What Is a Subdomain? (+ Basics for Business Leaders)

All right, you have a shiny new website domain you just purchased from GoDaddy or an alternative domain name listing service. Now, you need to structure your new website so it's easy for you to manage and for your customers to navigate.

Or, let's say you already have a website that you've migrated to the HubSpot platform but want to set up a dedicated set of pages for your blog or a customer-accessible knowledge base. 

Where do you go from here?

Don't panic, the answer is quite simple; set up a subdomain on your site.

What is a subdomain? How can you set one up in HubSpot? Why should you go to the trouble of creating specific subdomains?

Discover how subdomains can help your business improve the way it markets, services, and sells your customers.

Defining Subdomains: A Gateway to Enhanced Site Structure

A subdomain is a tool that website owners use to establish a hierarchical structure on their website under their root directory. The subdomain creates a kind of "mini website" under the main website domain's umbrella. It's still strongly associated with the main domain but typically has different content and its site health is tracked separately from that root domain.

In the address bar at the top of the Google Chrome window, the subdomain appears as a prefix to the main domain name.

For example, if your main domain is 'example.com', a subdomain could be 'blog.example.com' or 'shop.example.com'. Each subdomain can have its own unique content and functionality, making it easier for users to navigate to specific areas of your website.

Using subdomains creates a hierarchy within your website, making it easier to manage and maintain. It also provides a clear separation between different sections of your website, allowing you to target specific audiences or meet specific business goals more effectively with each subdomain.

The Strategic Advantages of Using Subdomains for Your Business

Using subdomains can offer several benefits for your business:

• Improved Website Organization: Subdomains allow you to categorize and organize your website's content, making it easier for users to find what they're looking for.
• Better User Experience: By creating separate subdomains for different purposes, you can provide a more tailored and personalized experience for your visitors. How important is UX? Abmatic AI notes that poor UX has an impact on bounce rate, user time on site, and lead conversion rate.
• Enhanced SEO: Using subdomains can help improve your search engine optimization by targeting specific keywords or topics within different subdomains. This lets you enhance SEO while catering to different target audiences.
• Greater Site Scalability: Subdomains allow for easy scalability and expansion as your business grows. You can add new subdomains to accommodate new product types, services, or target markets. This helps make growing your site easier than overloading your root directory with everything you add to your business over the years. Also, if you close down a product or service, you can shut down the subdomain and redirect it rather than having to painstakingly set up URL redirects for each individual page on the subdomain.
• Increased Branding Opportunities: Each subdomain can provide unique branding opportunities, helping to reinforce your brand identity across different sections of your website.
• Flexibility and Experimentation: Subdomains provide flexibility to try out new ideas or test different strategies without affecting your main website pages. Using these sites to test new design or website UI elements can help you test their efficacy and impact on user experience.

Step-by-Step Guide to Setting Up Subdomains in HubSpot

Setting up subdomains in HubSpot is a straightforward process. Here is a step-by-step guide (Note, this assumes you've already connected your main domain to HubSpot):

• Log in to your HubSpot account and navigate to the Settings menu (click the gear icon in the upper right of the main HubSpot nav menu).
• Under the "Tools" header in the left nav menu, click on the "Content" dropdown.
• Select "Domains & URLs" from the dropdown.
• On the domains tab (which should open by default), scroll down to the "Secondary domains" section and click on the "Connect a secondary domain" button.
  • Note: If you are connecting a reverse proxy, HubSpot recommends toggling the "Connect with HubSpot's built-in delivery network (CDN)" option off.
• Click "Connect" to continue.
• In the pop-up box, choose what kinds of content the subdomain will host:
  • Website pages
  • Blogs
  • Landing pages
  • Marketing emails
  • Sales & service emails
  • Knowledge base content
  • Customer portal
• Enter the desired subdomain name and select the main domain it should be associated with.
• Configure the DNS settings by adding a CNAME record or an A record, depending on your DNS provider.
• Verify the setup and wait for the DNS changes to propagate.
  • Note: It can take between 15 and 80 minutes for DNS records to finish verfication.
• Once the subdomain is set up, you can start creating content and customizing it according to your needs.

Types of Subdomains You Should Create for Your Business

So, what kinds of subdomains should you create for your business? The answer might vary depending on your business's nature and your goals for it. Here are a few common examples of subdomains used by different businesses:

• Dedicated Blogging Subdomains. A subdomain for publishing informative blog posts related to your industry. It allows your business to establish thought leadership and attract organic traffic.
• Store Listing Subdomains. This subdomain type serves as an e-commerce platform, providing a seamless shopping experience for your customers. It helps enable your business to focus on product showcasing and online sales.
• Knowledge Base Subdomains. This is a subdomain where you can post informative resources about your products and services for your customers. Knowledge base articles can be used to answer frequently asked questions and provide tutorials.
• Landing Page Subdomains. Using a subdomain for your landing pages is a great way to keep them organized and make them easier to sort separately from your main domain pages. 
• Customer Portal Subdomains. Give your existing customers exclusive access to tools and resources in a dedicated customer portal that requires a login to access. These portals are also useful for customer billing and account management.

By studying these examples, you can gain insights into how subdomains can be strategically utilized for different aspects of your business.

Best Practices for Managing and Optimizing Subdomains

To make the most out of your subdomains, consider the following best practices:

• Create Consistent Branding: Maintain consistent branding elements across all subdomains to reinforce your brand identity. This helps ensure your customers aren't confused by major design changes between your root domain and your subdomains.
• Provide Clear Navigation: Ensure your website's users can easily navigate between your main domain and subdomains to provide a seamless and pleasant browsing experience.
• Provide Unique Content: Create unique and valuable content for each subdomain to provide users with relevant information and encourage them to explore further. While you want the look to be consistent, your subdomains need to offer a unique value to your customers.
• Keep SEO Optimization in Mind: Optimize each subdomain for search engines by conducting keyword research, optimizing meta tags, and creating high-quality content.
• Perform Regular Maintenance: Regularly update and maintain your subdomains to ensure they are functioning properly and providing a positive user experience. A quarterly review and upkeep should be enough for most businesses, but larger organizations with more complicated websites might need to perform maintenance even more frequently than that. 
• Leverage Analytics Tracking: Set up analytics tracking for each subdomain to monitor performance, identify areas for improvement, and measure the success of your subdomain strategies. Thankfully, HubSpot has an array of reporting tools to make tracking your website's performance easy!

Need Help Building and Optimizing Your Website?

Book a meeting with the experts at Bluleadz for information and ask about our HubSpot design & dev services. Our HubSpot specialists have years of experience with the platform that you can leverage to get the most out of your HubSpot tools and resources.