SEO and addon domains on same server?

[wildchick]

Hello, I am planning on creating 2 new ecommerce websites. Instead of making 2 new plans with my hosting service provider. I am planning on using my existing host and doing the add on domain method, so while I may not get a seperate CPanel account for siteB and siteC, i will be saving money.

now I did small amount of research and found that the problem with add on domains makes it so the the URL of the original domain (siteA.com) on the account is a subdomain of your new domains. Thus it has 2 url paths: www.siteA.com/siteB.com/etc.php. and www.siteB.com/etc.php will work.

Instead of going to www.siteB.com directly.

Now i find a short soltuion to this by changing the htaccess file and doing a 301 redirect to prevent the spiders fromm indexing both siteA.com/siteB.com and siteB.com. This will prevent Punishment of non-unique content.

So my questions are, is there anything else I should be careful doing the add on domain to save money, in terms of SEO? or should I just avoid the idea all together. Each store is unique and different. And i do not want their SEO ranking to be effected b/c they are parked on the same cpanel account. does google see each site to be the same whether they are on same cpanel or different cpanels? I think the only thing that makes buying a seperate cpanel account from the same host would be the different ip, correct?

On a note: I will be leaving a banner advertimsent on site A for site B and C. I may also leave site A on its own cpanel and pay for a new cpanel for SIte B and C to be together on. Site A has all the traffic and do not want to risk it losing traffic for sharing 2 other sites.

i appreciate your replies and wait anxiously!

[RodG]

Hello, I am planning on creating 2 new ecommerce websites. Instead of making 2 new plans with my hosting service provider. I am planning on using my existing host and doing the add on domain method, so while I may not get a seperate CPanel account for siteB and siteC, i will be saving money.

Nothing wrong with this. In fact if you had asked for suggestions this is exactly what I would have suggested. Not only does it save money, but it can actually simplify maintenance for you.

now I did small amount of research and found that the problem with add on domains

Stop right there. There are no downsides to what cPanel calls 'add-on' domains.
A domain is a domain is a domain. Cpanel calls them 'add-on' domains because you are adding on a new domain under an existing cPanel management account. Nothing more, nothing less.

the problem with add on domains makes it so the the URL of the original domain (siteA.com) on the account is a subdomain of your new domains. Thus it has 2 url paths: www.siteA.com/siteB.com/etc.php. and www.siteB.com/etc.php will work.

Actually, the URL's will be more like
www.siteA.com/etc.php &
www.siteB.com/etc.php

The *file paths* will indeed appear as though one is subsection of the other, but don't confuse this with subdomains. These are a different kettle of fish.

Subdomains have URL's that look like:
www.siteA.com/
ww1.siteA.com/
shop.siteA.com/
secure.SiteA.com/
etc, etc.......

Instead of going to www.siteB.com directly.

If your main site is www.SiteA.com and you add another domain called www.SiteB.com you should be able to go directly to www.siteB.com without issue.

DON'T CONFUSE FILE PATHS WITH URL'S. THEY ARE DIFFERENT.

Now i find a short soltuion to this by changing the htaccess file and doing a 301 redirect

Do yourself a favour, Get rid of this .htaccess file and any redirects. These cause far more problems than they solve, mostly because people have been grossly misusing them for many years, doing the exact thing you are doing.

One of the original purposes of redirects was to allow sysadmins a relatively easy means to migrate websites from one server to another without interrupting the service, requests to the old site get redirected to the new site. Simple, effective...

What we see these days is people fail to set up their servers properly and find they need to go to www.siteA.com/siteB.com/etc.php rather than direct to www.SiteB.com, and instead of finding and fixing the actual problem, they'll add a redirect from this wrong URL to the correct one. In other words, the site has been effectively moved before it was even setup in the first place.. Then they find something else isn't tight, so another redirect... thing just fall into a big pileof smelly stuff.

Please don't abuse the .htaccess files.

to prevent the spiders fromm indexing both siteA.com/siteB.com and siteB.com. This will prevent Punishment of non-unique content.

