Offer of Channel Partner to host a microsite - should I be doing this.
-
Hi All.
I work for a regional IT services business and we supply various IT solutions. One of our channel distributors is running a campaign with a large global vendor (you will know them) where they have built a solution microsite at https://vendorname-solution.com for themselves and then created a copy of this site for ten end partners, including my business.
They have done this by what looks like copying the entire site and creating a copy of the site at a subdomain for each of the ten partners at http://partner1/2/3 etc.vendorname-solution.com.
So if we go ahead and agree to this approach I am potentially worried about the following and whether I should built out our own version instead.
1 - there is no https being offered so we will get penalised by Google ?
2 - we can't add any tracking to the subsite as it isn't under our control
3 - will Google see all these subdomain copies as duplicate content and penalise me (and the others)
4 - I am worried that anyone removing the subdomain from the URL will then land on the distributors microsite and not ours and the only way of trying to prevent this is to embed in an iframe but that doesn't sound a good idea to me.I don't get the feeling that the channel partner knows much about SEO so could do with some help trying to assess whether I should be concerned and politely politely turn down their offer to run this microsite for us ?
Thanks in advance for your comments
-
Hi Nigel
Thanks for your advice and confirming my concerns.
Regards
Gavin
-
Hi Gavsta
What they are offering is essentially a copy of your website on a micro-site within their own framework.
If you are happy with them doing this because you feel it will help generate more business for you then, by all means, go ahead. They must, however, Noindex the entire micro-site so that it does not appear in Google. If they allow it to rank then it will completely destroy all of your SEO efforts and your rankings will plummet. Google does not handle duplicate content well - it would simply not know which version to rank so would end up raking neither.
I suffered a huge penguin penalty in 2012 for trying to rank micro-sites which pre 2012 worked very well - don't fall into that trap. If they say no then you can't allow them to set it up at all.
Regards
Nigel
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
-
Is there a reason why a host would be reluctant to give up Cpanel access info?
Granted, a strange question here... My client lost her cpanel login credentials, or never bothered to get them (she didn't even know she had a hosting account). Apparently she has a friend who is hosting her website for her, free of charge. I need to get into the cpanel, but they are being extremely difficult. The client asked them and they didn't want to give it to her either. Still trying, but is there any reason why they would be so difficult? How does it benefit them? It can't be because they're afraid of losing her account because she isn't paying them anything. Totally confused by this. Any ideas?
Technical SEO | | Masbro1 -
Should I change hosting / registration when buying an established website?
I am buying an established website that is currently ranking very well for several keywords. I have no intentions of changing anything on the site. My question is, will it matter if I change where the site is hosted, and the whois information (I want to change it from public to private)? i.e., I don't want to do anything to mess up the current rankings of the site - will these changes have any effect? Thanks for the help.
Technical SEO | | red6marketing0 -
Redirecting domain to the main domain (hosting cost?)
Hello Everyone, I have the following situation. There is main domain and a secondary domain that is related to the page on the main domain. I want to integrate the content of the secondary domain into the page on the main domain and redirect the secondary domain via 301 to that specific page. As i understand I can do it via .htaccess using rewrite mechanism. http://www.seomoz.org/learn-seo/redirection But the question is does it mean I have to keep paying for the hosting for the secondary domain? Because htaccess has to be located on the web server so I would need a hosting plan for it? Is that true? Is there any way around it? P.S. to avoid any confusion - I am talking about hosting plan - not domain registration fees
Technical SEO | | SirMax0 -
What's best hosting option for web design company targeting UK market?
Hi, What would be the best hosting company to go with if I want to promote my site in the UK? Right now it's hostgator and I know I'll have to change it. Should I get something located in the UK (logic would suggest it) and rather dedicated server (very expensive, especially if you're using wordpress) or shared hosting will do? Thanks in advance, JJ
Technical SEO | | jjtech0 -
Hosting sitemap on another server
I was looking into XML sitemap generators and one that seems to be recommended quite a bit on the forums is the xml-sitemaps.com They have a few versions though. I'll need more than 500 pages indexed, so it is just a case of whether I go for their paid for version and install on our server or go for their pro-sitemaps.com offering. For the pro-sitemaps.com they say: "We host your sitemap files on our server and ping search engines automatically" My question is will this be less effective than my installing it on our server from an SEO perspective because it is no longer on our root domain?
Technical SEO | | design_man0 -
Can changing a host provider impact search rankings?
I was wondering if changing my host provider would impact my search rankings on the major search engines?
Technical SEO | | bronxpad0 -
Is SEO affected when hosting service is changed?
I put my plan to change web hosts on abeyance when an SEO friend of mine told me that it would negatively impact the sites SEO. I am not changing the url or anathing, just the host.
Technical SEO | | ambisuite0 -
To host within my city or not?
I'm opening up a web development company in Vancouver and I'm stuck between getting hosting in Montreal or Vancouver. Montreal is a cheaper but, my company is in Vancouver. I have a .ca which will be my domain name, so I'm already on top of that aspect. From what I understand it would help for SEO purposes if my IP is a local Vancouver IP for my company website. So my question is... Should I go for the Vancouver hosting and pay more or stick with the Montreal hosting.
Technical SEO | | VebianWebandMobileDevelopment1