A Subdomain Can Add Value To Your Site
Creating subdomains allow you to expand your brand without having to go through the entire site creation and brand development process from scratch. Sure, when you start with a subdomain you have the ability to create a new site from scratch, but you also have your existing brand and domain authority that you can lean on.
Even though subdomains can bring a lot of value to your site, there are still a few downsides youll want to be aware of. These include:
Which Hosting Plan Should I Choose For My Subdomain Requirements
Subdomains are aliases of your primary domain name. You can manage them in the âMultisiteâ section of your OVHcloud Control Panel.
Your primary domain name has three aliases:
- mydomain.com
- www.mydomain.com
- URL to access the hosting cluster
In addition to these initial three domains reserved for your website, the possible number of aliases you can add depends on the hosting plan you choose, and is set according to the recommended number of websites. For example, with the Professional plan, which includes 10 websites, you can hierarchise your website with a maximum of 7 additional subdomains.
Table comparing the number of possible subdomains for each Web Hosting plan:
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Separate Your Support Or Resource Pages
As we briefly touched on above, its common to create a separate site knowledgebase, or resource and tutorial library. You can find one of these here at HostGator Support, , and all over the web.
If you run a website that offers a technical product or service, you may find value in creating a tutorial library for your visitors. By keeping it separate from the rest of your site, you allow yourself to create a unique design and layout that can intuitively present all that information.
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Add Ns Records To Route Traffic To Your Subdomain
Note: The previous steps also apply for cross-account scenarios where the hosted zone for the domain and the subdomain are in different accounts.
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Closing Thoughts: Making Subdomains Work For You
Hopefully, by now you have a greater understanding of subdomains as a whole, why theyre used, and finally how to go about creating your own right here at HostGator.
When youre thinking of creating a subdomain you should do so with serious thoughtespecially if its going to play a central role in how your site is organized and have an impact on how your visitors will interact with your site.
Luckily, if you do decide to add a subdomain to your existing domain, its very easy to do so right here as HostGator. The only thing you need first is an epic domain name!
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What Is A Subdomain
A subdomain is a prefix that you add to your domain name. This prefix-added URL will point to a completely different website.
Here is an example:
The domain for this blog is: https://cloudzat.com. This is the main domain.
This is a subdomain for the blog: https://subdomain.cloudzat.com/.
A subdomain has the following parts:
- The protocol: https: The protocol is nothing more than a set of guidelines.
- The TLD : .com. This can be .net, .org, or any other extension.
- The SLD : Cloudzat. It is the domain name that you purchase from any domain registrar.
- The prefix: subdomain. The prefix always comes after the double forward slashes and before the SLD.
So, a subdomain can be anything. There are a few examples:
- https://docs.cloudzat.com/
- https://support.cloudzat.com/
You get the point, right? The prefix can be anything.
A subdomain reflects a completely different URL from the original domain. The website that a user reaches using the subdomain is a completely different website.
I will get to this later in this article.
When Should I Consider Creating A Website With Subdomains
Subdomains are employed in several common use cases. In the example above, the developer organised their website into three independent sections according to their activity: a photo area , a discussion area and a shopping area .
International websites, or one with a multi-local presence, often organise their sites into subdomains. It is common to encounter a website structure such as: âuk.mysite.comâ, âfrance.mysite.comâ or âlondon.mysite.comâ.
You can also consider a combination of this content tiering, such as âuk.blog.mysite.comâ, which would be associated with your websiteâs /blog/uk directory.
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Will My Ssl Certificate Cover My Subdomain
We always recommend using an SSL certificate on your website to offer your visitors a secure browsing experience. However, only certain SSL certificates have the ability to cover subdomains. Once you add a subdomain to your website, youll need to upgrade your SSL certificate to one that offers the wildcard feature. When a wildcard SSL certificate in place, it will cover all future subdomains that you add to your website.
Restrict Subdomain Access To Addon Domains
Each Addon Domain requires a subdomain. Using mod_rewrite, you can stop people from using the addon domain as a subdomain of the primary domain.
Put this in the .htaccess file located at the subdomains folder, changing the subdomain, primarydomain.com, and addondomain.com:
RewriteEngine OnRewriteCond % ^subdomain.primarydomain.com$ RewriteCond % ^www.subdomain.primarydomain.com$ RewriteCond % ^addondomain.com$RewriteCond % ^/$RewriteRule ^$ http://www.addondomain.com/
For further assistance, you may contact our Chat Support or Phone Support via 888-401-4678. You may also refer to our Knowledge Base articles to help answer common questions and guide you through various setup, configuration, and troubleshooting steps.
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How To Create A Sub
The usage of sub-subdomain may vary depending on your needs. You may want to create a sub-subdomain to make it read a complete sentence, for example, the.outstanding.homedecor.com, or for any other reasons you might have.
Imagine having a button on your hosting control panel that will let you create a sub-subdomain easily. If you are using cPanel, chances are, you already have the option on your control panel.
In this tutorial, we will guide you to create a sub-subdomain using cPanel subdomain creation section as well as using A-record .
Dont worry, its not as hard as it may sound, really!
Separate Your Blog From Your Website
The final common reason to consider using a subdomain is to separate your blog from the rest of your website. A lot of startups and eCommerce companies will choose to separate their blogs if they serve a different focus from the rest of their site.
If your site wasnt built using a CMS that allows you to create and manage content easily, then this will enable you to install a CMS like WordPress on your subdomain, so you can more easily run a blog on your site.
Just keep in mind that youll want to try and align the design of your blog with your existing site, so your visitors dont get confused when they navigate between your blog and your website.