I sure wish people would be more concerned about site functionality rather than concerning themselves over what Google, Bing, or any one of the other 1000 search engines may or may not do.
A decade or so ago things were different and 'SEO optimisation' (I use the term very loosely) was somewhat of a fine art. The search software has moved along in leaps and bounds. Concentrate on your site content and let the search engines do what they do best. 'Punishment of non-unique content' is, and always has been a myth.

So my questions are, is there anything else I should be careful doing the add on domain to save money, in terms of SEO?

First thing to do is get rid of the redirects. Do you really think that Google and friends will give a high ranking to any site where the first thing it comes across is a redirect to another site (or a different part of the same site?) Of course not. In cases like this the preferential rankings will go to the the site being directed to. The original site/URL (the with the redirection) would be lucky to get listed at all.

i do not want their SEO ranking to be effected b/c they are parked on the same cpanel account.

a cPanel is simply a website that any given person or persons can use to remotely control their hosting server via a Web interface. If allowed Google and co will happily index these just like any other website.

does google see each site to be the same whether they are on same cpanel or different cpanels?

As a general rule Google cannot/will not be able to associate any given cPanel with any given domain. They are separate entities.

I think the only thing that makes buying a seperate cpanel account from the same host would be the different ip, correct?

Wrong. Chances are you'll get the same shared IP address for both cPanels (which depending on your host could also be on the same shared IP as 1000 other cPanels and domains).

On a note: I will be leaving a banner advertimsent on site A for site B and C.

I'm not sure what you mean by this.

I may also leave site A on its own cpanel and pay for a new cpanel for SIte B and C to be together on. Site A has all the traffic and do not want to risk it losing traffic for sharing 2 other sites.

i appreciate your replies and wait anxiously!

You gain nothing by paying for another cPanel. You'll not loose any traffic by sharing with a couple of other sites. As stated, chances are you are already sharing with a 1000 others... one or two more isn't going to make a difference. Do get rid of those redirects though, seriously, they cause more headaches and problems than almost anything else on the 'net.
They *DO* have their place, but unless you are an experienced network administrator they need to be treated with care and caution. It is far too easy to abuse them to 'hide' a problem that shouldn't exist in the first place, and this is clearly a dangerous place to be.

That's my 5 bobs worth. :)
Cheers
Rod

[kobra]

wildchick,

The only downside to what you intend, paying attention to what RodG stated, is if you intend on using a payment gateway - - these require SSL which require a dedicated IP and addon domains can not have there own IP

[wildchick]

Hey guys, thanks for the detailed responses.

Now, I made a mistake on my first post. i was not clear enough on what I knew about how the new domains will be a subdomain of the primary domain. Thus there will be 2 paths: siteB.siteA.com and siteB.com Please read this article: http://www.ocularconcepts.us/blc/blo...ed-to-address/ It is where i got the idea of doing the redirect. And it had good reasons too: please do read it.

I will quote it here:

What is Multi-Site Hosting?

Businesses which operate multiple websites can easily host all their websites in one account with one FTP access rather than worrying about keeping multiple accounts and multiple accesses. This is referred to as multi-site hosting.

Technically, when you register your first domain on a hosting plan, your host assigns you a primary domain. All your additional domains become your primary domain’s sudomains. For example if you run two websites – example.com and example1.com, your accounts are initially added as example.com (primary domain) and example1.example.com (secondary domain). Your web host will later tweak its system to point the secondary domain to its corresponding folder so that you can access example1.com as is and not as a subdomain of your primary domain.

However, one thing that most website hosting companies do not care about is the SEO of your website. While some do not know about it, the others just don’t care. After they tweak their system to serve your website at example1.com, they do not take care of the fact that your website is still being served at example1.example.com. No human notices it, but the search engine robots do. They crawl the web and take notice of both the addresses on which they find the same content – duplicate content. Duplicate content is a strict no-no in search engines and results in search engines choosing one version of the content (which they think is the original) over the others. The other versions are relegated to the supplemental index, also known as Google Hell.

