Is a micro site the way to go?
-
Hello, a client has asked us today to quote for how much it would cost them to get a micro site built. A Google employee has told them that because their current URL doesn't include .co.uk or.com it is simply: brandname.word that it will be harder for them to get their website to rank.
My understanding is that micro sites aren't a good solution for any problem as Google doesn't like them. Would it be better for them to buy a .co.uk (they are a UK company) url and then redirect the url to their current website or is there a better solution?
Many thanks
-
You shouldn't have an issue with the TLD.
Ensure that their Webmaster Tools is set to the UK, not Worldwide (Search Traffic > International Targeting > Country tab), NAP (name, address, phone number) are on every page (pref in the header) and get directories or links that are in the UK built to the site.
You can use Majestic's topical trust flow to find sites that have Regional relevance to the UK if you're outreaching to sites, or scrape a competitors backlink profile.
Feel free to Tweet me at @StelinSEO if you have any further issues
Stel
-
Matt Cutts repeatedly said many ccTLD are recognized by google algo as a country specific signal, while few ccTLD and generic TLD are just... generic and treat as such.
I don't think the TLD of your customer is the real issue.
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
-
Backlinks that go to a redirected URL
Hey guys, just wondering, my client has 3 websites, 2 of 3 will be closed down and the domains will be permanently redirected to the 1 primary domain - however they have some high quality backlinks pointing the domains that will be redirected. How does this effective SEO? Domain One (primary - getting redesign and rebuilt) - not many backlinks
Technical SEO | | thinkLukeSEO
Domain Two (will redirect to Domain One) - has quality backlinks
Domain Three (will redirect to Domain One) - has quality backlinks When the new website is launched on Domain One I will contact the backlink providers and request they update their URL - i assume that would be the best.0 -
Any ideas why this site is being penalized?
http://www.my-french-house.com/ has been online since around 2004 and has nearly always been in the top 10 serps for terms like 'property for sale in france'. However, over the last 12 months we've been hit really hard by Google and have fallen dramatically in rank. Can anyone give any insight into what may have happened? As an aside, we've had no message in the Google Webmaster Console and have not contacted Google about the apparent penalty / penalization. Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated. Cheers Jim
Technical SEO | | jimpannell0 -
Go Daddy Ultimate Hosting?
I host several websites for my clients in my Go Daddy account. I've currently got each site on it's own hosting plan (about $5-$9 per month per site) but I was recently on the phone with Go Daddy and they suggested migrating everything to an Ultimate hosting plan, which allows me to host an unlimited number of websites, sql databases, etc for a set price. Will this negatively effect my SEO as all of my sites will essentially be tied together? I can save a few hundred dollars per year, but it's definitely not worth it if all of my clients' sites tank.
Technical SEO | | socialfirestarter0 -
Help optimising this site
Hi I have been optimising this site http://seakayakdevon.co.uk/ which is a wordpress site since making changes to it recently the site is now indexed and appearing among its competitors. trouble is they still are placed higher rn the SE rankings. i wish to optimise for local search i.e on Google places etc. but the trouble is there is'nt a physical address for the business it is run from various coastal locations. any ideas how i can still market for local search- maps etc. I have done the following optimisation: sitemaps title tag, description tag improved content removed duplicate content an blocker pages replace image text and replaced with header tag improved page names - making them static any advice of guidance would be greatly appreciated- will the fatc its built in wordpress limit its ability to gain better ranking in the SE? Thanks
Technical SEO | | Bristolweb0 -
Is Go Daddy a bad domain?
I heard today that Go Daddy is not the besting hosting domain for websites...it isn't crawled well by websites. Is this true? What is the best hosting domain?
Technical SEO | | CapitolShine0 -
Impact of Adding a Mobile Site
Hi, we ranked very well for keywords trophies and trophies and awards on our home page, trophycentral.com for quite a while (many years). Recently we dropped off the charts, but are not sure why. So we posted this issue last week and got some great suggestions and are in the process of addressing them. However, we are now wondering if we caused this issue when we launched our mobile site a few months ago (timing makes sense). Has anyone had trouble with a mobile site impacting their traditional site? I am wondering if maybe google is splitting the traffic to the trophycentral domain and the m.trophycentral.com domain? Here is the code we have< script type="text/javascript" src="http://lib.store.yahoo.net/lib/sportsawards/mobile-redirection.js">script>Appreciate your comments!
Technical SEO | | trophycentraltrophiesandawards0 -
How is this site doing this?
http://www.meccabingo.com It shows a splash / promotion page yet you check the cache and it's the real homepage, they are doing this so they don't lose rankings but how are they redirecting users to that but Google is caching the real homepage? is it friendly? thanks!!
Technical SEO | | AdiRste0 -
Why did our site drop in Google rankings?
My site's URL (web address) is: http://tinyurl.com/3svn2l9 Hi there, We operate a travel site that lists numerous tours, accommodation and activities. Since 6th August 2011 we have dropped from top 10 SERP rankings of our pages to around result number 100 (page 10) and losing massive amount of visitors via Google Search. Our Yahoo and Bing rankings are still in the top10. We need your advice and quick! The last changes we have made are the following: -redirected the non-www version to the www version on the 1st August -bought advertising with a follow link in a sidebar that is being populated across the site (+4000 pages) about 2 months ago -added a blog to the website 2 weeks ago and posted 2 posts to date. Additionally, our website structure allows visitors (and bots) to see the same listings via different URLs which caused duplicate content. This has been the case since the launch of our website about 1 year ago. To prevent this duplicate content we have placed canonical tags on the individual listings pages. Why did our site all of a sudden plummet in the rankings?
Technical SEO | | Robbern0