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Select The Way Your Subdomain Will Be Connected From The List Below:
Catch-all subdomainSubdomain that points to an IP addressA RecordType Host Subdomain that points to a IP address of the destination hostnameCNAME RecordHostValueALIAS record Host ValueSubdomain that forwards to a link/URLURL Redirect Record TypeHost Value Forward typeSubdomain that points to a server nameNS RecordType Host Save All Changes 30 minutesCatch-all subdomainhere
Brand Aesthetic Can Suffer
If youre creating a subdomain that will still be an ongoing aspect of your site, like a blog or eCommerce store, then youll need to take extra time to ensure your design remains consistent. This is especially true if the software youre using for your subdomain is different than your primary domain.
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Laravel Subdomains How To Create And Manage Subdomains In Your Apps
Modern web applications usually perform more than one function. They often have more than one section, offer more than one service, and have a couple of clients.
But the more functionality the app has, the clumsier your route paths will get.
What if there was a way to separate all these parts into smaller components with better and cleaner routes? Something that users could easily access and use independently, under the same website?
Fortunately, there is such a way: Subdomains.
Name Of The Subdomain
The name of the subdomain is placed in front of the domain name and can be chosen freely. Popular subdomain names are for example shop.your-domain.com or blog.your-domain.com. It is not necessary to put an additional www in front of the subdomain name.
The version www.your-domain.com is automatically available for all of your domains and has the same usage type as the actual domain. If you want to set a different usage type, you can always create a subdomain www.your-domain.com manually and adjust it to your needs.
For more information on the structure and length of subdomains or allowed characters, please see this article.
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Why Would I Use A Subdomain
Before we show you how to create a subdomain, its important to cover exactly why youd want to use a subdomain in the first place.
There are multiple different applications for subdomains, whether youre creating one for a temporary project, or you want to use one for the entirety of the time your site remains online.
Below youll learn about the eight most common scenarios where a subdomain is used.
How To Set Up And Use Subdomains
For this section, were going to focus on how to create subdomains using cPanel, given that its currently the most popular hosting panel available. If your host doesnt use cPanel, youll need to get in touch with them and check out their documentation concerning subdomains. If youve never accessed your cPanel before, keep reading well cover the process in full.
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Cater To Different Markets Or Languages
If you have a large brand with a global audience, then you may want to create separate versions of your site to speak to each audience in their local language.
Now, this is a large task, especially when youre maintaining multiple different websites with varying languages. But, if youre operating at a global scale, then this is probably something you have the budget for.
Another common approach for large businesses that speak to multiple different market segments is to create separate subdomains for each of these products or services you offer. For example, if youre a large marketing company which provides services to real estate agents, financial services firms, and corporations, you could create specific subdomains for each of these like, realestate.marketing.com, financial.marketing.com, and corporate.marketing.com.
Where Do Subdomain Files Go
Older versions of cPanel required a subdomains files to be stored in the parent domains directory. This is no longer required. The latest best practices in security recommend that you do not place a domain or subdomain inside of another domains directory. cPanel, by default, will create a new, separate directory for your subdomains in your home folder.
Now that you have a subdomain, you can build out an entirely new site without needing to register a new domain.
John-Paul is an Electronics Engineer that spent most of his career in IT. He has been a Technical Writer for InMotion since 2013.
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Benefits Of Creating Subdomains
- Subdomains are easy to create without any additional cost.
- It increases the site crawl rate and helps to get higher search engine rankings through topical authority.
- A website can be well organized with subdomains and yes, the structured content would attract more visitors.
- You can easily establish the brand identity for your business with the domain extension.
- It is more likely to target the audience in different geographic locations to get the international reach for your business.
- You may launch an eCommerce store or a mobile site through a subdomain.
- If you want to look at the features and test the performance of the plugins and themes, the subdomain will come to the rescue.
- When any of your subdomains got penalized by Google, then it doesnt affect the other subdomains and primary site.
- You may use the section of the website for learning purposes and do experiments to understand the search engine algorithms.
- Subdomains are well suitable for working as a team. You dont need to share the login credentials of the main site, instead, you may give access to the specific sub-sites to get the job done like editing/writing the content, testing the third-party tools installed, etc.
How To Manage Subdomains
You can manage your subdomains from the same cPanel page, under SubDomains and Modify a Subdomain. You will find all the created subdomains and their management tools to their right.
Document Root contains a link allowing you to directly modify a subdomain’s files with cPanel’s File Manager.
In the Actions column, you will find two tools: Manage Redirection and Delete. The Manage Redirection option allows you to redirect the subdomain to another address. For example, you could create a subdomain m which implements mobile access to your site the address m.mydomain.com would then take you to an interface designed to be viewed on mobile devices. The Delete link allows you to delete the selected subdomain.
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What Is A Subdomain How To Create Sub Domains
Ever wondered what sub domains are? A subdomain is a third level domain which can be used for different purposes. Its created in a sub directory on your web server. Which means a new folder is created and that becomes your third level domain.
Example: If your have created a sub domain and the URL is http://support.example.com
Log In Into Your Cpanel And Find Subdomains Option
Your hosting provider will give you access to cPanel. The login credentials will be there in the welcome email you receive.
Use the credentials to login.
A typical cPanel will look like this:
You will notice how everything is segmented into groups. Scroll down to find the group called Domains. This is how that group should look like:
You will find the option called Subdomains. In the image above, I have highlighted it using a red box.
This option will be present irrespective of which shared hosting provider you are using. Yes, the option for subdomains will be there even when you are using hosting providers that do not use cPanel.
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