Targeted Microsites
February 11, 2011
Subdomains and Nested Pages Versus a Targeted Micro Site for Local and Regional Optimization
There are two schools of thought when addressing Local and Regional searches. Subdomains and nested pages are the strategy of choice, to 99.99% of the SEO strategist, since once the page is crawled by spiders these pages get a significant boost based on the page rank of the web site they are in. In order to not reduce the page rank of the website the linking architecture of such website is used extremely sparingly if completely non existent. The result is the page loses position on SERP’s as the age of the page increases. However since these subdomains and nested pages are part of the host sites link architecture the parent websites page rank increases, as the nested pages and subdomains decreases, over time. However the oposite occurs for a targeted micro site because its page rank goes in the opposite direction.
Targeted micro sites (TMS) are websites optimized for two to three keyword phrases plus a city, state, or geographical descriptor; ie used cars San Antonio would be an example. In the beginning of a TMS life they start off just like a new born they need constant care for them to progress and grow. Google, Yahoo, and Bing assigns the most association of the websites page rank with its default or index page; a subdomain or nested pages do not benefit from this same association. Then in the long run the TMS page rank increases, by onsite and off site optimization such as interlinking, and as a result the website benefits with top placement in search engines for their keyword phrases of interest. However the question remains, can nested pages and or subdomains have a detrimental effect on the parent website?
Crawl Budget is an area of concern for all websites and nested pages and or subdomains can and will have detrimental effects on a websites crawl budget. Crawl Budget is the length of time that search engines assign to their spiders when they crawl, or scan, a website; the amount of time allocated is not known and additionally the interval between scans is also unknown. XML sitemaps are a tool that web designers use to prioritize a websites pages to help search engines set the order in which a website is crawled. Now you can see the implications subdomains and nested pages, since they increase the number of pages spiders have to crawl, have on your crawl budget. Eventually these pages end up in the ugly step child category and fall from SERP’s as a result since they rarely get crawled.
TMS, on the other hand, follow a different path. Through onsite and offsite optimization their page rank grows over time which also increases their crawl budget. They also have a domain origination date and a website deployment date. This is very importants since longevity is king to search engines; a website deployment date is the most important factor in a domains life. While subdomains and nested pages give you some instant gratification, when they are crawled by search engines, but in the long run Target Micro Sites will rule the day in Local and Regional SEO. Additionally TMS are more profitable in other areas of SEO and I will leave you, for now, to do research and determine what these may be.
