What's the difference and impact of these domains

[PowerUp]

I want to know what difference between these 2 domains.

http://www.xyz.com/widget
http://widget.xyz.com

Which is better for search engines.

Also whats the difference between the 2 below and how to get the 2nd domain.

http://www.xyz.com
http//xyz.com

Thanks.

 

[weblord]

when you add domain xyz.com on cpanel as addon domain or in whm it can be accessed as both xyz.com and www.xyz.com

http://www.xyz.com/widget
http://widget.xyz.com
it's the same thing, but better is the second one esp. if the xyz.com is something else like a real word and the widget is descriptive of xyz.com

 

[PowerUp]

it's the same thing, but better is the second one esp. if the xyz.com is something else like a real word and the widget is descriptive of xyz.com

Does the search engines prefer one to the other? I read somewhere that search engines shun sites that has alot of sub directories as a eg. http://widget.xyz.com as a way to improve SE ranking

 

[kingster]

Does the search engines prefer one to the other? I read somewhere that search engines shun sites that has alot of sub directories as a eg. http://widget.xyz.com as a way to improve SE ranking

Yep, i read that somewhere too, cant remember where. I think subdomains makes it easier for you to generate the xml sitemap for google.

 

[weblord]

yeah it's called spamming if you create something like this:
http://adsense.xyz.com
http://adbrite.xyz.com
and they end up pointing on same content that's spam.
but if it's a good content on each one sub and unique as the sub says then it's accepted.
but actualy it's the same thing
whether you call it sub.domain.com
or domain.com/sub/ it all ends up pointing to content and index.htm or html uploaded on folder domain.com/sub/

Does the search engines prefer one to the other? I read somewhere that search engines shun sites that has alot of sub directories as a eg. http://widget.xyz.com as a way to improve SE ranking

 

[AdoptableDomains]

Does the search engines prefer one to the other? I read somewhere that search engines shun sites that has alot of sub directories as a eg. http://widget.xyz.com as a way to improve SE ranking

Actually your example is a subDOMAIN, not a subdirectory. However, neither should effect you in search rankings if the content is different on each subdomain or subdirectory and is linked to each other. Having identical content on multiple accessible URL's can get you blacklisted for SE spamming regardless if it's different subdomains, domains, or directories.

The second level and www. domains are pretty much considered one and the same in general practice. I believe the SE's would consider them as the same site if content was identical.

The original concept of the internet domain system was that a second level domain was normally a company or institution network, and the third level was an individual server computer on that network. However, most third level domains are now just virtual servers and can be on the same or different computers.

 

[PowerUp]

Can anyone tell me how to create a subdomain? Is subdomain = subfolder?

 

[AdoptableDomains]

Can anyone tell me how to create a subdomain? Is subdomain = subfolder?

It can be, but not necessarily. In the DNS, a CNAME record can point to any URL on the same or any other domain. An A RECORD points to an IP address, which is usually a computer, but since servers can be assigned many IP numbers, it could be a specific directory in a computer.

http://www.rscott.org/dns/

Each DNS host may have different controls to do what you need, so it's best to search help at your DNS host.

 

[vslevin]

You can just do it through cPanel, by going to "Subdomains" and filling out the required information.