We all use subdomains while browsing the internet. Truth is sometimes we do not even realise that we are, and that is fine. But if you own a website it’s important for you to understand what subdomains are and learn how you can incorporate them into your site.
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What is a subdomain?
You already have a website. That is your domain, eg. https://hosting.co.uk/web-hosting.
From that, you can create a subdomain.
What does this mean? Well, typically a subdomain facilitates the housing of content that is different from what’s normally found on your site. Let us say you have a website that speaks about love, eg. www.lovesite.com but now you want to incorporate an e-store on it to sell T-shirt with love quotes. You can create a subdomain, which in essence is a separate e-commerce store with its own servers, but linked directly to your site. It would look like shop.lovesite.com.
Difference between a Subdomain and a subdirectory
Many persons believe that subdomains and subdirectories are the same. That is not the case; they play similar roles but are very different. A subdomain as said earlier is a completely different site from your main website. It has its own hosting but is linked to your main domain.
A subdirectory, on the other hand, is label or heading for a particular page on your site.
An easy way to tell the difference is the location of the root URL. The name of a subdomain usually comes in front (the left) of the URL, eg. Store.lovesite.com while it comes after (to the right) with a subdirectory, eg. Lovesite.com\store.
What are the advantages of having a subdomain?
Subdomains offer a number of advantages. They not only help you to organise your content into manageable chunks for your visitors but also help you to facilitate several target audiences on one site without negatively affecting your SEO ranking.
1. Makes it easy to connect with an international audience
A Subdomain is also useful in helping you to connect with an international audience. It allows you to post a variation of targeted content in several languages while linking them all to your main website. Sure you can optimise your site to translate into different languages. However, languages have particular structures and some phrases when translated means something completely different.
A subdomain in a particular language limits and can completely omit the chances of misrepresenting your brand when something becomes lost in translation.
2. Improves site loading
Subdomains are hosted on a completely different platform from your main site. This is a good thing because the more content and traffic you bring to your site the slower it might become. With a subdomain, you can benefit from high-speed loading and uptime, which in turn improves visitor experience.
3. Subdomains can help to boost your SEO
Your SEO ranking is important and helps customers to find you on the internet. Having a subdomain can help to increase your search engine ranking because it allows you to use target keywords related to your business that aren’t a part of your main domain.
If your site already ranks well, it will also help your subdomain to be indexed quickly, which is great for the ranking and reach of that subdomain.
A higher ranking means more traffic from an audience that is more likely to make a purchase.
4. Help businesses with different geographical branches
Let’s say your business has branches in different cities or countries. Subdomains allow you to easily manage and monitor a site for each without having them separated and unlinked. For example, if your company has offices in London and Paris, you could create the subdomains, London.company.com and Paris.company.com. Both of these subdomains would be a part of your main website company.com.
Not only will this improve customer experience but will also make it easier for employees in these locations to control their branch’s site.
Each subdomain would have its own address, phone number and unique content related to its location.
5. Subdomains help to make your website mobile-friendly
Most persons access the internet with their smartphones than any other device. That’s why it is necessary for your website to be optimised for mobiles.
Subdomains make this simple. You can create a separate mobile version of your website specifically for smartphone users. This enhances the layout, feel and navigation of your site boosting your mobile visitor experience.
Since subdomains also use its own server and software, your site will load faster and retain more visitors.
6. Help to improve user experience
A subdomain caters to target audiences with specific needs. Since it is clear and to the point, both regular customers and visitors will be able to easily find what they are looking for on your website.
This ability to navigate seamlessly on your page will enhance the experience of users. The better the experience the greater the probability that visitors will return to your site and support your business.
This will also influence the reach of your website as satisfied customers are likely to leave reviews and share links.
The flip side of Subdomains
It is clear that there are many advantages to using subdomains; however, it is not without flaw and limitation.
1. Paying more than one hosting fee
Subdomains differ from subdirectories and therefore it has its own web hosting. This means that you will have to pay to host your main domain as well as all the additional subdomains you have as well.
2. It can be difficult to maintain
If you are the sole person providing content for both your main website and subdomains, it can become taxing to consistently keep them up to date. If you operate a company, where persons in different locations add content to their subdomain, you are still responsible for keeping it consistent with the nature of the main domain.
Summary
The truth is that you do not need subdomains for every website. However, it is very useful if your company has a blog, wants to add an e-commerce store or has branches in different geographical locations.
If you are looking for an efficient and fast hosting platform to launch a website or to host a subdomain, Hosting.uk is ready to help. We offer several plans to suit your budget. We also provide SSL certificates for securing your subdomains with HTTPS encryption.
