Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Root-Domain vs Subdomain Linkbuilding
-
Hello Mozzers!
Couple of days ago I received a request to start optimizing a wordpress website, the domain itself has been around for around 10-12 years so it's it can be considered as one that has real history behind it. The page has been moved from HTML/FLASH to wordpress about 3 - 4 years ago and hasn't been any SEO maintenance on it. The site used to rank for first position with several keywords, but now understandably, it has greatly decreased.
My main question would be, that when I've checked the root domain's and the subdomain's metrics with MOZ Open Site Explorer, the sub domain (with "www.") showed a PA 40 and 90 external links while the root domain (without "www.") only has 27 PA and 6 External links.
I know that the 301 or server redirects only transfers about 90% of the link juice to the targeted URL but the difference between the 2 results seem way too big for me.
What do you think? Is this normal?
During future link building is it more beneficial to target the root domain so the page won't lose that "10%" by redirecting the new link from sub-domain to root domain?
Is it possible to get more juice transferred?Thank you very much,
Adam -
Hey
I'm a bit confused - not the first time! Would very much appreciate if you good folks could shed some light on a couple of questions.
Our site in the search console is inputed as www.domain.co.uk
Is this our subdomain?
When I'm using Open Site Explorer and filter by Target, say "this root domain" is it now showing me inbound links to domain.co.uk instead?
Lastly how does this affect rankings i.e getting links to www.domain.co.uk or domain.co.uk as whoever types in either domain gets to the correct site.
-
Thank you CKG for your answer, it's much appreciated.
I have already started to move to www. , I changed in WordPress settings, from non-www to www version, also selected the preferred version www. in webmaster tools and contacted the server administrators about the change. My only last problem is the battle with the htaccess to redirect the rootdomain to the www. subdomain but I should get it sorted out pretty soon
Cheers,
Adam -
Hey
I think you should go through both for analysis purposes however in order to moving forward you should be focusing on one URL which contains www.
here are the link for you to help yourself to understand the difference between these.
http://moz.rainyclouds.online/community/q/root-domain-and-subdomain-links-opensite-explorer
https://moz.rainyclouds.online/help/guides/links/link-analysis
-
I have just come across the same issue for a site I am optimising. For me, when www is used the page authority in OSE is 42 compared to 33 when there is no www.
It would be really good to hear what people's views are on this.
Billy
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Why are there less backlink domains in Moz vs. Semrush?
For our domain studyville.com, Semrush is reporting 46 linking domains, and Moz is reporting 7. Does anyone know where there is such a large discrepancy?
Link Building | | shelbythomas0 -
I just uncovered a massive 500+ domain PBN linking to competitors
As the title, some competitors I've been watching are using a PBN they (or their agency) have built. I'm looking to get some discussion on how you approach situations like this - do you just report all of the domains to Google and pray they do something? There are 4 sites I'm looking at, all competing in the same niche with very similar websites (different branding and content, but essentially the same pages). I thought all were related, but after Excel-ing all the domains to see which overlap I've found that there's several sets; PBN 1 covers 117 domains that link to competitors A, B & C. Signaling to me that these are owned by the same person. PBN 2 links together B & C with 30 domains, PBN 3 is just C with 40 domains. PBN 4 is just B with 105 domains. PBN 5 is just A with 10 domains. PBN 6 is D by itself with more than 340 domains. Signaling to me that this one probably isn't owned by the same person. It looks like new domains are added to these PBNs every week and this has been going on for quite some time. Now, I'm fully against use of PBNs that don't use authentic websites that provide value, and I can't find any of these sites that aren't just a basic WP template with a single-word text logo followed by spun content. This is a goldmine, because according to Ahrefs these sites are pulling in well over 500,000 monthly visitors between them, and these links make up the majority of each site's link profile. If these networks were to crumble, that would open up a big opportunity for more authentic sites to rank well. How would you recommend to tackle this? Do I find example URLs and write reports for each of the 500+ domains or are there better ways of working through this?
Link Building | | Leads.Bz0 -
Backlinks from ads on parked domains? Is this possible?
Hello Moz Friends, So as I was researching some competitive backlinks and I noticed a lot of backlinks that a clients competitor has are on parked domains and they appear to be google ads from some point. You know the pages that this page no longer exists, or hey do you want to buy this domain? and it has like 6 google ads on it? Yep those pages. My clients industry is construction and their competitor has links from zombie websites, foreign, websites and more. But the links are no longer on the page. Like when it was crawled, their ad was showing. Does this make any sense and is it usually temporary? Thank you for your thoughts friends!
Link Building | | asbchris0 -
Backlinks from subdomain, can it hurt ranking?
I just started doing an SEO audit and noticed I have 40,000 some odd back links from an OLD version of our site that has been moved to a subdomain. The back links are for articles that already exist on our main site. I don't think Google is picking it up as duplicate content because that site isn't being crawled anymore. Could this hurt us SEO wise? I plan on removing the site, but how long after it's been removed should those back links disappear?
Link Building | | MMAffiliate0 -
Blog articles on website vs submitting to article submission sites
I had some articles created for a client. The site is on WordPress. I'm wondering if it is best to add the articles to the blog page of the website or if it is better to submit the articles to ezine articles. Or can I submit the same article to both places? Is there a strategy that should be followed generally speaking when creating content for the blog vs article submission sites? The goal is to increase the ranking for target keywords. I realize that the answers could take a lot of different directions. But generally speaking I would like to know, If I have an article where is the best place to add it to achieve better rankings for target keywords? Thanks for the help.
Link Building | | rwaynick111 -
What is a good ratio of total links to linking root domains?
Is 100 total links for every linking domain too high? I suppose I could also look at ratios of sites that are doing well in the rankings.
Link Building | | ProjectLabs0 -
Unique Domains vs. Total Links?
At what point is there diminishing returns from getting multiple links from one website? Edit: To clarify, when doing competitor research I come across lots of sites that have say 500 linking domains with 5000 total links. When setting goals and calculating the types of links I should go after, I'm not certain which number is the one actually helping the site to rank.
Link Building | | ErikDster0 -
Shortened url vs. anchor text
Are there any benefits to linking a shortened url vs. an anchor text when I am link building?Would linking via shortened link such as tinyurl cause problems with SERPS? Also, would it be more beneficial to short link to the homepage or landing page?
Link Building | | Modbargains0