A single 1000 page site or five 200 page sites?

[Pjman]

I'm about to start working on some new sites for myself.

I have 5 main interests in my life. I would like to share my knowledge with the world. In the long term, Google referral wise, do you think it is better for me to focus on:

A) 1 site at a time

(build 1,000 pages; move to one article a week, next topic)


B) all 5 sites at once

(Build 200 pages to start; move to one article a week)


Pre-Panda I would have said Letter A is the obvious choice. Post Panda, I'm not sure that's the case. Has Panda caused us to diversify much more?

What would you guys opt for?

[netmeg]

Whatever makes the most sense for you and for your potential users. Are the five topics related enough so that it makes sense for them to exist on the same site? Will people interested in one topic be likely to be interested in some of the others? If so, then just put it on the one site. If not, then separate them out.

(If it were I, and I was worrying about how Google would handle it, I would also look at what's already out there as far as competing sites; the sites with the least healthy competition would probably the the first ones I'd break out on their own)

[walkman]

Make 5, if 2 go down you still have three.

[wheel]

Mmmmmm I love me some mini-sites. Absolutely go niche, 5 domains on 5 closely related topics IMO is better than one site with 5 closely related topics (unless you're going after big terms).

[HuskyPup]

After all Pandas definitely 5, if you'd asked me only 3 months ago I would have said one large site even though I do have quite a few sites about my widgets.

In fact I'm constructing a new 250 page niche site at this very moment.

[tristanperry]

'Don't put too many eggs in one basket' comes to mind.

I'd go for the second option. It gives more diversity and flexibility IMO.

[driller41]

What would people do on a 1000 page site, most pages would never get a viewing I bet.

Go 5 sites.

[bhartzer]

Pjman, you have to see what it will take to compete. Look at the competitors in your industry, the ones that are currently ranking well, and analyze their sites.

Look at some of the main keywords you'll be going after. Make a list of all of the competitors ranking in the top 20 for those keywords. See how many pages they have on their sites and the approach they're taking. I bet once you do some analysis you'll be able to figure out whether you need one large site or 5 smaller sites.

Making decisions like this based on a whim is not what I recommend. You need solid evidence to base your decisions on. And competitive analysis is where I would start.

[Jane_Doe]

Do both. Sometimes bigger sites do better and sometimes smaller sites do better. With the Google algo history tends to repeat itself.

[Simsi]

If you don't intend relying on it for income, I'd suggest just do one site. If you are looking to generate income then I'd suggest doing five sites - more work but ultimately spreads the risk, even if the goals may take longer to acheive.

[asabbia]

Mmmmmm I love me some mini-sites. Absolutely go niche, 5 domains on 5 closely related topics IMO is better than one site with 5 closely related topics (unless you're going after big terms).

how can you suggest this (and everyone else suggesting this) when ehow (just to say a name) treats all-known-world-topic within one domain and ranks top 10 ?

[TheMadScientist]

ehow does, Demand Media doesn't ... ehow is only one of many sites in their portfolio.

[bwnbwn]

I like mini sites takes fewer links to get the content spidered, makes it easier to grow, and spreads out the revenue. Downside as others have suggested more work, time energy, and upkeep.

I would just do one for now get it going and see what you would like to do. See what time this one site takes up and then X 5 and get the time you will be expending.

[wheel]

how can you suggest this (and everyone else suggesting this) when ehow (just to say a name) treats all-known-world-topic within one domain and ranks top 10 ?

Ehow can kiss my grits. They don't outrank MY mini-sites. They don't even have pages that my minisites target.

That's how I can suggest it.

[zehrila]

1 site with 1000 pages. 1k pages are not too many to begin with, build it up, and once your domain matures and claims authority, you will rank for all pages. In 5 domain cases, you will have to manage 5 sites, possibly 5 different hosting, dedicated links to each domain and probably. With 1 site, you will have 1 hosting, focal point will be one site, mental burden will be less, actual burden and responsibility will be less. In 1K page site, users will be to browse other related content, which means more page views.

[plondon]

Even if it was my plan to build one large site, I'd still probably start with a bunch of small sites.

A common SEO strategy is to build satellite sites to assist the ranking of the main site, and to 'widen the net'. I just do this the other way around - build a bunch of satellites first.

This gives you two options. One is you can use the research of the small sites to decide where you can compete best, plus you have a bunch of seasoned sites to act as links. The second is you take the best performing site and build that out into a large one, using the remainder to link back.

Since Panda I have found that one or two of my sites have plummetted, but others have remained more or less untouched. Yet they were all built the same, and all have unique and original content. Why would one or two be affected and not the others? For this reason alone, multiple sites must be the best policy.

When your environment is unpredictable - diversify.

[Pjman]

I want to thank all of you for your input. Everyone made great points. I think I'm going to take everyone's advice a little here and I have come up with this decision:

@plondon

You hit the nail on the head.

1) I'm going to start with Five 200 Page sites that I'm interested in.

2) All areas will have a decent number of advertiser dollars and decent amount of people looking for the info.

3) I'm going to just let them passively grow by 1-2 new pages a week.

4) Which ever niches produces the most bang for your buck after say 1 year, I'll go full throttle on those and ramp them up to 1,000 page sites.