One big site or many sister sites?

Website growing big - time to fragement?

[tomthumb2000]

I have a travel info site that's getting pretty large now and we're about to expand into areas such as world cuisine, world film, world news.

So is it worth setting up new domains for each of these so they can draw their own links and then interlink with the main site? Or is it better to keep all my eggs in one basket with the single large information site?

Intuitively it would seem better to me to have many sites, as the anchor text in links would me more specific to the topic, as well as the overall optimisation.

But in the days of the sandbox and all the coding issues, would this be overextension?

[metrofeed]

I think that a lot of people here will tell you to segment and create sister sites, but I have found more success in staying with one mega site.

The reasons are that with the mega site, I can continually add new content which immediately has great Google/Yahoo/MSN listings, and immediately has an audience.

I have also found that Google especially loves larger sites and rewards them accordingly. I also find it a lot easier to manage and scale one site, especially when it comes to ecommerce.

I feel your overal position in the marketplace will be more powerful with one site, assuming all the topics are basically related. If you are looking for long-term value, one large site is in my opinion, the way to go.

[pageoneresults]

So is it worth setting up new domains for each of these so they can draw their own links and then interlink with the main site? Or is it better to keep all my eggs in one basket with the single large information site?

There was a time years ago where I might have recommended you build sibling sites to help fuel the parent site. I wouldn't recommend that anymore, it is not needed.

Once you have a mega site established, you have all the building blocks you need to expand that site. The architecture of the site is going to be the key element in how it performs.

I would take each one of those new sections and give them their own sub-directories. Each sub-directory will have an index page that serves as a table of contents for what is within that section. And then within that sub-directory will be other sub-directories that are all related to the primary topic that you created the sub-directory for. Follow me?

[SEOdevhead]

I have to disagree with the above two posts. While it maybe more beneficial "search engine" wise to put all your eggs in one basket, for marketing and branding purposes, I have found it much better to start sister sites. It really helps your branding strategies develop much more widely and will strengthen your branding as well. Be careful about the interlinking though... 4-5 sites will be fine, but after that the SE's might think you are link farming, etc.

I created a sister site for a section of my larger site that most definitely could have remained on the big domain. However, after some serious SEO and marketing, there are many big keywords that I am now #1, #2 (for the sister site) and #3 and #4 (for the big domain).

[edited by: caveman at 5:19 pm (utc) on April 17, 2006]