While the concept of supplemental index is no longer talked about because Google no longer maintains two separate indices, it is still very real. A page labeled as duplicate never ranks high enough in search engines. From a searcher’s perspective this is correct too as they only want to see the content once from the best site that serves it.

When search engines see your website at both example1.example.com and at example1.com, they decide to pick one. You would be lucky if they choose example1.com, but there is no guarantee that they will do so. If example.com is an old domain with strong content and link popularity, and the example1.com is a newer one, it is the later than will be caught as duplicate while the subdomain will be treated as the original.
Solutions for Hosting Related Duplicate Content Problems

The solution is to use a file which as no name and just the extension – .htaccess. This file is found at the server level and at the subdomain level. You need to find the one at the subdomain level (example1.example.com) and write a directive in it to redirect it to the main domain (example.com.)
To write the directive, download the file using an FTP client like CuteFTP or Filezilla (or any other that you want to use). Use a basic text editor like Notepad. Here is the directive that you need to add:

RewriteEngine On
## PERMANENT REDIRECT
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !^www.example1.com
RewriteRule (.*) http:// www.example1.com /$1 [R=301,L]

Please remember to replace example1.com to your website’s domain name. If you cannot save it back after modifying as .htaccess then save it as .txt and rename the extension later as .htaccess. To check if it worked correctly, open your subdomain address in the web browser and see where you land. You should land on example1.com.

Now as you can see the article states:

When search engines see your website at both example1.example.com and at example1.com, they decide to pick one. You would be lucky if they choose example1.com, but there is no guarantee that they will do so. If example.com is an old domain with strong content and link popularity, and the example1.com is a newer one, it is the later than will be caught as duplicate while the subdomain will be treated as the original.

RodG, do you still agree with you said? You made some very strong points. However at the same time the article has some strong points about the new domain being penalized as duplicate content.

I think a simple solution would be to tell the spiders not to index example1.example.com or in my example siteB.siteA.com. Do you think this is a good idea?


Sorry for giving misinformation in original post.

[RodG]

RodG, do you still agree with you said? .

Every single word of it.

The site you have referenced is/was written by a company that promotes/sells SEO as a service. It has several inaccuracies. For example:

What is Multi-Site Hosting?

Businesses which operate multiple websites can easily host all their websites in one account with one FTP access rather than worrying about keeping multiple accounts and multiple accesses.

This is true. I'm not sure why they restricted it to 'FTP' though, because it applies to one CPanel Access, or SSH access, etc too. As I originally stated (implied) these are management systems that are totally unrelated to any given domain name.

This is referred to as multi-site hosting.

Agreed, but this is a very limited view. Take a service such as GoDaddy... They host 1000's of sites for 1000's of *unrelated* customers and businessness on any one of their servers. This is also Multi-Site hosting. It is nothing new or special, it has been this way ever since Tim Berners-Lee invented the WWW in 1990. (The Internet has been around for a lot longer of course).

Technically, when you register your first domain on a hosting plan, your host assigns you a primary domain..

Technically this is pure BS. The registration of a domain name and where it is hosted are completely unrelated. There is no such thing (technically) as a 'primary domain'. All domains are created equal.
A webhost doesn't 'assign' domains.

All your additional domains become your primary domain’s sudomains..

There is no such thing as a primary domain. All domains are created equal. Additional domains are just as 'primary' as the first domain.
A sub-domain is well, a sub domain. For instance: (real examples).

homestead.vcsweb.com is a subdomain of vcsweb.com.
cbm.vcsweb.com is another subdomain of vcsweb.com

If I added another domain to this stable, eg: vcsweb.net it will stand alone, completely independent of vcsweb.com or any of its subdomains.
It will NOT become vcsweb.net.vcsweb.com.

If I *wanted* vcsweb.net.vcsweb.com. I wouldn't even need to register 'vcsweb.net' - I could simply add it as a *legitimate* subdomain of vcsweb.com.

