Ranking Deep Pages is Easier than Home Page?

Seems since around 6-8 months ago ranking deep pages is easier than home page(unless you have EMD, or similar).

Searching for competitive KWs brings lots of results with
brand1.com/keyword_variation
brand2.com/keyword-variation.html
brand3.com/particial-keyword

Anybody have the same experience?

In one of the niches we are working one of our competition has 2 top positions:
1st: brandname.com/pages/about-particial-key-word , Title : All About Authentic Particial Keyword
2nd:brandname.com, Title : Brand Name - Buy Particial Keyword Online
Both pages have similar onpage, word count, LSI, etc. Home Page have 30 times more links, still google thinks that deep page is more relevant.

We have one site in small niche with pretty much one big KW, and we optimized home page(brandname.com) and build majority of links to it. Still getting outranked by lots of deep pages... Seems like we should build deep page brand.com/key-word?

We still have lots of home pages ranking top spots in other niches, but only if it's key-word variation.

I've seen this as well. I try to focus on deep pages as much as possible for my niche sites. I'll also be applying that same strategy to my brand websites. Company blogs are the future, and people want direct answers (not a hub that could​ bring them to the answer).

yep have happened to me as well on two domains..

for me it is same on both.. i think its based on something else.

I have noticed it too but if you look at your example

1st: brandname.com/pages/about-particial-key-word , Title : All About Authentic Particial Keyword

This looks like it would provide more information

2nd:brandname.com, Title : Brand Name - Buy Particial Keyword Online

This looks like it would go to a checkout/sales page

As both pages have similar statistics, and I take it are ranking for the KW, what are the positions when you search for BUY KW?
Are the positions reversed?

I have found from my experience is that,deep pages will rank on the long tail keywords.The search engines rank pages not domains,IMHO, so it is very possible that our deeper pages rank more easily than homepage.