Are you ever handicapping yourself in search by using a subfolder over a new domain/website?
-
Hello Moz Community!
We are building a separate hospital related to a single service line that is currently part of our main website. Traditionally all our hospitals are folded into one website with the same brand.
Problem: Our organization's leaders want to market the new hospital as "Brand Name X" nationally, and not use our locally strong brand name at all.
Therefore is the smarter long-term decision to begin building content on a new website with the new "Brand name X" even though it will take longer and be harder, than building it on our big, established website with a 60+ DA site?
What I fear is our current website's DA won't matter much if people nationally are using Brand X, which isn't part of our traditional brand name? And they won't be using the traditional brand name at all.
Example Scenario: We create a new hospital just focused on heart-related issues.
Do we move the bulk of information for this new hospital from http://www.nebraskamed.com/heart, to a new website that will better rank with the new brand X and for just heart-related keywords?
Or is it still better to try and stick with the same domain in a subfolder?
-
Hi Patrick, I hate to be the dissenting opinion here, but I think it would be best to use a subdomain or something connected to the main brand domain.
For example, I feel heart.nebraskamed.com (or even building up nebraskamed.com/heart, but giving it a distinct brand and look) would get off to a better start by leveraging the existing DA, while also being separate enough to have an associated brand. Branding is super tricky, but I know it's also a marathon to launch a new website from scratch and compete for new business. Is there a lot of cardiology competition? Are you trying to compete locally or regionally, or both? Plus, wouldn't you want to leverage the strength of the local brand, for something as serious as cardiology where the best-of-the-best expertise is sought?
Just a few thoughts. Of course if your organizational compass points to a completely separate domain, I would establish a linking strategy and go from there.
Best of luck!
Kristine
-
Thanks Ryan, Josh and Dmitrii,
You all brought up good points for me to consider. Thanks.
Patrick
-
Hey Patrick,
I lean toward Dmitrii's response as well. With a new domain you don't have to try to work in the new branding into your existing brand at all. Many times the attempt to make a new entity work within an existing one fails because of confusion. The clearer you can make something to a unfamiliar visitor, the better and can very likely turn into some indirect SEO benefits.
Additionally, I'm sure there is a way you can utilize the power of your existing authoritative website and build up a secondary domain. For example: if the secondary product is all about heart-related issues, could you link to this entity from a hear-related page on the primary website? A link from a health-related website on a heart-related page to a heart-related website seems pretty relevant to a visitor and can pass some great juice.
I'm also on the same page with Josh regarding cost. If the budget really doesn't support the above efforts, then the route of a sub folder being the primary landing of this product is a great option. If budget isn't the primary concern, I'd think the second entity is much better for the long-term health.
Best of luck, Ryan
-
Thanks for the quick and useful feedback Dmitrii. We're leaning toward what you're saying, but just want to make sure others feel the same way.
-
Hi there.
Yes, I'd recommend to create new domain with new website, new brand name and content. Since you guys want to market it on it's own, it's going to be separate entity, so separate website/domain is needed. Yes, it's going to be more work in the beginning, but much less work than moving and rebranding (or "disonnecting" brands) in future. Additionally, there won't be any user-related confusion, which can happen if you put new brand on existing brand's website.
Cheers.
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
-
Sometimes I write a post for another site and then post the first 1/3rd on my site to help promote it. Is this a bad idea?
Sometimes I write a post for another site and then post the first 1/3rd on my site to help promote it. Is this a bad idea? When I do that should I be adding a canonical link to the original post? Should I have /make sure the 3rd party site does something? Is there anything else I should do? Thanks in advance.
Branding | | mcarroll0 -
A website for China - SEO & Marketing
I want to launch a website in China and have read that the best way forward for Baidu SEO is to host the site in China itself - does anyone have experience with doing that? It seems there are a few hoops to jump through, but I imagine I'm not the first to try?
Branding | | jo910 -
Should I fix a high quality link when the website linking was complaining? What would you do?
