Developing multiple sites

[soggyindo]

I was wondering if anyone had experience buying and developing mini sites for multiple domain names, and connecting these up to save time.

I've just bought several names based around the same keyword. Let's say it was hybrid cars (I wish!).

If you had BuyHybrids.com, HybridReviews.com, HybridStores.com, HybridCarSales.com, and HybridPhotos.com, say...

- could you develop minisite just "entrances" for each of these names, that each have different google results?
- can you then link these sites up together to form one site, with the same content and just different 'entrance points'?
- any tricks to making it look smooth? for branding under one name, getting it to work with wordpress, etc?
- how would search engines deal with the above (are there duplicate content issues?)
- if you were just pointing different domains to "start" on different pages of the same site - will SEs be able to read each domain name as different sites?

i thought it might be a good alternative to parking names, if they can be developed easily in this way

 

[weblord]

these are called doorway pages

 

[barefoottech]

these are called doorway pages

ALso called Pointless Exercise
Develop them as Separate but interlinked minisites
Each one with a Sub-niche of it's own, but referred back to one main site

 

[cache]

you don't want duplicated contents, search engine will penalize you.

 

[soggyindo]

Develop them as Separate but interlinked minisites
Each one with a Sub-niche of it's own, but referred back to one main site

Hmm, just trying to work that sentence out.

Separate - yep

Interlinked - hm, ok, so there's links between them, maybe like a side navigation thing, ok

each with a sub-niche: cool, well there is inherently in the name, so no problem

but referred back to one main site: ok, although who's to say which one is the main one, they'd all be cool/ immensely valuable



ok, thanks for that. i can sort of see it. you still have to make 5-10 separate logos and stuff, which adds time, i wonder?

this branding part is the part i'm not sure about, it'd be nice if the viewer thought they never left the site as they travelled through the categories.

it'd also be nice if you could do this via forwarding names to various 'parts' of the same wordpress site, but it sounds like that is not possible or at least not recommended.

rep added, any more info/ thoughts/ reports would be fab

:tu:

 

[popopo]

I think you have already did this very well by your post, why do you need this?

 

[soggyindo]

I think you have already did this very well by your post, why do you need this?

Um, perhaps i'm not being very clear (i'm not very usually!)

:p

The context is our earlier discussions on how to develop names in the cheapest/ easiest way possible.

Idea
If we could find a way to:
(a) Buy a lot of names, but around one keyword - say 50 or so names.
(b) Build some sort of site that they could all be part of. With unique content suiting each keyword on individual pages.
(c) The domains point to their respective pages, but viewers can navigate across the "site" (and think of it as one site).
And (d) each domain somehow still builds up their individual links and PR for resale.

Then:
(a) You would make way more than parking (or just making one new site per domain topic).
(b) You would draw traffic from all your other 50 related names.
(c) You would have a super cheap way of adding value to your names, and developing sites.

Problem
(a) I'm still hazy about what is smart, and what is spammy, in search engine eyes. I want to stay on the right side of the law!
(b) I'm still hazy about tricks you can do with forwarding domains to one site. Or, if there's no way around having to upload 50 unique sites manually to each 50 different names.

Questions
(a) Has anyone thought about smart ways to make each minisite that doesn't require new logos, lots of uploading, etc? I see 'turnkey sites' in the for sale area here using one generic logo, eg. "hybrid cars", and using it for a range of domains, like "Hybridsales.com", "HybridNews.com", etc. etc. How's this process, exactly? Any other ideas on it?
(b) Any tricks to make it seem seamless to the viewer that they're not leaving sites. i.e. can you copy sites by just changing the file names and putting new content in.
(c) Any reports from people who have tried this. Or links to information, etc.?

I'm sure this is really obvious to website dudes, and impossible to comprehend for others like me!

Clear as mud?


Goodness, the longer you're on Namepros, the more bold and italics you seem to use!

 

[JGK]

Hi Soggyindo,

I'm not quite certain that I understand fully what you're considering, but I do think that at least part of it is something you should avoid.

Here's a quote from Google:

Doorway pages

Doorway pages are typically large sets of poor-quality pages where each page is optimized for a specific keyword or phrase. In many cases, doorway pages are written to rank for a particular phrase and then funnel users to a single destination.

Whether deployed across many domains or established within one domain, doorway pages tend to frustrate users, and are in violation of our webmaster guidelines.

Google's aim is to give our users the most valuable and relevant search results. Therefore, we frown on practices that are designed to manipulate search engines and deceive users by directing them to sites other than the ones they selected, and that provide content solely for the benefit of search engines. Google may take action on doorway sites and other sites making use of these deceptive practice, including removing these sites from the Google index.

Now, that aside, I don't see any problem with having different sites with unique content, that all contain a link to the "main site" (sort of like a main company site). Let's say you had a clothes network, then you could have your women's clothes, men's clothes and children's clothes sites all provide a link into your main network site.

In general, I would probably avoid interlinking them all, even if the content were unique on each of them. Even if done with good intent, I can see that as potentially sending up flags over at Google HQ. Even if no harm came out of it, my feeling is that you wouldn't get the pagerank boost that it seems you're hoping for, as it would be quite diluted.

If I've misunderstood anything that you were trying to get across, please accept my apologies.

 

[mhdoc]

Aspen, at www.websitepublisher.net talks about Hub & Spoke design. You make one site the hub which has links to all the spokes. Spokes link back to the hub, but not to each other.

 

[Garcia Coder]

well we can't duplicate this type since search engines will be penalise us.