9 replies to this topic

[Convergent7]

I have a customer who has www.example.com and shop.example.com. The www is hosted on GoDaddy and the shop is hosted by an ecommerce site. The problem is www and shop are competing with each other despite the same domain name.

Obviously we'd like to combine them but the ecommerce does not lend itself well to non-shopping pages and articles so we need to leave it where it is.

Does anyone have any advice or suggestions on how to combine them while maintaining separate hosts or perhaps, a way to let the search engines know they're the same and actually one big site?

Thanks!
Erik

[Jill]

They are the same site/domain. shop is just a subdomain of example.com. It's fine to have both assuming the content is not the same on each. If they each serve their own purpose, it shouldn't be a problem.

[Convergent7]

Okay, good to know. It seems inefficient that on many search terms both sites come up for the same term and we feel like we're losing value and could be ranked higher if they were under the same, complete site. But what I'm hearing is that is not relevant.

Thanks Jill.

[Randy]

I guess the best way to explain why it's not really a problem is to remind folks that the search engines rank Pages, not domains. So unless you'd not be making some fairly drastic changes in how all of these pages link to each other when trying to merge things together, there's probably not much to be gained. The pages rank where they do because they're both relevant for the search terms, regardless of whether they're on the www or shop subdomains. They'd probably still do that after merging things too.

Assuming you've got some links on those www pages that are showing up for product terms have a good user friendly link that will shoot rabid visitors looking to buy right into the correct page of your store (and that's the way I'd recommend constructing those info pages even if were all on the www address) you're effectively getting two bites at the proverbial apple when the two pages end up competing with each other in the same SERP.

[Jill]

Okay, good to know. It seems inefficient that on many search terms both sites come up for the same term

Most companies would pay good money to have that happen...

[torka]

Look at it this way. You're not competing against yourself, you're blocking your competitors from holding more positions on the same results page (and increasing the odds that visitors will land on one of your pages).

Then, assuming that you've done your job in relating your articles to your products and linking from non-ecommerce pages to appropriate ecommerce product sales pages, you have maximized your potential for making sales.

This can actually be an advantageous set up if you approach it with the right mindset.

--Torka

[BBCoach]

This can actually be an advantageous set up if you approach it with the right mindset.

Kacheeng!!!!

Most companies would pay good money to have that happen...

Kacheeng!!!!

[Convergent7]

Great...I appreciate everyone's input on this and feel better that the path were on is not one where we're hurting ourselves.

[Alan Perkins]

Convergent7, I think I understand your concerns. You have two different pages appearing in the search results for the same query. Let's say they are at #5 and #7, for the sake of argument. Your thinking is probably that if all the "ranking power" of those two pages was channelled into one page, that one page may rank higher than the current two, e.g. at #2. The resultant clicks and sales from one page ranking higher (at #2) would be better than from two pages ranking lower (at #5 and #7). Is that a fair summary of your concerns?

In addition, if both pages were on the same subdomain, both would still be listed in the above scenario. The page that is currently listed #7 would be listed indented under the page at #5, i.e. it would be promoted.

All-in-all. then, you are not getting the best results possible with the current setup. However, you are getting pretty good results, as previous posters have pointed out.

If you wanted to improve the ranking of one of the pages, it may be possible to do so by modifying the current links between them. However, such differences may be marginal. You'd be better off concentrating on optimising the content of both pages and improving quality and quantity of the links to the page you wanted to rank higher.

[Convergent7]

Excellent summary and very helpful for me. I will work on optimizing both pages placing emphasis on two different but similar long tail keywords...that way they'll rise but there will be some separation for additional traffic in related phrases.