I set up two sites on the same topic with similar, but not duplicate content. On one site, I used directories to divide the topics. On the other, I used subdomains. The same set of KWs were used to name directories and subdomains.

The site with directories has numerous IBLs (marketleap 789) due to actively seeking links. Each page in the directories has about 90 internal IBLs. The subdomain site has few IBLs (marketleap 62) on the www. and almost all of these are from the subdomains. The subdomains have about 4 IBLs each all from the www. I gave the subdomain site a couple of links from a third site just to get it spidered, but otherwise did not build links.

The pages in the directories are mostly PR2. The subdomains are PR0 or 1.

In Yahoo, both sites rank about the same (5 to 12) for a KW phrase that includes the directory or subdomain name. The SERPs show the directory or subdomain page optimized for that KW, not the site index that has all the IBLs.

Yahoo is giving ranking the subdomain site very well considering almost no IBLs. It's nowhere in G and M. Either Yahoo doesn't give a yodel about IBLs or it gives a subdomain a boost.

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Montana Internet Service ISP Dialup Internet Service Provider

We're finding that Google is fine with our subdomain scheme (city.st.mypages.com) but that Yahoo! and MSN both have been really reluctant to crawl it.

We had a lot of choices available - city-st.mypages.com, city.mypages.com (first city = largest, add state to others like albany (ny), albanyor), and so on.

We chose the city.st.mypages.com layout because it will let us spread the load easier if there ever comes a day when that's necessary. We can send the NY traffic to an east coast server, etc. And we think it's more "relevant" to split the state out on its own, grouping the cities within states.

But if I had it to do over, I'd have gone with city-st, I think.

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US Yellow Pages
List Your Business

I have seen the same thing in yahoo. They mostly rank well subdomains without any yahoo PR. Basically this tells us to build lots of subdomains.

I will