DIFFERENCE OF SUBDOMAIN AND SUBDIRECTORY
Most of clients who focus on online marketing don’t know why they need to use subdomain for their main site and difference of subdomain and subdirectory.
Subdomain and subdirectory have their own advantages and values. If you are considering use domain for your site(s) so this article will help you to have the basic but value understanding for using it.
Figure 1 Difference of subdomain and subdirectory
What is a subdomain?
A subdomain is simply a domain tagged on to an existing domain. For example, google.com will take you to their main search page. Gmail and Google Plus use the subdomains mail.google.com and plus.google.com. In these examples, mail and plus are the subdomain names and google is the main or root domain.In contrast a sub-directory is just a folder within a domain. If mail was a subdirectory of google.com it would take the form google.com/mail.
A subdomain is a completely different site to your main domain. This means that you can install anything you wish on there without any impact on your main site.
Search engines consider subdomains as different sites and index them in their own right.
Subdomains’ Advantages
- Subdomains are free. If your hosting plan allows, once you have bought a domain you can add subdomains for no cost.
- Subdomains are very simple to add and you use them like you would any site.
- Search engines may not dig deep enough to index and rank your main site pages but, because a subdomain is viewed as a different site, it will get indexed in its own right.
- If you use WordPress or any software that creates dynamic links you avoid url conflicts by using subdomains rather than subdirectories.
- Blog posts get lost over time and, even if they initially do well in search engines, they lose impetus and ranking. A subdomain with posts dedicated to a particular topic will retain freshness and search engine value.
- Unless you have a large amount of subdomains on one domain Google will not penalize a site.
- From my experience, a subdomain tagged on to an already well ranked site gets indexed quickly and benefits from its parent’s success.
- It is easy to install or upload anything to a subdomain without impact on your main site. You can avoid software and plugin conflicts.
- To use a different theme for particular purposes or landing page themes when plugins don’t meet your needs.
- Your main site will not be slowed down by adding resource heavy applications or plugins. Install them on a subdomain instead.
- The ability to use a keyword for the subdomain name for clarity, search engine and promotional purposes. For example mail.google.com describes exactly what its purpose is.
- To establish brand awareness and align that brand with you.
- To target a particular reader group, market segment or country.
- Where you want to keep your main site informational but also want to sell products or services.
- To highlight a major topic from your main site.
- To use for a different topic or niche.
- Use for aspects such as lists of links which do not rank well but still provide value to readers.
- For adding value and resources for your readers, teams and clients and attract new ones.
- If a search engine may not like a particular topic put it on a subdomain and don’t damage the reputation or potential of your main site.
- For using WordPress multi-sites for yourself or others.
- You can add functionality for your own use when you are unable to add it to your main site.
- Use for learning purposes.
- For coaching, mentoring and support.
- To increase your online presence.
- Usefulness for many personal purposes.
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