Two websites for same company, am I wrong for doing this?

[ggplastering]

My company is GG Plastering & Joinery Services and we provide plastering and joinery services as well as kitchen fitting. When we first started the majority of our work was just plastering but more recently we've got into kitchen fitting and this is something that we really want to advertise and get more work on the kitchen fitting side. A lot of people aren't aware simply from our name and website address that we do kitchen fitting so I thought I would set up a "sister" website to highlight the fact we do kitchens.

However, I'm not a bit concerned that Google might penalise me for having two website for the same company. My ggplastering website redirects people to the ggkitchens website if they are interested in kitchen fitting services and vice versa with regards to plastering. However, from a user perspective I don't know whether its better just to house all the information on plastering / kitchen fitting on the ggplastering website.

I get a lot of hits if people put in plastering in Leeds in Google and presumed this was because I have plastering in my website address and also my company name. I thought if I set up ggkitchens website because it had kitchens in the name it would show up in search results if people want to search for kitchen fitters in Leeds.

I don't mind having just the one website but want to be able to optimise it so that I get hits if people search for kitchen fitters. I thought I wouldn't be able to do this is my web address was wwwggplasteringcouk instead of wwwggkitchenscouk

Any help much appreciated, should I delete my ggkitchens website straightaway to avoid being penalised by Google?

 

[OldWelshGuy]

Nothing at all wrong with this. go for it.

 

[paulears]

I've got three! One each for each business area.

 

[darren atkinson]

Yep, just backing the other good advice already received, go for it.

No risks of problems with the search engines. Just keep the bulk of the content different but I'm guessing it will be anyway.

 

[GreatSEO]

Always a good idea to host with different hosts for both sites as well.

Ensure no duplicate content and make sure all of the meta data has the relevant key terms in it that you need to target.

If you need any assistance feel free to pm me

Regards

Dave

 

[Jeremy Bentley]

Hello Gents,

I actually have a similar query which you may be able to advise on...

I have two domain names that are slightly different but link up to the one website, is this SEO compliant?

Cheers!

Jeremy

 

[Ali-v-8]

i think its a great way to increase positions and gives better focus on the service you provide.
if a person is looking for a plasterer and lands on a website covered in kitchens it would confuse the matter as would the content.
How ever there is no rule to stop you placing a link tab that sends people who also require a Kitchen fitter to the other website. In fact it is common practice.

 

[BustersDogs]

I've got two sites, one for walking and sitting, and one for training (for the same reason you have done it, different keywords in the URL). They have some pages in common, such as About Us, but at the bottom on the menu they link to each other, in a different colour so it stands out. I didn't notice any problem with search engines when I added the second site, and it didn't take long for the second site to catch up the first with rankings.

 

[darren atkinson]

Hello Gents,

I actually have a similar query which you may be able to advise on...

I have two domain names that are slightly different but link up to the one website, is this SEO compliant?

Cheers!

Jeremy

Depends.

Does one of the domain names redirect to the other one? or can you access the website from both url's?

A redirect is the method you should go with, specifically a 301 redirect.

If both domain names access the same website without redirect to one or the other then you will end up in trouble as it would be classed as duplicate content.

It's best to perform the redirect.

 

[makeusvisible]

100% agree with the above comments.....do it!

 

[adventurelife]

If you do it well and have the time to work on them all it is a great strategy.

I test new start ups this way ( I hate start ups) stick a site up but run it through one of my businesses , if it takes of spin it out as a stand a lone business.

All the time you are just catching more clients in your network

As has been said just do it

 

[Jeremy Bentley]

Depends.

Does one of the domain names redirect to the other one? or can you access the website from both url's?

A redirect is the method you should go with, specifically a 301 redirect.

If both domain names access the same website without redirect to one or the other then you will end up in trouble as it would be classed as duplicate content.

It's best to perform the redirect.

Thanks for the reply Darren,

Well, its a little bit more complicated...I am not very technical on the subject so please excuse my ignorance but basically we have one domain based on Microsoft platform and another on UNIX so that we could break the website down into different sectors using Wordpress. The main index page is what links to the "broken down" sectors but these "broken down" sector pages are actually individual websites. All of my SEO efforts are going into one of the main domains, the one hosted on the UNIX platform, but I have a funny feeling that its going to wasted...its hard to explain, maybe take a look at the website to get a better idea.

I cant post URLS but if you Google the Fink Agency it will pop up!

Any advice is appreciated, Cheers!

 

[The Web Guy]

Having different domains that point to the same single website will be seen by Google as underhand. Avoid! You will be penalised.
Instead, you can do this:
Set up a few satellite websites - all with different unique domains & content and offering different/variations of services or info. They can all have same contact details etc, that's fine. But don't replicate content. Big companies are doing this every day. Its basically spreading the net, and by doing so, they're pushing the competition downwards and out of the first google page results!

 

[BOBBYDEMAN]

Yea I would although i don't think you would be penalized with google current algorithm but google is finiky and they change there algorithms often so just delete it just to be safe.

 

[TommyGG]

Generally I prefer to have all my content on the same site as it's better to strengthen the position of one site than have multiple weaker sites in my opinion. This isn't for SEO purposes purely either, it's also a business decision to build your brand.

I would question your strategy because someone looking for a bathroom might also be in the market for a kitchen, so you might lose their business. You're also probably losing brand identity as well.

From a moral/ethical point of view there's nothing wrong with what you're doing in my opinion though, but perhaps you are looking at the reason for splitting the site like this in a purely SEO sense rather than a business sense. It's important to consider this decision from a business point of view as well.

 

[The Web Guy]

Hi TommyGG,
yes, you are right about brand building and i would agree that 1 site encompassing all services is the best way to go. But many big companies in high competition areas are funnelling in traffic from more than one site. It depends on the service and product(s) too. I'm not suggesting this is best practise for all. Only that it's an option, an alternative strategy if you simply don't have the money to compete with the big guys spending thousands per month on adwords and other campaigns. This tactic is actually from the book 'Get into bed with Google' by Jon Smith.
The worst practice according to the author is pointing different domain names to one site, but its fine to own domains with variant suffixes (com, co.uk, net etc) pointing to your prefered TLD.

 

[Ali-v-8]

Not true!!
Many big companies have differing Urls pointing to the same website and sit comfortably on the top of Google.
Its not seen as underhand (black hat).
however having 2 websites with the exact same content and different URL is a waste of time - only one website gets the kudos for the content.

Having different domains that point to the same single website will be seen by Google as underhand. Avoid! You will be penalised.