Over the years I have received similar questions from clients about having multiple websites and domains. Do you really need more than one? The are many reasons to do so and not to do so. Let’s find out the pros and cons!
Most large-sized organizations and businesses have multiple websites for a number of reasons:
- Demographic locations
- Offering different services
- A dedicated website for selling physical products
However, we have also seen smaller businesses having multiple websites to feature the same products and services. It is a misconception that having more websites mean they will have a better chance of succeeding by having a higher exposure.
So, when should you have multiple websites?
1. The is a special need for it.
When we are offering a new product or a new service that doesn’t match the original brand and message, it makes sense to create a new website for that particular venture. For example, if you are a real estate company that begins to over a limousine service that has little or no connections to your existing service, it makes sense to create a standalone website for it.
As an entrepreneur like myself who wears multiple hats, my main business focus is providing web design service, but I am also a hobbyist photographer, I would not feature my photography portfolio in my web design company’s website.
2. You operate in different regions.
We can register multiple top-level domains while having the same business name if you are running your business in multiple regions. The country abbreviation .uk (United Kingdom) or .ca (Canada) is the country code top-level domain.
For example, for apple.com, its .com domain is mainly for customers in the United States. It also has a huge number of country-code top-level domains for each country, such as apple.co.uk exclusively for UK customers.
3. Subdomains for technical reasons
It is often seen that company domain come with subdomains such as shop.example.co.uk. In most cases, they are not standalone websites. In fact, the subdomain is just a shortcut to a direct folder on the website’s server. For example, most blog sections of a website will have a subdomain such as blog.example.co.uk which links to the directory folder example.co.uk/blog with the intention to appear more professional.
One thing to bear in mind, if you are using a subdomain, Google Search Console will regard the subdomain as a separate site to your primary domain. Therefore, the value you built on your primary domain will not share with your subdomain.
4. Attempt to appear in more search results
This technique remains a myth. We cannot personally confirm that this is true but it is popular amongst large companies. By having a multiple domain strategy, companies are attempting to increase their search exposure. For example, cheaptickets.com has multiple websites with similar designs and user experiences that operate under the same company. While it is possible to have multiple websites to increase your visibility, the sensible question would be, do you have the time and resources to have multiple websites? Maintaining one website itself is already a difficult task, imagine having more than a couple. Instead of having multiple websites, we recommend having one website and focusing on it by allocating resources to improve its content.
At the end of the day, it’s often quality over quantity.
5. Exact match domain
You can be selling cupcakes but not having the word cupcakes in your domain name. Should you register another domain name with the cupcakes in it and redirect to your existing website?
Having a keyword in the domain name used to be an important ranking factor back in the day. However, as Google’s algorithm improves over the year, it tends to focus more on the content quality of your site instead of your domain name. In fact, most of our client’s websites that rank well do not have the keyword of their services or products at all.
Our website NR1WebDesign.co.uk has the keyword “web design” in it, but it does not necessarily improve our search results. Because people could be searching for “web designers” or “WordPress designers.” However, the reason why we rank well is due to the quality of our content.
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