In other words: "vcsweb.net" and "vcsweb.net.vcsweb.com" are completely different domains with no relation to each other in any way whatsover. They may or may not be hosted on the same server.

For example if you run two websites – example.com and example1.com, your accounts are initially added as example.com (primary domain) and example1.example.com (secondary domain).

There is no such thing as a primary and a secondary domain. All domains are created equal.

Your web host will later tweak its system to point the secondary domain to its corresponding folder so that you can access example1.com as is and not as a subdomain of your primary domain.

The webhost should not need to do this for you (at least not these days). The management tools (such as cPanel) will set the correct folder for any given domain name when it is added to the server. Most (all?) cPanels will even give you an option to set your *own* folder path for any given domain name.

However, one thing that most website hosting companies do not care about is the SEO of your website

And there's the sales pitch!.

After they tweak their system to serve your website at example1.com, they do not take care of the fact that your website is still being served at example1.example.com.

Well, only if "example1" has been configured to be a subdomain of "example.com", otherwise example1.com stands alone just as any other domain name.

No human notices it, but the search engine robots do

This must be one of those magical search engines robots I often read about. Unless a pre-indexed site has a link to this newly created subdomain, or unless *someone* has 'told' the search engines about it, there is no way that any search engine will even know the subdomain exists.

Duplicate content is a strict no-no in search engines

This statement is without merit (mostly).

and results in search engines choosing one version of the content (which they think is the original) over the others

Well, at least this is true. It is the very core of how search engines are *supposed* to work.

If example.com is an old domain with strong content and link popularity, and the example1.com is a newer one, it is the later than will be caught as duplicate while the subdomain will be treated as the original.

Although I don't know all the inner workings of all search engines, I do know enough to be able to state categorically that this statement will not hold water over time. Given two identical sites, one a full domain, the other a subdomain, the full domain will be given a much higher ranking (all else being equal).

The solution is to use a file which as no name and just the extension – .htaccess. This file is found at the server level and at the subdomain level.

Gee, they seemed to have forgotten about the FQDN (domain) level. Actually, they screwed up, I think they meant 'domain' rather than 'server'. The server itself doesn't need an .htaccess file because it has its own config files that do what the .htaccess files can and a whole lot more.

find the one at the subdomain level (example1.example.com) and write a directive in it to redirect it to the main domain (example.com.)

Or better yet, just don't create/use example1.example.com in the first place!!!!!!

OK, now to put a fly in the ointment.... cPanel will automatically create a subdomain such as example1.example.com if/when you add 'example1.com' to your example.com management account. It does this IN ADDITION to creating the FQDN domain name (there are reasons for this that I won't go into at the moment), but basically, these subdomains are unknown to the outside world and should be kept that way. As stated, the search engines will not automagically find these domains, and the only way anyone will know they exist is if you tell them. The act of adding a redirect as suggested in this article is counter productive because this very thing is enough to make the search engines aware of this subdomains existance, which is what we don't want. It is far better to simply deny requests to this 'unwanted' subdomain than it is to accept and redirect them. This will solve any issues that you may have with duplicate content at the same time.

Important Note: To the best of my knowledge, this creation of a subdomain in addition to the FQDN is something unique/specific to cPanel. It is not a reflection as to how things are usually done.

Bottom line. Don't use redirects to fix a problem that shouldn't exist in the first place.

Anyway, I think/hope that this will help you sort some of the chaff from the wheat. You don't *have* to take my words as gospel (I'm not infallible), but if it helps any I've included my credentials below.

Cheers
Rod

Adv dip network security
Cert IV Network adminstration
Cert IV Server administration
Cert IV programming
Cert IV Training and Assessment (IT)

[wildchick]

Hey RodG, thanks for clearing up that last part on the information. It makes sense to just deny requests to the subdomains.

Thanks!

[volkeram]

As long as you are not planning to inter link all the sites setup on addon domains, you should be fine. Otherwise, all links from same IP might cause spam links issue.