub domains are quite different. For instance www is a sub domain. You can have groomer.mysampledomain.com where groomer is a sub-domain. stylist.mysampledomain.com where stylist is a sub-domain etc.

      These are configured similarly to an add-on domain using your control panel - in that you specify the sub-domain portion and then the directory you want that traffic to land in.

      These don't have to be related content, but commonly are sub departments of a larger company site.

      You can also send a sub-domain to a completely different server. For instance if you use a hosted ticketing/support system, you could specify support.mysampledomain.com to re-direct over to that service.

      What about sub-domains in Wordpress?

      You can also use the sub-domain method to host multiple Wordpress sites under one Wordpress Multisite installation and hosting account....thus saving on additional costs of domain name registrations and the headache of keeping a bunch of Wordpress installations updated, but that setup is done from within the Wordpress configuration.

      How many of each?

      Your hosting company will tell you that. Many times they will say unlimited add-on domains...then your limit will be the CPU load (buried deep in the small print of their terms), disk space and monthly bandwidth of the account.
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  • Profile picture of the author RB
    Thanks you guys. That was a big help and I will save this for reference.
    RB
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