No doubt this has been discussed before, so feel free to just point me to a previous thread or two. No need to rehash if we don't have to....

I'm just not clear on what the value of having subdomain.maindomain.com is vs. a good ol' maindomain.com/subdomain directory form of website organization. Is it just a matter of users liking the subdomain better? Maybe it looks more like a "real" domain or something?

Or is there some more meaningful advantage to using a subdomain? Maybe it serves faster, or allows separate FTP access or....whatever?

Thanks.
-lateron

Well, that part of the site could be on another server, so in some cases it is a DNS issue to forward requests for subdomain.domain.com to another server, but overall, I don't think it is right or wrong to do it one way or another. If it works, fine.

It has been discussed before but I'm not sure how you'd find it.

For me, it has to do with the fact that subdomains have their own directory structure. Meaning, they have their own 'images' directory, '_private' directory, etc. Not that you can't create these anyway. I just find it much more easier to organize some things into subdomains. The key word "some". For example, my main site has a support page. The support page is located on a subdomain. However, the forms on my site are not. Because those forms are only accessed when selecting specific links (unless you know the direct URL). For the support page, it's easier to create it separately on a subdomain. In my opinion, of course.

A sub domain may point to a different server for example:

www.forums.domain.com would point to the server your site forums are on.
www.ads.domain.com would point to your ad server. and so on.

A subdomain is a "real" domain and is easier for users to remember while a directory has to be on the same server as the main domain. A subdomain can have its own account while a directory is under the main domain's account.

Directories can also be redirected to other servers via scripts or htaccess files.

Not only does a sub domain look more professional, it can also point at a completely different server. So for example if you had a gaming web site called GamePlanet.com for example, you could have q3.gameplanet.com, which could point at your Quake 3 server (just an example). This server could be in a completely different data center.

When used on a normal site, sub domains can sometimes also improve search engine rankings.

Originally posted by avara
When used on a normal site, sub domains can sometimes also improve search engine rankings. Or, when used on a normal site, subdomains might result in bans or penalties from some search engines.

Here's a general rule, from the search engine optimization standpoint: if the site content is logically cohesive; and "seems" like one site or is of one strong theme, don't use subdomains.

If you can design the site around "subthemes," then you might benefit by using subdomains. If you're using subdomains, be extra sure that the site is completely clean from a page spam (in the search engine sense) point of view. Duplicate (or seemingly duplicate) content is, on some search engines, as likely to give you SE problems (read: banning or de-listing) on subdomains as it is on separate second-level domains.


There can be clear advantages organizationally with using subdomains, I'm only cautioning about one possible drawback. As in most things, order your priorities. From a search engine positioning standpoint, though, I've never seen any evidence that having a keyword in a subdomain name is of any more value than would be having that keyword in a subdirectory name.

Your replies have completely cleared this up for me. I see the advantages are several and not just superficial. I think I now have a good idea of when to use a sub v. a directory.

Thanks to all.
-lateron

JayC is right on point in discussing the limitations of subdomains from a search engine perspective. I'd just like to add in the specific case of Google, sub-domains are penalized.

As a general rule of thumb, a directory on a site has a Google Page Rank (PR) one below the main page. For example, if http://www.example.com is a PR-5 as soon as you make http://www.example.com/newdirectory it will likely be a PR-4.

If instead you make http://newdomain.example.com it will start at < PR-1 until you get some links to it.

Additionally subdomains unlike directories aren't case sensative (the files being called still are, but just going to the subdomain one wouldn't have to worry about casing). Also, depending on how the creation of the subdomains is setup, they can be used to shorten a url. What I used to like doing (until I moved to a cpanel server and was then unable to), was putting any sub users of the domain in a users directory:

mydomain.com/users/theirname/

However I gave them the subdomain:
theirname.mydomain.com

It shortened it up a bit, but if you go with somewhere that allows you to point the subdomain to a certain directory then it lets you organized the back structure that only you see, while keeping the outer structure simple and short.

Originally posted by figment88
As a general rule of thumb, a directory on a site has a Google Page Rank (PR) one below the main page. For example, if http://www.example.com is a PR-5 as soon as you make http://www.example.com/newdirectory it will likely be a PR-4.

If instead you make http://newdomain.example.com it will start at < PR-1 until you get some links to it.
Those are interesting numbers, figment. Just curious, do you have a source for the SE Ranking algorithms? I'd like to do some follow up research on it. Thanx!

I don't think anyone can provide you with this kind of algo. This what was mentioned, is what is usually observed in the internet.

Nainil.

subdomains I think give a much cleaner more oranganised look. they are easier to manage. however don't overuse them . I just use them for the important secions on my website (ie. forums, hosting)

From a web development stand point....I like subdomains because they have their own document root.

For example, if I have www.mydomain.com/newsite

That site can't have it's own images directory that can be reference as /images in the code. Because /images at that point go to the main sites' images directory.

However, if I have newsite.mydomain.com, and point it to a subdirectory of my main domain site....it can have it's own /images, /cgi-bin....everything.

Makes moving the site to it's permanent location easier too.


-k

As a rule of thumb, I say use Subdomains for *related services only. Say I wanted to create a design site off of xshare.org. I'd probobly make it designs.xshare.org. Or domain registration? domains.xshare.org. That way it makes sense. In cases like that, of a related, yet not directly coherent, site, subdomains look better than directories.

Hope that helped.

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