Moving blog to a subdomain, how can I help it rank?
-
Hi all,
We recently moved our blog to a sub-domain where it is hosted on Wordpress. It was very recent and we're actively working on the SEO, but any pointers on getting the subdomain to rank higher than the old blog posts would be terrific.
Thanks!
-
That's great, thanks for the info! Do you know of any resources off-hand about "generally not [listing] more than two of these subdomains in the search results" for more detail?
-
You can use PHP redirects, and they'll do the same thing. Though it will be a little slower and the page still has to technically exist. If it's a very high traffic site, then it may eventually become an issue.
-
My long-term is to get it into a folder, but in the meantime I've had to do a subdomain. Just wondering if I can specifically make the subdomain rank higher than the old (previous) folder URL.
-
Going to a folder would be great, but the reason was due to the way the CMS works and a few other things. I know it's not the most popular way, but it's a dramatic improvement so far.
-
We haven't lost any traffic yet, I've been pretty cautious and we've actually had a huge improvement in some areas. I'm can't really share all of the reasoning behind it, but I appreciate the note about potentially losing traffic. I had a suspicion about the redirect though, if I can't change the htaccess, would PHP or similar redirects do anything?
-
I would like to have done it as a folder, but that wasn't feasible at the time. I have some limitations in terms of the CMS that our corporate site is hosted.
-
Sure, but the subdomain/folder debate has been going back and forth for years. And I wonder if it's not so much a question of where, but a question of a bunch of new URLs. Would that possibly make a search engine reconsider the pages?
We know Google and Bing have stupid amounts of computing power. Duane Forrester has said that a Bing server farm causes so much heat, that they have to contact the FAA when they vent the facility. It causes turbulence.
We already know that no search engine can crawl the entire web at this point. So, it may be reasonable to think that some pages are just rated and possibly semi-forgotten. Once a page gets a new URL, it may look like a new thing. The algorithm has changed. New results populate. That may be the case.
Or there could actually be a genuine human preference, though my mom doesn't pay much attention to the URL.
This stuff is quite difficult to discern with complete certainty. It's basically physics. When you contact the search engines, they contact you back. Now, those contacts are happening billions of times a day.
For now, I will remain agnostic. Sub domain, or sub folder are equally fine until proven otherwise with proof beyond a few tests.
-
Right on, David. That's what I'm referring to Travis. Rand also mentioned this recently in a WBF.
-
From search engine journal:
"For blogs, I prefer a subfolder (http://www.seomoz.org/blog/) because the link juice which is sent to that blog is going to be naturally distributed to that main domain, and other subfolders under the domain.
Futhermore, the forum/blog will default logo, home page and other links back to the subfolder. If you set this up with a subdomain, by default, the links in the forum/blog itself will all point back to the subdomain. So, with a subfolder, both the inbound and internal linking structure favor the entire site.
With a subdomain, the forum or blog will be listed as a separate entity in the Google search results, which is good for owning the results and one’s reputation management. However, Google and other engines will generally not list more than two of these subdomains in the search results, unless those subdomains can prove to Google that they are independent and relevant entities."
If you don't know htaccess, redirecting the site to and from the subdomain can be a nightmare. If not setup correctly, your subdomain can cause you all types of duplication and strange URL complications.
Hope this helps!
-
Funny, we made that last few month - but the different way - from a subdomain to a folder. We directed older to newer posts, cleaned the code, speed up, made it responsive and moved it to the folder.
If you want to have great SEO effects with a blog you need it on the sub-folder like RickyShockley said bevore.
-
A sub domain is no better than a folder and vice versa. I'm more curious what brought about this decision. So if you know of an interesting argument, I would like to hear it.
Now, what you may need to do, unless all the external links to the pages are terrible, is setup 301 redirects. How to do that would really depend upon your server. The vast majority are Linux based. So you would have to search something like '301 redirect htaccess (server flavor)'. That could be Apache, Nginx, CentOS... whatever. Either way, you'll get there, and if it's still a question then there are plenty of forums that specialize in your server type.
Beware of htaccess. It will knock your site down if you mess up the configuration via white space or some other syntax error. Try it in a test environment first, if possible. 'Always look both ways before crossing the street.' That is how you handle htaccess.
I don't want to startle you, but right now you're possibly losing a ton of traffic. Maybe you aren't losing any at all. I don't know, I don't know your domain. I can't even begin to guess.
Refer to your analytics and redirect if it's worthwhile. That's all I can say without knowing more.
-
I know that rand recommends hosting your blog on a FOLDER of your root domain instead of hosting your blog on a subdomain.
The reason for doing so is that the domain authority of the subdomain will put a slightly larger distance (in terms of authority signals carrying over) from the root.
