Are-Too-Many-Dashes-Viewed-As-Spam?

I think that proves my point. How many times is that exact phrase searched for? Wordtracker and overture say 0. What might be a more prudent keyphrase for that page might be a shorter, more often searched for phrase, that will actually produce traffic such as one of the following:

cd chapter fable key lost 31.6 /day
lost key 24.6 /day
lost car key 20.5 /day
chapter fable key lost product 9.6 /day
lost product key 8.9 /day
chapter fable key lost serial 7.2 /day
lost cd key 4.8 /day
lost window xp product key 4.3 /day
lost window 98 product key 4.1 /day
chapter fable key lost 4.0 /day
lost microsoft product key 3.9 /day
window product key lost 2.6 /day
chapter fable key lost silver 2.5 /day
lost toyota key 2.5 /day
lost key code 2.2 /day

Notice all of these phrases are less than 5 words. Which means you dont need 20 hyphens

 

That doesn't answer my question about the keys, though, does it?

 

Lol...sorry i forgot... Your keys are in the left pocket of the pants you wore last night.

 

In the end, which would you choose:
1-) www.domain.com/blah_blah1.html
2-) www.domain.com/blah-blah1.html
3-) www.domain.com/blah/blah1.html

 

I wouuld chose either 2 or 3, for sure. I would base my decision on which was easier for the developer. i don't think there is any seo difference between 2 and 3, good questions tho.

 

One of the fundamental points here is that what we as webmasters would choose is almost certainly different than what 95% of web users would use.

Out of your choices, I like #2, because of the hyphen. But the average surfer doesn't read Matt Cutts' blog.

I'm more interested in what the average searcher would prefer out of these:

domain.com/get-great-rankings.html

or

domain.com/085.xml

 

I didn't have time to read the whole thread, but just wanted to add that I have personally seen domains with multiple hyphens/keywords within the top ten. I think seven keywords is the most (such as: imtiaz-hami-search-engine-optimization-submission-india.com). These folks are ranking for some pretty good seo related keywords.


Also...many CMS and blogging programs use hyphens and convert the page/post title into the file name. I think that since this is fairly common now it's not an issue unless you're also using other spammy techniques.