While reviewing 404 errors in Webmaster Tools, I noticed that a client had a link from a high authority, well respected forum, to a page which no longer exists. When I checked out the linking post, it was from 2004 and showed a campaign against the company for it's advertising tactics. I'll spare the details but the company has since changed their ways. It's tempting to implement a 301 to get the link juice from this DA 80 post, but since the reason for the link is a negative one and the co-citations are not going to be positive, is it better to just let this link go? Or what about something more up-front, such as setting up a page which states the company's mission statement and commitment to quality and standards and 301 redirecting to there? Even if we let this link be broken, a potential customer could be put off, so it might be a good idea to address this past issue on site? Let me know your opinions on whether there is a way to benefit from this link or whether we are better off allowing the 404.
Branding | | McCannSEO0 -
Long term risks of using .org for commercial websites
Hi everybody, I'm having a 'heated' discussion with a collegae about .org domains. Originally .org domains were created for non-profit organizations and it was fairly difficult to get a .org domain ( like .gov and .edu still are). Nowadays it's easy to register a .org domain and i see plenty of commercial .org emd's ranking well. We are planning on launching a new white label in the Netherlands (.nl) and have several domains in our portfolio that we can us for this. I recommend using an exact match .org domain (.nl and .com are already taken) for the new white label www.exactkeyword.org. **My collegae says don't use www.exactkeyword.org, because we aren't a non-profit organizaton and we can't garantuee we won't lose our rankings over the next 3 to 4 years. He would recommend going with the available www.exact-keyword.info. ** Who right and who's wrong and why? Can i garantuee no risk with .org for a commercial organization?
Branding | | PrizeWize0 -
Is it a good idea to participate in review / giveaway bloggers
Hi, I sell Gift Baskets for children and the best customers are Moms. Is it a good idea to participate in review / giveaway mom bloggers? The way it works I give the blogger a product to review. They write their true experience with the Gift Basket and they link to my site Then we do a few product giveaway to moms / (bloggers subscriber) once a month. Then moms will review the winning products. To participate in drawing moms will visit my site, follow my tweeter. Like or dislike me on Facebook……. For each action they do they will get one extra chance on drawing. In here I will get few links to different page of the site. Are these links are good links? I am not paying cash to buy the link. But I give them product to review and they get to keep it. Simply Sassy Media at http://simplysassymedia.com/ is a good example. they manage and connect me to a lot of the blogger sites.
Branding | | giftbasket4kids0 -
Acquired Premium Domain, question about Brand name change related to SEO
We recently acquired a premium domain name The domain we were operating on before had a lot of SEO done on it, as well as branding campaigns. Now that we have the premium domain, would it be wise to start doing SEO on the premium domain and discontinue old domain promotions if we plan on changing the brand name? to clear up any confusion, we own for example AAAFurnitureStore.com we acquired the premium domain: AAAFurniture.com should we redirect AAAFurnitureStore.com -> AAAFurniture.com or since we already have established presence/brand do opposite and redirect AAAFurniture.com -> AAAFurnitureStore.com and keep the brand name same as "AAA Furniture Store"?
Branding | | lafurniturestore0 -
What tools do you use to submit a site to local yellowpages?
Hey all, two part question for you. Do you use any tools to automatically submit websites to local yellowpages (example: http://business.intuit.com/directory/marketing/100_syndication_sites.jsp)? and if so, what one and why? Are there any dangers to doing it this way? It seems that this might save a lot of time and be incredibly helpful to manage your brand profile pages in a centralized location. Also some tools that I am seeing incorporate brand monitoring (which you can do through a variety of tools I know). Anyways, thoughts? comments? tips?
Branding | | prima-2535090 -
.us domain extension for US locales
I have a large US travel site and am looking to make targeted pages for specific locations, attractions etc around the United States. With many of the TLD's already purchased for these niches, I thought about using the .us extension as it seemed relevant to the topics. Does this hurt seo possibilities or does the .us extension come across as spammy?
Branding | | Millibit2