Quick answer
A microsite is a small, separate website, usually with its own domain or subdomain, built for one product, event, campaign or audience. It beats a normal page when the audience or brand is genuinely different from your main business, or an event needs its own home. For short campaigns, a landing page on your main site usually works better.
What counts as a microsite
A microsite sits apart from your main website. It might be a festival your business organises, a product line with its own name, a recruitment campaign, or a partnership with another company. It typically has a handful of pages, its own navigation and often its own look, and it lives at its own address, such as a separate domain or a subdomain.
The key word is separate. A microsite does not share your main site’s menus, its search reputation or its visitors, unless you deliberately connect them.
Microsite, landing page or section?
| Option | What it is | Best for | Trade-off |
|---|---|---|---|
| Landing page | One focused page on your main site | Adverts, offers, single campaigns | Limited room for depth |
| Section of your site | A group of pages within your main site | A product range or service line | Must fit the main brand |
| Microsite | A small separate website | Events, sub-brands, distinct audiences | Separate upkeep, separate SEO |
Our guide to landing page costs covers the first option in detail, and our comparison of one-page and multi-page websites helps with structure.
When a microsite wins
- A different brand. A product with its own name and look that would feel out of place on the main site.
- A different audience. A recruitment site for apprentices, for example, speaks to people who are not your customers.
- An event that needs its own programme, tickets and sponsor pages, and its own memorable address.
- A partnership where neither partner’s main site is the natural home.
When a normal page wins
- Short campaigns and adverts. A landing page on your main site borrows its trust and is quicker to build.
- Anything you want found in search. Content on your main site builds your main site’s reputation.
- Limited time or budget. One website is easier to keep updated than two.
The costs people forget
A microsite has its own domain renewal, hosting, SSL, updates, security, analytics and content to keep current. Each of those is small; together they add up, and the most common outcome is a microsite that is forgotten after the campaign and left online, out of date. Decide who owns it before you build it.
There is a search cost too. Links and mentions earned by the microsite strengthen the microsite, not your main site. For a business that wants its main website to rank, splitting effort across two domains usually slows both down.
Subdomain or separate domain?
If you do build a microsite, the address matters. A subdomain, such as festival.yourbusiness.co.uk, keeps an obvious link to your main brand and costs nothing extra to register. A separate domain, such as a festival name, is easier to say on posters and radio and stands alone as a brand. Search engines treat both largely as separate sites from your main one, so neither shares your main site’s reputation automatically. Google’s SEO starter guide covers how sites are understood, whichever you choose. Pick the address people will remember, and link the microsite and the main site to each other clearly.
Plan the ending at the start
Every microsite should have a plan for what happens after the campaign: keep it running and updated, or fold it into the main site. If you fold it in, move the useful content across and set permanent redirects from the old addresses, following Google’s guidance on moving a site with URL changes, so links and visitors still arrive somewhere useful. Keep the domain registered for a while afterwards so nobody else picks it up; Nominet’s domain support explains renewals for .uk names.
A worked example
A family-run brewery in Kent ran an annual beer festival. For years, festival information sat on a page of the brewery’s website, which was fine until the festival grew to need a programme, a map, food stall applications and ticket sales. The festival got its own microsite with a memorable domain, built in the brewery’s colours but with its own festival look, linking back to the brewery site. Meanwhile, the brewery’s seasonal beer launches stayed as landing pages on the main site, because they were short campaigns that benefited from the main site’s visitors and search reputation. Each tool fitted its job.
Keeping it on brand
A microsite with a different look still needs to feel connected to you, through shared colours, typefaces or a clear “from the makers of” link. If you are creating a sub-brand for it, our brand identity versus logo design guide explains what a sub-brand needs.
Getting it built
Our landing page design is £199 one-off for a focused campaign page, and our one-page website is £299 for a small standalone site such as an event. All our prices are on the pricing page.
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Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between a microsite and a landing page? +
A landing page is a single page, usually on your main website, built for one campaign or advert with one call to action. A microsite is a small separate website, often with its own domain or subdomain and several pages, built around one product, event or audience. A landing page borrows your main site's trust; a microsite has to build its own.
Are microsites bad for SEO? +
They can split your efforts. Links, mentions and content on a separate domain build that domain's reputation, not your main site's. A microsite can rank well for its own narrow topic, but for most small businesses a section of the main website is the stronger long-term choice for search.
What should happen to a microsite when the campaign ends? +
Plan it from the start. Either keep it running with updates, or move its useful content onto your main site and redirect the old addresses with permanent redirects, so any links and visitors are not lost. Leaving an outdated microsite live, unmaintained, is the worst option.
