Structure of Websites

rodeboy · Apr 24, 2013

Your thoughts please, on what is probably a basic question for you experts ...

I have a customer who is looking for me to put website(s) together for him, and I would be interested to hear of anyone's thoughts on the best set up of site(s). Let me try and explain ...

The brand name is his own name, and he owns the .com and .co.uk for this.

There are then three needs for him;

need one is consultancy services, for which he has a business name and owns the .co.uk and .com for this.

need two is to sell ebooks on Amazon, again he has a title name and owns the .co.uk and .com for this.

need three is for a blog and once again he has a blog name owning the .co.uk and .com for this.

The target market is international so any site(s) will be set up on .com with the .co.uk forwarding to that.

My dilema is this ...

Am I best setting up just one website on OwnName.com with web forwarding on all the others, and the three needs incorporated in this site?

Or should I have mini-sites on the three needs domains, linking (nofollow to avoid link farm label by Google?) to the main content on the OwnName.com? This way the mini sites can generate their own visitors, PR etc

Or doesn't it really matter so long as the content is good, backed up with decent SEO and linking?

Maybe there's an even better, more simple approach that I am missing.

Any pointers are appreciated and thanks for your time.

Chris

retired_member32 · Apr 24, 2013

does the selling ebooks have any relevancy towards the consultancy business ? because maybe put that on a another domain altogether

tifosi · Apr 24, 2013

Agreed, the relevency is important. Blog and consulancy fit well together in one site, probably with something like wordpress.

The ebooks really depend on whether there is a strong connection to the consultancy business or is more a standalone enterprise.

In either instance, where the com & co.uk is owned i'd run off the .com and park the .co.uk on top. I know some would do the reverse. And even then it's probably more important to know what they have been trading via - com/uk - and what is on external material - business cards etc.

S

rodeboy · Apr 24, 2013

Websites

Yes, the ebooks are relevant to the blog and consultancy as they deal in the same subject.

So I guess you are saying that the decision is more down to a marketing strategy rather than a website design matter. I didn't want to go down the one main site with several mini sites route, for example, only to find that Google is likely to penalise us as it looked like a big link farm type thing.

Really appreciate your thoughts, thanks guys.