Will having two wordpress themes installed hurt seo?
-
We currently have 3 sites built on WordPress that have little to no blogging capabilities.
Currently, all published posts show up on a /category page which does not resemble the traditional blog format and is not aesthetically pleasing.
We would like to have a more traditional blog and are considering installing a second wordpress theme on the site which will strictly be used for /blog and all the posts.
My question is will having the second WordPress installation on the sites hurt us in any way on the SEO front and if we go this way should we place the install in a subfolder or on a subdomain?
Is there anything else we need to worry about with making this transition?
Thank you in advance for the advice!
Patrick
-
Travis,
Thank you for this detailed response!
Your correct with the assumption that the site does not fit our needs. The problem was that the company we work with develops WP sites using their own theme which is a very raw form of WP.
Basically out of box the site does not have the functionality of any mainstream WP theme (no blog, backed limits a lot of control, a lot of custom CSS needed, etc.)
We thought maybe installing a second theme would put a little more control in our hands (at least for the blog), and this could be done in house.
After reading all the responses including yours it seems this unfortunately is not the way to go.
Thank you for the all the info, Patrick
-
Hello, the way you are viewing it is correct!
Basically what it comes down too is time and money it will take if we have the developer custom code the blog.
We are all fairly proficient with wordpress and could create the blog in a day on our own if a new theme was installed but after reading all the comments here it seems like working the blog into the one theme is the way to go.
Thank you for the response!
-
I second, or third?, the notion that you should more than likely only have a single WordPress installation. It definitely would increase the maintenance involved. Take everything you should do to maintain an installation, then double it. I'm certain everyone in your organization could do without that.
But if your organization is willing to endure the duplication of effort, there are other things to be concerned about. Not every theme is created equal. Some themes are faster than others, some are more secure than others and most themes will differ in every other way. So one theme could be a hindrance, while the other at least pulls it's weight.
In regard to the subdomain blog or subfolder blog question, there was a time in recent history where I would have said it didn't matter. Supposedly the link equity/juice flows just fine either way. However, someone in Moz Q&A made a very good point. To paraphrase EGOL; "Algorithms change, if you install your blog on a subfolder you will always be right."
I'm not sure when your company made the jump to WordPress, but WordPress has had the ability to display static pages for years. My first agency used to run a combination of CMS Made Simple and WordPress, I think it was due to the page handling issue. That was over six years ago. They later made the jump to full WordPress about five years ago.
So it sounds like the site isn't properly configured for your purposes. Here is how you should handle that, direct from the WordPress codex. From there you can setup your site's page structure through parent/child relationships. So if you're selling widgets, your structure may look like:
**Page Hierarchy **
Posts Hierarchy
site.com/blog-diggety/sweet-post
There are Pages and Posts. You bring the hierarchy. And speaking of which, should you change your site URL structure, you will definitely want to research 301 redirects.
To me, there's no question in my mind. You should stick with one WordPress install. Hopefully that helps.
-
Hi Patrick,
Will this hurt your SEO? Maybe, but not in the more traditional way. For example, there is no direct penalty that this would fall under, but what it could do is confuse the user experience. Just keep in mind that SEO isn't just about your SERP positions.
As a user on any site, you want to see consistency. If you change theme part way through, then this can devalue the level of trust in the site as it no longer looks like the original site.
I would stick with one theme and if you aren't happy with the current look and feel, change your whole site to match this.
From Google's perspective, no, this wouldn't cause a devalued ranking by installing an additional theme (unless SEO issues arise from the installation), but there are a whole host of reason why you shouldn't do it.
-Andy
-
You should go with one theme. Parts of the site that are controlled by the theme remain static, no matter what content you're working on whether it's a page or blog post. Those things include the header and footer. I don't see how you could have multiple conflicting versions of those files in a single installation. Those files are important to SEO.
If I were you, I'd customize the existing theme(s) to include the features/functions you're currently lacking rather than try to integrate two different themes and multiple plugins (never mind the additional maintenance Unikey mentioned). I'm assuming you're using an SEO plugin but even if that's not the case, you probably have others that you will want to continue to work seamlessly.
Someone else might have experience with this. I don't, meaning I've never tried to optimize a site that uses two simultaneously installed themes. Hopefully they'll chime in if they have a different opinion. I'll be interested to hear.
-
I am not sure of the seo implications, but I would do everything I could to keep 1 installation if I could. It just seems like it would make management a lot easier. I may not be following what you are asking though. It sounds like you have a site without a blog using 1 worpress theme and then you are wanting to add a blog using another wordpress theme, is that right?
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
-
Does an age verification home page hurt SEO?
