I want to add a blog to my website. So I can either do blog.domain.com or domain.com/blog. I’m completely frozen by indecision. I’ve been reading on this subject for 2 days now hoping one article will make up my mind. So far they haven’t. As you may know google considers subdomains to be separate websites. Or so it was in the past? With the Google Panda Update Google now considers subdomain links to the main/parent site to be intersite links like they would be in subdirectories. Really good article on the subject http://www.whitefireseo.com/site-architecture/subdomain-or-subfolder-post-panda/360/
I have a niche website that does extremely well in search results. For its subject its probably the largest site out there though still small in comparison to 1000 page sites out there. It’s focused on one set of key words/subject. The blog will basically consist of the same subject though more broad in nature. So on one hand I don’t want to dilute my main sites lazer focus with a subdirectory blog, but on the other more rich key words and subjects could be helpful to pull in a broader range of readers, therefore paying clients. A subdomain could be beneficial as I could dominate the first page of google better with two websites.
Additionally I have the integration to consider. I want to use Wordpress. I don’t want to even try to match the layout of my site with Wordpress blog. Therefore a subdirectory would be less attractive for this purpose. As opposed to a subdomain it would be considered ok to have a different layout as its a separate site. If I did a subdirectory I would just use my existing sites layout and therefore I would have to manually code each post. Which is obviously less desirable than just wordpressing each post from my iPad.
Reading for the last 2 days more people suggest subdirectories for blogs. However, acknowledge the pros of subdomains. Looking around at other sites a slight advantage goes to subdirectories. However many well established sites use subdomains. Like google and Facebook use subdomains for their blogs.
In summery I’m leaning towards a subdomain as it seems cleaner in nature and installation. Although I can’t discount the seo benefit or pleasing look of one universal layout with the subdirectories. What should I do???