Crappy user experience indeed...very similar to the Craigslist or About.com' href='http://About.com">About.com'>http://About.com">About.com subdomain effect which often infiltrates the SERPs in a similar fashion.
Any relation between Google's tolerance for SEO practices and the size of the AdWords spend? The true "separation of church and state-ers" at Google would say no way, although I have seen a propensity (real or not) for either ignorance or a turning of a blind eye to SEO "gray hat" for those who spend on Google. Maybe a grassy knoll? Maybe not.
Don't know, JP. I do know first-hand that Google won't bat an eye at dumping six-figures a month in adwords spend. (long story and ancient history, which I'm happy to share over a beer for anyone who's interested.)
I tend to think it has less to do with adwords spend and more to do with user expectations that a certain site will appear up top in the search results. When you search for shoes, if Zappos doesn't show, there's a problem.
However, that Zappos shows 5 times, is a big problem as well that I expect Google will want to do something about.
I think you hit the nail on the head Scott.
People expect certain results to appear at the top, and Google tries to make sure that happens. The crazy thing is that while at one time the natural search results were grand equalizer for marketers, now it seems that brand recognition is really driving the search results more than actual optimization (to a certain extent at least.)
This is extremely apparent in the insurance space where affiliate sites that rank well are quickly removed from the first page of any competitive term.
Offline ad spending now heavily dictates online search results in competitive vertical. The rich get richer, etc.
I think you hit the nail on the head Scott.
People expect certain results to appear at the top, and Google tries to make sure that happens. The crazy thing is that while at one time the natural search results were grand equalizer for marketers, now it seems that brand recognition is really driving the search results more than actual optimization (to a certain extent at least.)
This is extremely apparent in the insurance space where affiliate sites that rank well are quickly removed from the first page of any competitive term.
Offline ad spending now heavily dictates online search results in competitive vertical. The rich get richer, etc.
While each its nice to have multiple subdomains listed in the serps at one time, I'm sure each domain required its own individual links and optimisation campaign.
For example if you look at randomblog. blogger.com or randomblog. wordpress.com - they are all subdomains within a powerful main domain, however they won't just feature in SERPs without any effort from the users.
I have had great experiences using subdomains as well, and while this may appear spammy, ultimately it is an Internet Marketer's purpose to get their client out in front of the people as much as possible. If you dominate the first page with multiple site links, product reviews on other sites, WIkis, etc., then you have earned your paycheck!
Kun, no doubt it took links to each subdomain to help these rankings. Sorta makes the point that this was deliberate.
PublisherZilla and Guerilla: You say brilliant. I say reckless. Rank well now at any cost is very short-sighted. Product reviews on other sites, wikis, etc. is great. Duplicate content on subdomains not so much.
I've seen that sort of thing a lot in the gambling industry, it does seem to be spreading a bit though, in fact, I've often wondered between separating ideas with / or . IF you look in your adsence account, it's simple to see that google considers subdomains separate sites.. but with this exploit being used more and more, those pages have got to lose some weight very soon....
One of my clients got into big trouble with Yahoo over subdomain use exactly like this and actually got removed from the serps for a while. Yahoo insisted that the subdomains be converted to subdirectories. We did and got back in.
Compared to what Zappos is doing, however, my client's use of subdomains was minimal. I do suspect this will backfire on them eventually. It is definitely spammy and intended for no other reason but to rank.
But, it's nice while it lasts.
I think from a branding standpoint it is a good idea though abit overboard, from a SE standpoint the pages should all be different, no dup content. Many companies do not realize this is a great way to tell their story in a different way, that is a good thing just takes more work and good writers. :):)
see http://sphinn.com/story/2961' href='http://sphinn.com/story/2961">http://sphinn.com/story/2961'>http://sphinn.com/story/2961">http://sphinn.com/story/2961
Only the large companies that spend lots on PPC can get away with having a lot of sub domains. If a small web site were to try this, Google would shut them down. I believe Aaron Wall has written about this a few times. I sure hope that Google will do something to limit the effect of these sub domains in the future.
It is true any one can create a passive income at home,
its no big deal no a days. You can also start off ,getting forms and all kinds of
legal documents. Its no big deal there are a lot opportunities out there and all kinds of
other affiliate marketing programs out there, so what
are you waiting for get started.
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RSS
http://www.zappos.com http://canada.zappos.com
Category-based http://running.zappos.com http://outdoors.zappos.com http://rideshop.zappos.com http://couture.zappos.com
Brand-based http://clarks.zappos.com http://privo.zappos.com http://stuartweitzman.zappos.com http://indigo.zappos.com http://tarynrose.zappos.com http://bostonian.zappos.com
You can get a good look at many of them with this google site search.
And while the navigation is changed and trimmed down on some of these subdomains, you can change out the subdomain in many cases and get some strange results.
Looking for a 4" heel running shoe?
Where am I going with all this? It's wreaking a bit of havok in google's search results. It's not difficult to find a search where zappos dominates 3 or 4 of the top ten natural searches with these subdomains, with many more on pages 2+.
Check out this search for "clarks trinidad". From where I sit, they dominate 4 of the top 8 spots plus a product search result at the top.
Is this a good user experience, Google?
Is this a happy accident?
While this may not be their primary purpose for this, I'm sure they're enjoying the traffic. It's all a bit spammy in my opinion and it could backfire. Well, it should backfire. Big companies have a way of getting away with this.