Back in the day, running several sites alongside one another was advised so that companies could target their desired market effectively.

There is no right or wrong answer when trying to decide whether to manage multiple sites or run just the one, but there are pros and cons to both which we’ll explore in this blog so that you can make a more informed decision about which choice is right for you.

To explore this topic further, we’re going to use our client, Rap Interiors, who faced this exact challenge, as an example. Rap is a refurbishment and fit-out specialist who works with a variety of commercial businesses to renovate spaces.

When we first met Rap back in 2015, they had several websites all catering to different industry clients, i.e. a site each for Schools, Offices, Care-Homes, Furniture-Specific and more. For the Rap team, this meant that it was a mammoth task every time they wanted to add or update content, it also meant they didn’t have one authoritative voice in the industry and that they were struggling to cross-sell their services. Other cons included having to pay more for development time when they wanted to make brand-wide design and structural changes to their sites. Due to their services being siloed, Rap was missing referral opportunities. We went through the following pros and cons with the client to help them decide what to do next:

Pros for managing multiple websites

• A specific focus for each one – ensuring no confusion
• Rank well for specific key terms

Cons for managing multiple websites

• Pay for numerous domains, hosting, SSL certificates
• More expensive to make design changes, updates and redesigns
• More work to maintain and update for the team
• Harder to cross-sell products
• Harder to build an authoritative, credible brand

Pros for managing one website

• Only pay for an update once for one site
• Only pay for one domain, hosting and SSL certificate
• Maintain brand value
• Build an authoritative voice
• Easier to manage internally
• Create a more strategic approach to your marketing efforts

Cons for managing one website

• Requires a specialist Search strategy to go after multiple service, industry or location keywords
• Need to ensure the site is laid out well in terms of structure and design to assure each client is catered for in the right way

When presented with the pros and cons of each, Rap decided to merge their sites and create one authentic brand. Rap utilises SEO and PPC alongside a carefully crafted UX and UI design to cater to each of their clients via one central website.

Since the site’s initial launch in 2016 and continuous improvement to its design and content since then, Rap has experienced substantial growth and return on their investment. In terms of the site’s performance, they have a healthy level of user engagement with an average session duration of 2.53 mins, a bounce rate of 57.28% and more than 50% of all traffic coming from organic search.

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