Can too many subdomains be mistaken as a problem?

Overuse of Subdomains

[DeDobber]

I've put together a site which sells many products from multiple vendors. The URLs are (roughly) formatted www.domain.com/site/vendor-name/catalog-number/specsheet.html. I was thinking of shortening the URLS to www.domain.com/vendor-name/catalog-number.html, which seems like a no-brainer. Then I realized I could just as easily have catalog-number.vendor-name.domain.com do the same thing, and this setup would have additional advantages with relation to acquiring incoming links.

This worries me a bit, though, as I understand that many sites use similarly-formatted URLs for affiliate links, and Google (AFAIK) does what it can to avoid affiliate links. Has anyone had any unpleasant experiences with regards to the use of subdomains? Will the pages be spidered normally? Will the incoming links get the credit they deserve?

Thanks so much for your input.

[amoore]

Hi DeDobber -

Welcome to WebmasterWorld!

...and this setup would have additional advantages with relation to acquiring incoming links.

I'm not sure I understand this advantage. How would this help you get incoming links to your site?

[metablue]

I did the same thing, but with only one subdomain,
eg www.product1.mydomain.com, www.product2.mydomain.com

Each product site has a different look and feel, so it didn't make as much sense to have them as subdirectories.

It seems odd to ask people to link to subdirectories. I can imagine many of them getting confused and linking to the top level instead.

So far I haven't had any trouble with Google. One site went to PR6 on its first update with about 30 incoming links, the other is lagging because I didn't spend as much time on its links. But it's only been a couple of months and I only have the two sites in the directory so far.

[yetanotheruser]

DeDobber

AFIAK google's quite happy with subdomains.

At my old job we used to deal with sites with ~200+ subdomains, because each site was different and privately owned, but part of a branded franchise (who would own the top domain)..

I don't think it's ever been frowned apon, plus I don't think cross-linking subdomains will hurt you like cross-linking different domains might.

:)

[The Subtle Knife]

At my old job we used to deal with sites with ~200+ subdomains, because each site was different and privately owned, but part of a branded franchise (who would own the top domain)..

Where they all uniquely found in google? i.e. did the home
page have a page rank.

I've recently set up many hundreds of sub-domains, and I must say it's worrying the hell out of me.

[yetanotheruser]

TSK,

Yes.. they all do fine.. They are all different sites, for different clients, but in the same (or in some cases one of three) templates.

None of them are massive.. PR5 sites. But they do very well in their industry. (Hopefully not for long though, they're going to be direct competition next dance ;) )

This particular example is one of those - Google shouldn't penalize cos it's a perfectly legitimate use of subdomains things for me. (IMHO)

I should point out that there is no duplication of content or anything like that, and nothing is mathematically gained by subdomaining in this instance....

ATB :)

[egomaniac]

Google is fine with subdomains. I have 3, two of which I have a lot of content under (15-50 pages).

I would be wary of a subdomain plan where all of the subdomains were using a similar template, had only one page each, and there were dozens or hundreds of them.

Subdomains per se aren't the problem. Duplicate content and excessive cross-linking are problems.

BTW, subdomains are great for getting additional links, and keeping your branding. My subdomains are all top ranked PR5 pages.

[DeDobber]

Thanks for the great responses. I was ready to pull the trigger until egomaniac said that one should be wary if all the subdomains contained one page each, as this would be the case for my site... Add to that the 5-10 "related products" on each of these one-page subdomains, and the site essentially becomes a collection of thousands of cross-linked subdomains. Would putting this together be too risky, or is there a distinct difference in Google's eyes between a domain and a subdomain?

It is good to hear that some of you do just fine with many subdomains, and I had forgotten that subdomains are commonly used to create personal web pages for thousands of users on the same domain (meaning Google can't possibly penalize for the mere existence of an excessive number of subdomains). I'm still on the fence as to whether to implement this or not. Guess I can take a chance on it, and if I get nailed for it, I can always revert to the previous setup before the next month's crawl begins...

[BigDave]

Not all penalties go away when you fix the problem.

If the pages are all going to have a similar template and have all of them crosslinking, then it is not going to look like a bunch of personal sites.

If you can come up with a way that it might be viewed as spam, then you might want to rethink your plan. Is it worth the risk that you may have to throw away the domain at some point?

I don't think you would have a problem, but i would not take that chance if it was my site.

[vitaplease]

Do a Google search for: +the site:nasa.gov

If you start dominating the search results listings with similar information, thats when you should worry.

[muesli]

i have (theoretically) 4.8 million subdomains (user.mysite.com), of which 196,000 are in the index. before i installed them i posted here if that was OK for google (you'll find that via site search), most said it wasn't but googleguy had a look at my site (that was before i had read the charter;-) and said it was OK.

and it is, very successful setup. the subdomains are heavily interlinked (as they are blog-style) but also have (up to 6 per page) outgoing links. i think without the outgoing links the setup would be considered spam.

sticky me if you want to know my site's URL.

[vitaplease]

Just to add to Muesli's comments on that thread:
[webmasterworld.com...]

One could conclude, but thats just an opinion, that linking between subdomains is regarded as linking within one domain (internal linking).

[yetanotheruser]

linking between subdomains is regarded as linking within one domain (internal linking)

I'm with you vitaplease.

I was about to say that I don't think its in the users interests to make hundreds of one page subdomains, but muesli's right - there are plenty of valid uses.. Subdomained client/user microsites could easily reach high numbers..

Let us know how you get on DeDobber.. :)