How important is the domain name in terms of achieving good rankings? For instance, lets say I am designed a sit with the main keyword being "large widgets". Will there be a significant difference between the domains www.largewidgets.com and www.large-widgets.com? My understanding is that the later is the way to go. Can anyone confirm this? If that's the case and www.large-widgets.com has already been taken, will I be shooting myself in the foot if I add another word to the domain name such as www.quality-large-widgets.com??? (the word "quality" will not be one of my keywords). Specifically, is there some criteria on how to go about selecting the additiona word? Here are some examples: www.quality-large-widgets.com www.all-large-widgets.com www.large-widgets-store.com This may be going a bit picky, but I want to make sure I get the domain name right before I start doing anything else.
Domain name is not important. It is only better to have some keyword in your domain because of anchor.
I think the domain name IS important. If you do a google search, you will see parts of a domain with that keyword highlighted, meaning google recognizes this. I would go with largewidgets.com instead of large-widgets.com, partially because hyphened domains always look spammy to me. I think it may even be better for Google.
that's what I came across. I did a google search using my main keyword, and one of the top sites was a site like www.all-large-widgets.com. I agree that it looks spammy with the dashes, but I'm beginning to wonder if the trade-off is really worth it. I mean, do people really look at the domain name when they choose whether or not to click on the link to the site???
Well if you use adsense it will be part of your ad -- and the ad itself will be only a few lines. I like hyphens. It is easier to see what the words are, for people and for SE. People, it is believed, forget the hyphens when they type in domain names so hyphenated names are considered of lesser value for resale, although there are signs this is changing. I like hyphens, but I don't usually buy them for resale. My main selling site is on a hyphenated domain, I have a non-hyphenated .com pointed to it that I promote to people. Are you sure there is not a third (short) keyword that would sound good with the two keywords you want to use? Try the Overture tool and see if there is a relevant word you could add: http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/ If there really is nothing then I would go for "all" - it is amazing how many people who want to see all the widget sites will type in "all widgets" into the search engines. Some SEs discard it, others dutifully return the sites containing "all". And yes, I think keywords in the domain name are important.
accentepal, I agree with you there... I strongly believe that domain names should be short, simple and somewhat catchy. BY short, I mean two words if possible...If three words are necesssary, then the third word should be 1 syllabel and VERY simple (such as "all", "just"). It looks like the words - www.allredwidgets.com, www.bestredwidgets.com, www.buyredwidgets.com, www.justredwidgets.com, www.coolredwidgets.com are all taken up... I did the overture search and these are some of the words that came up. I do have the option of taking www.buy-red-widgets.com and buy-redwidgets.com but these look really spamming and unpredictable. I'm thinking www.qualityredwidgets.com and www.shopredwidgets.com but these look a bit too long? Any thoughts????
Domain is very important. Ill discuss 2 types of sites. 1. Enter site through SE and click an add and never return again - These types of sites where you could care less about return users that means you should care less about your domain name. Fill it up with keywords!! www.keyword1-keyword2.com 2. I want people to come back to my site! - Then brand a domain name. Short, 1 word, pronouncable, catchy, domain name if possible. But like I said it depends on what type of site you are making on what type of domain name to register. It is not always best to go with one over the other.
Domain name is extremely important for your online business, since nobody knows you, how good your domain is will determine your creditbility directly. For example, I will deposit $100 on 888.com and I wont worry about being scamed, cause I know 888.com alone worth million dollars, but I wll take extra cuation if site with domain like bet-here-casinos.com.
A domain name is important- * For SEO * For explanation of the website * For the company name to be popular IT