Just Web Hosting Solution

When you are still new to owning your own web site, there are times when you will look at the CPanel and wonder what in the world does it all mean. There are so many configuration options that it would take many pages to really start to explain what every button is for. So we will start with one that can be useful in the further development of your web site, the sub domain. We will explain what the sub domain is and what you can use it for in the following paragraphs.

A sub domain is an extension of your main domain. For example, if you have a domain that is named “mydomain.com” and you wanted to have a URL of “mysub.mydomain.com”, the “mysub” part is the sub domain. You can use a sub domain for many things but most people use the sub domain to create a section of your web site dedicated to one particular subject. If you had a web site dealing with cars, you could create a sub domain called “ford” to be used as a section of your web site that only dealt with cars and trucks that were made by Ford. The ability to create sub domains can really help your web site stay organized for easy searching. When a sub domain is created it is similar to having a second site set up. Usually you can provide FTP access to the sub domain. This can actually allow you to set up a test portion of your web site (e.g., test.mydomain.com) so that you can test your site without impacting your main site.

That brings me to an interesting use of a sub domain. When you are trying to be indexed by a search engine for a certain particular keyword, a great way to do it is with the use of sub domains. Google and most other search engines see a sub domain just like they do a regular top level domain. This allows you to really optimize your site for a certain keyword without having to buy another domain. Using the “ford” web site as an example again, if we wrote up a section about the F150 we could probably get some traction in Google without the use of a sub domain. But if we decided to create a whole section for the F150 and put in under a sub domain, there is a reasonable chance that Google will give it a little more authority.

The ability to create sub domains can be very useful in developing a successful web site. Although I just discussed using sub domains for potential testing and segmenting your content, there are many valuable uses of sub domains. Log in to your CPanel and test out the sub domain functionality your host allows. While most webhosts offer sub domains as part of their basic hosting packages, you may want to review several web hosts to make sure that you are getting the most flexibility when it comes to sub domain usage.