Question

Topic: SEO/SEM

A Generic Website + A Branded Website : Potential

Posted by shrinivas.ayyar on 8/6/2010 at 10:12 PM ET 250 Points
We intend launching 2 separate websites for a hospital. One will be a direct website with the brand name of the hospital as the domain name. The second will be a generic medical term as the domain name.

The first website: brand name one will have details of doctors, services offered etc.

The second generic one will have community sharing, useful medical tips, videos etc.

From an SEO perspective, is it a good idea to have 2 different websites? Will it confuse visitors? Will the differentiation work? Or will it confuse visitors?

Providing generic information without in your face sales can give you brownie points and position you as an expert. That is our strategy. Can you provide us examples of companies that have successfully done this?

What do you feel about this two pronged web strategy from an SEM and lead generation perspective?
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RESPONSES

  • Posted by shrinivas.ayyar on 8/6/2010 at 10:54 PM Author
    @Karen: Thanks for participating. Let me clarify: which according to you is a better idea in terms of lead generation: Mayo Clinic doctors creating community sharing within their website or creating a separate domain where doctors of Mayo Clinic can provide generic information.

    Which one will you trust more especially if the hospital is not as known as Mayo clinic?
  • Posted by Gail@PUBLISIDE on 8/6/2010 at 11:16 PM Accepted
    From a consumer standpoint, I think visitors would be confused with two different sites. I think you can optimize your content by keeping everything under the hospital umbrella. It's also much more credible.

    If your doctors want to identify themselves apart from as well as a member of the hospital, you could offer links to their websites or blogs at which they could answer the questions I think you have in mind.
  • Posted on 8/7/2010 at 5:57 AM Accepted
    I can't understand why you have to make two separate websites. I believe you can generate every information you want to impart to people under one website (hospital website). Focus on the hospital website to make it credible. Provide advice section on the website, and you can have your doctors answer them.
  • Posted on 8/7/2010 at 7:27 AM Accepted
    I'd trust a site that identifies itself clearly (e.g., Mayo Clinic) more than I'd trust a bunch of generic doctors.

    My approach to this would be to have one website, not two. It's OK to have a "medical information" section of the website and a "nuts-and-bolts" section on the same site. In fact, it's probably better for the hospital's reputation to have all the information in one place.

    I don't see much advantage to the two-sites approach, and it will probably hurt both sites if they're separate. Those who go to a "generic" site will wish the information came from a more credible source, and those who go to the hospital site will appreciate the service offered by the hospital.
  • Posted on 8/7/2010 at 8:08 PM Accepted
    You would be doubling your misery. I can't imagine the reason to do all the work on the generic site when it won't increase brand awareness and trust. IMHO Bad idea. Dan Derrick
  • Posted by excellira on 8/7/2010 at 11:31 PM Accepted
    Typically most organizations don't have the resources to manage one site let alone two and my recommendation would be to build one.

    In this case I think we need to know more about the intent of the 2nd site. Clearly the main site is a business site. What specifically is the purpose of the 2nd site? If you are looking to have general content (including user-generated) then I'm not certain why a 2nd site is necessary.

    However, if the 2nd site will be specifically focused on a particular disease or subject matter then a separate site may be advantageous. Users will find the information they require without wading through all the business pages, and search engines will recognize the authority the site may have in its niche because it's so highly focused.

    Can you provide more info about the 2nd site?
  • Posted by shrinivas.ayyar on 8/13/2010 at 6:20 AM Author
    Thanks a ton. These answers helped us in fine-tuning our strategy.
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