Beginner Questions

My previous post was deleted because the thread title was written in French. First of all, I want to thank the person who replied to my previous post – your advice was really helpful, especially since I’m just starting out and had a few beginner questions.

Here’s my second question:

Does using the same CMS platform (like Shopify or WordPress) for multiple stores increase the risk of linking them in Google’s eyes? Or is it more about how the accounts and configurations are set up rather than the CMS itself?

Thanks in advance for your help!

Vincent

Shopify and Wordpress are both prevalent enough to not really be a linking factor in itself. What is more important if you want to avoid stores being linked together is to use completely different content in all of them, including product descriptions if possible, and making sure each site has a different backlink profile. What are you attempting to do if you're worried about different stores being linked together?

Steptoe said:

Shopify and Wordpress are both prevalent enough to not really be a linking factor in itself. What is more important if you want to avoid stores being linked together is to use completely different content in all of them, including product descriptions if possible, and making sure each site has a different backlink profile. What are you attempting to do if you're worried about different stores being linked together?

Click to expand...

Thanks for the response! I'm currently running a White Hat Shopify store in a niche I'm really passionate about. My goal is to create a second store where I can experiment with Black Hat techniques without risking my main store.

I'm planning to target a specific keyword from the niche with an exact match domain on the second store. The idea is to experiment freely with Black Hat strategies, knowing that this store will most likely get penalized at some point.

I'm worried that if I don't separate things properly, Google might link the two stores and penalize both, which would be a disaster for my main store.

That's why I'm trying to understand how far I need to go to keep the two completely separated – not just in terms of CMS but also content, backlinks, and any other technical factors that could link them together.

Your advice about using different content and backlinks makes sense, but I'm wondering if there are other specific aspects I should be cautious about.

Thanks again for your help!

If you’re using the same Google accounts, hosting, IPs, or payment details, Google might link your stores. A good way to avoid that is by using mobile proxies. They rotate IPs, so it looks like your stores are coming from different users, helping keep them separate and making it harder for Google to tie them together.

i’m honestly not sure google can automatically link all sites owned by the same person and penalize them all if one gets hit. that would be technically complex, error-prone, and not really fair.

there have been stories like that, but usually only when there was a manual penalty for something really serious.

but if you’re feeling paranoid, i’d go with an antidetect browser and a residential proxy. use that setup to register google accounts, set up services, and do all the blackhat stuff

probably the best balance between convenience and safety

As long as each store has its own domain, account, and unique content, using the same CMS is safe.