For example, its better to have your blog at bobsmithdental.com/blog vs blog.bobsmithdental.com.
After that, its really a matter of tightening up your keyword optimization on the blog posts and building and earning quality inbound links!
-Ricky
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Help with 404 pages
Hello everyone, A few days back, we have permanently removed 3 main categories from our E-commerce website and because of that our more than 50k URLs are showing 404 error (according to Google Search Console). What are the good practices to handle such extensively 404 pages? Please help!!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Obbserv0 -
Can internal links from a blog harm the ranking of a page?
Here is the situation: A site was moved from its original domain to its new domain, and at the same time, the external wordpress.com blog was moved to a subdirectory, making it an onsite blog. The two pages that rank the highest on the site have virtually no links from the blog and no external links, while all the other pages are linked extensively from the blog and have backlinks. Their targeted keywords are not so much easier to rank than the other pages for that to be the sole cause. To confuse the matter even more, there was a manual penalty affecting incoming links which was removed last month. The old site, which has many backlinks to the new site, is still in Google's index. The old blog however, has been redirected page by page and is not in Google's index. Most of the blog posts are short 1-paragraph company updates and potentially considered low quality content because of that (?) The common denominator among the two highest ranked pages (I'm talking top 3 in SERP v. page 3 or 4) seems to be either the lack of external backlinks or the lack of internal links from the blog. Could there be an issue with the blog such that internal links from it are detrimental rather than helpful?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | kimmiedawn0 -
Checking keyword rankings
I have 2 questions: 1. To check keyword rankings with firefox, i am choosing: Tools>Options>Privacy>"clear all current history" Timerange to clear: Everything Check Boxes: Browsing and download history, form and search history, cookies, cache, active logins Is there anything else I need to be doing? 2. Search results in my Niche are heavily localized. Is there any way to check rankings in another area? Ex: By default, our rankings are for Northeast NJ. Is there any way to check Baltimore, for example?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | CsmBill0 -
Trouble ranking
I have a site that got messed over pretty hard by a BigCommerce issue. They used to rank but then Big Commerce had a glitch that set every page on the site to a https which was auto set, by their system, to not be indexed. This caused the entire site to go missing. It was then fixed by me, only to have the same glitch happen again. I again fixed it, and BigCommerce released a patch to resolve the issue. They admitted blame to my client and said it can take a while to resolve. It has been a few months now, and google is slowly recrawling the site. It has about half the pages indexed. The pages that are indexed do not rank at all. I was wondering if you guys see any major flags that would cause this or if it is still related to the big commerce glitch. link
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Atomicx0 -
Time sensitive: HELP! We are having a problem doing a 301 redirect.....what can we do instead?
Our website has dynamic URLs and we are moving to another server/platform. 301 redirects is looking like a highly unlikely solution. A 3rd party company is handling the back-end of the website which they say works more like a "search engine" than a traditional website. Maybe that explains why they're having a hard time with the 301 redirects. Worst case scenario: we can't use the 301 redirect. What else can we do? We are considering "Indicate your canonical (preferred) URLs by including them in a Sitemap" as Google describes here: http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=139066#2. I'm wondering if this method only applies to duplicate content........and what would happen once the old website results in a 404 page...... HELP! We need to cross over to the new platform as soon as possible.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | PatriotOutfitters810 -
Company name often shows in anchor text (important keyword phrase within), can this impact ranking?
Hi everyone, My company is called "Hawaii Job Engine" - www.hawaiijobengine.com - and many sites that link to my site use my company name as anchor text "Hawaii Job Engine". I have heard Google may devalue a certain keyword phrase if used too often in anchor text. Does this mean I may, over time, get a poor ranking for the term "Hawaii Job" since that phrase is part of my company's name. Or, will search engines easily notice it is my company name and therefore it will not have a negative impact on rankings? Example: if the anchor text leading to my company's homepage is company's name 95% of the time (on authoritative sites) could this be an issue? I don't know the %, but just to establish if there may be in % levels to keep in mind. thank you, Kristian
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | knielsen1 -
How can i get high ranking on yahoo?
My search terms are highly visible on Google but is hardly visible on Yahoo. This has been the case for a few months. What can I do to boost my ranking on Yahoo? Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | csknight0 -
Rank went up, But?
ok, I have been optimizing a sit for a while and decided to drop the flash site build an HTML site instead for obvious reasons. But, as I was building the new site, BANG! a big jump in Google rank? How can this be, I thought out loud. Must be all my anchor text kicking in...So, I am left with this question...Or did google pick up on my new site as I was building it. I build it on a new DNS, then revert back to the main DNS... Drop the HTML site and continue my link getting with the main site? Or chalk it up under something else and roll with new site. I hope that was not to confusing
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | SEObleu.com0