Room At The Top: Google’s Domain Diversity Changes

While you may not be familiar with domain diversity, odds are that it affects how your website appears in search results. Luckily, as of June 2019 Google made small changes to its search algorithms to include a more diverse group of domain names that will most likely improve your search results in one way or another. Learn more about these exciting changes and what they mean for your website below. 

What is domain diversity?

In June 2019, Google SearchLiaison tweeted, “Have you ever done a search and gotten many listings all from the same site in the top results? We’ve heard your feedback about this and wanting more variety.” This introduction was followed by an explanation that the changes weren’t exactly an update, rather an attempt to free up space previously dominated by the same website. Google now wants to display no more than two links to any one website. 

Domain diversity means that if a search is requested, a variety of options will appear in the results rather than a monopoly of one website with a dozen or more subdomains that also fit the search request. This creates additional room for smaller websites that might otherwise be dropped from first-page search results. 

Google writes that subdomains will now be considered part of the main domain. For example, if you have blog.yourdomain.com, it will now most likely index as part of your main website. However, Google has reserved the right to not be perfect within each search. “However, we may still show more than two in cases where our systems determine it’s especially relevant to do so for a particular search,” Google wrote. They continued, “However, subdomains are treated as separate sites for diversity purposes when deemed relevant to do so,”

What does this mean for your website?

If you already dominate search engine result pages for specific queries, then chances are not much will change. Your website links will still appear close to the top of search results, but there may be fewer links to your pages than you are accustomed to. 

If your web pages do not typically appear in the first few search result pages, Google’s focus on domain diversity will most likely free up space for your website to move up through the ranks. However, recent changes are not a guarantee that your website will search better.   

Need a hand with your SEO efforts?

For website owners who prefer to focus on their business rather than their search engine results, you are in luck. If SEO is not your favorite part of owning a small business or blog, don’t worry. UK2.NET can help. 

Our Website SEO Guru can quickly scan your website, look for anything that may damage your search engine value, find areas where you can easily improve your ranking, and walk you step by step through the process of boosting your website SEO. For more information on how Website SEO Guru can help get your website closer to the top of the first search engine results page, visit UK2.NET today.