There's a microbrewery in our area that just launched its first website. It has the "verify your age" homepage (which is not really their homepage, but I don't know what it's called) before you can enter. It looks like this: http://angrychairbrewing.com/ Anyway, does this hurt them at all from a rankings standpoint? Also, assuming bots/spiders/ROGER can crawl sites like this, (which I think they would have to be able to do) how do they get around this verification? Thanks, Ruben
Web Design | | KempRugeLawGroup0 -
Wordpress Plugin To Capture Form Completion Data, Before Visitor Hits "Submit"?
Greetings MOZ Community: Visitors frequently start to enter contact information in the forms on our website, but then chicken out and don't hit the submit button. I noticed this watching the recordings of visitor web site visits using Mouse Flow. Is there a Wordpress Plugin that would allow us to capture data entered in forms, where the visitor does not finally hit the "submit" button? Obviously this would be very, very valuable as this scenario occurs in one out of three or four instances. Thanks!!!
Web Design | | Kingalan1
Alan0 -
Old site to new WordPress site - Client concerned about Yahoo Ranking
Hello, Back Story I have a client (law firm) who has a large .html website. He has been doing his own SEO for years and it shows. I think the only reason he reached out to a professional is because he got a huge penalty from Google last fall and fell very far down in rankings. Although, he still retains a #1 spot in Yahoo for his site for the keyword phrase he wants. I have been creating a new WordPress theme for the client and creating all new pages and updating the formatting/SEO. From the beginning I have told the client that when we delete the old site and install a new WordPress site (same domain name, but different page hierarchy) he will take a bump in the search engines until all the 301 redirects get sorted out. I told him I can't guarantee any time frame of how long the dip in SEO will last. Some sites bounce right back while others take longer. Last week, during a discussion, he tells me that if he loses his #1 ranking on Yahoo for any length of time he thinks he will go out of business. Needless to say I was a little taken back. When it comes to SEO I use best practice techniques, do my research, stay on top of trends but I never guarantee rankings when moving to a new site. I'm thinking of ways I can help elevate any type of huge SEO drop off and help the client. Here is what I was thinking of suggesting to the client and I would love some feedback. Main Question He has another domain he isn't doing anything with. It's pretty much his domain name with pc added. I was thinking about using that domain to create a simple 1-2 page WordPress website with brand new content (no duplicate content) aimed at attracting his keyword phrase. I would do as much SEO as I could with a 1-2 page site and give it a month or so to see if this smaller site can get into the top #10 in Yahoo, or higher. Then, when we move the site he will still have a website on the first page of Yahoo for his keyword phrase. I hope I explained it clearly 🙂 I would be open to any suggestions anyone may have. Thanks
Web Design | | Bill_K0 -
4XX (Client Error) on Wordpress Wesbite
I've just taken over the management of a website and am getting 4x 4XX (client Error) issues. Example: http://inter-italia.com/en/wp-login.php?action=lostpassword Can anyone give any guidance as how to fix this wordpress? I also see a lot of 'temporary redirects' due to multilingual plugin - is there anything I can do to fix this?
Web Design | | skehoe0 -
Just How Bad is Adobe MUSE for SEO?
Adobe's new website builder "Adobe Muse" has a reputation for creating terrible code. I want to know if anyone has experience with the software and what your opinion is on just how bad the code really is for SEO. I'm currently using "Weebly", which is a similar, but more basic website building software. My results for SEO have been going well using that software, however it's limited in terms of building an aesthetically pleasing website design. On the other hand, you can build gorgeous websites with Adobe Muse, but I don't want to use it if it's going to prevent me from ranking. What are your thoughts?
Web Design | | Alchemist230 -
I have a button that repeats it self many times on same page, what can i do so button name does not affect my SEO?
I have a shopping car button named "Add to car" but it repeats on many pages on my website, is this affecting my seo? If yes.. What should i do so it does not affect? Should button appear on hover? Thanks
Web Design | | SeMeAntoja0 -
What is the best SEO friendly CMS platform?
Would like to build some content sites and would appreciate some guidance on what you believe to be the most SEO friendly CMS platform. I'm also hoping to find something that doesn't require much HTML and is pretty easy to jump into.
Web Design | | EdStaton0 -
Using Wordpress as CMS for large Websites
Is Wordpress good enough to be used as a full fledge CMS for a large website. In particular, I'm talking about a news website. We have been online since 2002 but pretty soon we will have digitized our print newspaper archives of about 60 years. So, my question is, is it OK to use Wordpress for the entire website and if so what are some of the important things that need to be kept in mind. Cheers!
Web Design | | RishadShaikh590