pdivi - 8:56 pm on Jan 18, 2010 (gmt 0)

Many of my competitors have started publishing articles with the intent of attracting links, which in-turn (presumably) improves their store's search engine rankings. I have seen them use 3 different structures.
1. articles right on main domain, under a directory like "widgetshop.com/news/"
2. articles under a subdomain, like news.widgetshop.com
3. articles under a totally separate domain, like widgetblog.com, with ample links back to widgetshop.com

#3 seems a little odd to me. Perhaps the idea is that a "pure" content site will achieve a high PR, which will then get passed to the store via links.

I am interested in testing article content as a means of improving my position in the search engines, and I was wondering which structure has the best chance of success. Thoughts?