If you have ever hesitated about adding any websites to your Google Search Console account because you don’t want Google to “connect the dots” between multiple sites sharing the same market area, in case Google splits ranks between the two.  John Mueller addressed it in today’s Google Webmaster Hangouts.

The question was specifically whether the second site would have a “diminished ability to rank” for the same keywords as the first site on the same Google Search Console Account.

A site is registered in GWMT and ranks well for lots of keywords around “blue widgets”. A 2nd website that competes for the same blue widget keywords is added to the same GWMT account. Does the 2nd site have a diminished ability to rank for these keywords?

He does say that you want to be careful that you aren’t diluting your efforts on a site by creating two competing sites – it is better to have one great site than two mediocre ones.

From our point of view these are separate sites, so its not something I would see as a critical problem.  On the other hand if you are creating multiple sites to target the same thing, then you are kind of diluting your work and maybe it makes more sense to have one really strong website than two sites that are kind of mediocre.

So from my point of view, I would try to aim on to have one really strong website rather than splitting things up like that.

It was also raised about an agency situation and if the GSC connection could be an issue, and whether Google looks for a connection between the two sites, even though the only real connection is they both hired the same SEO or markeitng agency.

But if you are in an agency and you might have multiple websites under a Google Search Console account that happen to compete against each other, or have overlapping market / product areas.  So it is a valid concern, but Mueller says that it isn’t a concern and that there is no impact on the rankings based on the fact they share the same Google Search Console account.

I don’t think that would really make sense because there;s some agencies that have hundreds of websites in their accounts and just because they do doesn’t mean that there’s any problem with that.

That said, many SEOs prefer to keep many sites under completely separate Search Console, Analytics and AdSense accounts, particularly if they have a Private Blog Network (PBN) or multiple sites that are slightly on the sketchy side of spam.