This begs other questions. Do redirects hurt SEO? Is a HubSpot domain really an advantage? Read on to find out.
To move your blog or not to move your blog? That is the question.
Proponents of the “don’t move it” camp will argue that any adjustment to your blog domain can harm your SEO, lower SERP rankings, and slow down lead generation (at least in the short term). On the other hand, moving your blog onto a HubSpot subdomain can offer distinct advantages, and there’s also good reason to believe that the demise of your SEO has been greatly exaggerated.
Let’s walk through how subdomains work, the possible — but often overstated — effects of moving your blog, and why a new subdomain can actually be the optimal choice.
A website's main page typically lives at a base URL address (the top-level “domain,” such as www.hubspot.com). You can extend this URL address with additional text, following a “/” (such as www.hubspot.com/why-go-hubspot), to direct visitors to another page or directory that’s also contained within that same top-level domain.
When you move your blog to a subdomain, it may resemble the main domain, but it’s actually functionally a separate website because the core URL address is different (for example, blog.hubspot.com). It’s called a “subdomain” because, in practice, it’s a sub-website of your main website. Think of it as part of the family and under your umbrella, but separate. Sort of like your website’s pet puppy.
This means that when you migrate your blog to the subdomain, all of the individual URLs of the blog posts must also change. Some folks will throw red flags here, because any links pointing to the original blog pages will now be wrong and “broken,” potentially impacting traffic, SEO, and the user experience. However, this pitfall can be seamlessly solved through URL redirection.