Landing Page vs Mirror Web site

[kvegas]

Hello All,

First like me thank in advance for all the informative information that I have found on this site already inregards to SEM.

I am looking to do so SEM for my firm (legal) and have spoken to a few vendors my question is there an advantage to using a landing page vs "mirroring my site"? any success stpries either way?

[Jazajay]

When you say mirroring your site.
Do your mean duplicating the pages under a different domain so you have 2 pages in the SERP's for that keyword?

Jaza

[kvegas]

Yes sorry wasn't made clear but duplicating under a different domain

[Jazajay]

Then the site that is duplicated would be penalized for duplicate content.
Now it really depends on several criteria.
1. Your Creativeness. //that words getting used loads around here recently.
2. Knowing your area.
3. Time available.

If you created a seperate site with a seperate navigation, header, footer and most importnatly content. You then did differnet link building for each. You could then possibly have four SERP's on 1 page rather than just 2.

However...
You would have to be good at the above 3 to have a have any chance of pulling this off. If you get it wrong, then your main domain will suffer and you wont rank at all, yet alone hold 4 SERP's. Due to you splitting your content, links and more importantly, time.

I would have to know my market inside and out before I attempted that.

98% of the time an optimized landing page is the way to go. That said you would need to optimize both sites to pull it off any way and this would have to be a long term plan to get either site to rank well with no black hat. IMO.

Possible but not practical in most situations.

Jaza

[kvegas]

Thanks for the information, One last question will the landing page or reverse proxy site help any in natural or organic listing or is that a "bill of goods" some vendors are offering in their SEM package?

[jimbeetle]

I'm a bit confused as to exactly what this topic is about. Are you talking about a search engine optimization package? A search engine marketing package that might include pay per click? Why a mirror site? Exactly how does a reverse proxy fit in?

[kvegas]

I was asking a seperate question and forgive me not as verse in the field as yet but trying to learn more specifically if my company would be better served going with a vendor like Reachlocal for SEM marketing or another who uses a landing page to drive traffic from search engines, we are a law firm in Ga

[Jazajay]

Hi Kvegas
I'm being thick.
What's a reverse proxy site?
I know what a reverse proxy is but cant see how it could be a whole site.

Sorry being thick.

Jaza

[kvegas]

Again brought on by my lack of knowledge in the subject matter but guess utimately trying to seee which would doing the reverse proxy be advantageous over creating a landing page or are they one in the same focusing on PPC and no real boost organic or natural search?

[Jazajay]

Ok when you say a reverse proxy do you mean you have/would have 2 sites on 2 seperate severs hidden behind a proxy server. They are then accessed through this reverse proxy?

So when a request comes in for domain A/site1 it goes to the proxy instead of directly to the server, the proxy then redirects it to the server responsible for domain A.

If the request comes in for domain B/site2 to the reverse proxy it then redirects it's request to the other server?

The server then sends the information to the proxy who then redirects it back on to the user?

Again brought on by my lack of knowledge in the subject matter

That's alright Jim bobs often got a lack of knowledge in this subject.
Only joking Jim.

Are you then saying if this would be better than creating a site with out the proxy - So requests go straight to the server rather than the proxy then the server?

[kvegas]

I am trying to make the marketing decisions right now on who to choose to do our SEM, I have it narrowed to 2 vendors Reachloacal or Yellow pages who have a search product that creates a landing page to drive traffic, We have one website so just based on the two vendors looking for feedback on which method could be more effective for our firm.

[Jazajay]

Ok could you explain how the reverse proxy comes into play?
That's sort of throwing me.

Jaza

[kvegas]

My understanding that the method Reach local will use is either a reverse proxy or a proxy server as opposed to the landing page method, so trying to get feedback on which method may bring better results or personal experience from folks who have used either

[Jazajay]

Well I don't use a reverse proxy.
That said I cant see that being good for rankings IMO when 2 or more sites are used. Maybe someone would like to correct me. But I would say the landing page method is the better approach IMO.

Jaza

[JohnW]

>will the landing page or reverse proxy site help any in natural or organic listing or is that a "bill of goods" some vendors are offering in their SEM package

Landing pages are a required strategy for PPC campaigns, but used in the context of organic rankings this term could mean something that you might not want to do, or something you must do very carefully.

There are few if any legitimate reasons for using a reverse proxy for organic rankings or PPC.

And IMO anything with the word mirror in it sounds dangerous. Allowing search engines to see the same page located on more than a single URL can be a bad problem.

Some of this sounds a bit fishy, I suggest you do more research and get more answers from your vendors.

[Jazajay]

Yeah I agree with John.
The only use of a reverse proxy as I can see.
Is if you have 1 site with different servers that bring in the data.
IE a main server that generates your HTML, 2 image servers, 1 for tracking and 1 for email.

They then all come together.

2 or more sites coming from one wouldn't be advisable.

Also you would have a huge performance hit with all the extra redirection of the HTTP requests to the different servers and then back to the proxy then off to the client. Rather than just 1 to the main server and 1 to the client IMO.

Jaza

[cryptblade]

Originally Posted by kvegas

My understanding that the method Reach local will use is either a reverse proxy or a proxy server as opposed to the landing page method, so trying to get feedback on which method may bring better results or personal experience from folks who have used either

I was just reading this and - not sure if you are still checking on this - but I want to chime in on Reachlocal vs. Yellowpages for "SEM". Are you looking for an SEM company or an SEM solution?

What they are doing - both companies - is creating a type of advertising platform for you. This is not really doing SEM for your company as it is fitting your company into their pre-packaged SEM platform. Another similar type of company is Yodle.com.

All of them have this myopic, templated," proprietary" way of doing PPC for you. They also like to claim they "partner" with Google and Yahoo, etc.

That aside, if that is what you are looking for, then may God be with you. If you are looking for a search engine marketing company to actively manage your own AdWords or Yahoo PPC accounts or even to do SEO for you, you need to look at other companies because that's not what they do.

[onlineseo]

Originally Posted by kvegas

Yes sorry wasn't made clear but duplicating under a different domain

It would be similar to performing HARA-KIRI ( Self-suicidal ritual) on your own website.

Never ever try to duplicate content on other websites. This will seriously effect your future rankings on search engines.