We have mainsite[dot]com which has been online for almost 30 years, has a good history with Google, ranks decently, etc. However, this site is directed towards a niche market (the motorcycle apparel industry) but we have products that we want to promote separately as they aren't motorcycle related. We are wanting to branch out because our niche market is continually going downhill.
We are toying with the idea of creating an additional two separate sites (one for leather crafts & hardware, one for those said products that we want to stand apart from the motorcycle industry). We want to do this because people do not come to our main site looking for these products, the markets are totally different. My goal is to do this in a way that benefits us SEO-wise, without hurting us.
should we have our brand name on these other two sites as well or create a new brand name?
I'm worried about duplicate content because we will have some of the same products on all 3 sites. How different does the content have to be? Do the product names need to be different? Images will also be the same.
how important are keywords in the URL now? Should we have the same brand name in the URL?
are there any suggestions or best practices to follow?
will Google potentially see this as blackhat although it's not intended to be?
