Buying a domain to target a keyword - Help!

Hey all,

Quick question. We all know that buying a domain with your target keyword helps for SEO.

My question is, if yourkeyword.com is not available, or for whatever reason you can't acquire it and you decide to search for the next best domain... Does it matter whether you get word+yourkeyword.com or yourkeyword+word.com or would both of these have the exact same effect?

Thanks in advance for your replies!

 

I would have to disagree that buying a domain with your target keyword helps. Domain name has no direct effect on ranking. It doesn't matter if your domain doesn't contain your desired keywords. It'll still rank if you build quality links.

 

I agree and disagree with the last comment. A keyword rich domain name does help - as it tells the search engine your site is relevant - it will take this in to account with all other SEO factors. However you can still perform well without a keyword rich domain as mentioned above.

To answer your question - you might want to see which is the most popular search term for your keyword and get the domain as close as possible to that rather than changing the order of the words.

 

its good practice to target keyword in domain itself but should be specific for few keywords

 

I also agree to itsallwhite !!

But if u r looking for BRANDING then I would not recommend a keyword domain... And that also depends.. Like if the domain name is Cars.com it will be good for branding also ! But if ur domain name is buy-weight-loss-products.com then its not that good for branding !

 

Thanks for all your replies. I normally tend to search for popular search terms in regards to my keyword and get one of those. However, sometimes I am not able to find any available and I need to consider the alternatives.

For example, if we assume that my keyword is "best cars". BestCars.com would obviously be great, but chances are that all the commonly searched terms in regards to cars (or best cars for that matter) will be taken. In that case, I just use a random extra word. For example, I could go for thebestcars.com. My question is, would it make any difference if I got THEbestcars.com or bestcarsONLINE.com? Does it matter if the extra word is before or after the keyword?

I heard somewhere that it's best if it's after your keyword and I wanted to confirm if that's true.

Thanks again!

 

You can try a branded domain or a small LLLL.com or LLL domains which are aged for better rankings. It wont matter much if you have word+yourdomain.com but it does matter a lot if you have yourdomain.com and someone search for 'yourdomain'

 

Some time the long keyword combination make the domain name longer/

 

Thanks again for all your replies!

Just wanted to point out something so that we don't get carried away from the initial question.

I am not trying to buy "good" domains in order to be able to resell them later on. I am not even trying to buy domains that are easy to remember in order to have repeat visitors. I just need some domains in order to put minisites on them targeting specific keywords, so I just need the domain to help me do just that (in regards to SEO).

So, would thebestcars.com be better than bestcarsonline.com as far as SEO goes? Does putting an extra word in front or after your actual keyword in your domain make ANY difference? Or maybe is it that as long as the keyword you are targeting is included in the domain, there is nothing more you can do?

Looking forward to reading your replies!

Thanks!

 

While it is good to have keywords in domain name, pages index content and priority of keywords distributed all over your web pages.
no matter what domain name you select, you can't control what users would type in the search box.
If you can predict what typically is used by users ie. if they type "the best cars" search go for thebestcars.com however if "best cars online" search is more, you opt for bestcarsonline.com.
Point is - If you know what keyword phrase is used more - you can select based on historical trend (which still doesn't give you any control on the future)
Finally, if .com isn't available - go for .info / .biz and .us or .me - develop content well and you would get same traffic as a .com would.

Cheers
G

 

It's unfortunate that I'm not experienced in this field as all the above for some reason don't have the ability to answer your question which you've clarified numerous times.

Guys, he's not asking for your opinion on wether it's better to use keywords in domain or not, it's known that keywords in the domain add a bit more weight, so he's asking if it would be affected by adding another word in order to be able to register the keyword domain (if the weight would be lost by adding "the" or "online", and/or if it would matter if the extra word is before or after).

I hope someone does properly answer your question as they've all basically went off-track and given completely wrong answers. It is something I would like to know too.

 

Domain name doesn't count that much ...

 

TS: from ur siggy, u look like domainer ...

 

My experience is that having the keyword combo in the domain does help. I recommend putting the extra word at the end. The reason for this is that the organic inbound links you get are usually of the websites name, thus you want the keyword combo you're going after to appear first, not last.

 

no, you want your keyword first and the other words after.

 

It doesnt really matter that much to have keyword in your domain.
But if you do have then its a Bonus always for you.

 

As a domainer and an SEO, I'll give you my opinion.

Content is king. Linkbacks are important as well. However, a domain does help A LOT. thebestcars.com and bestcarsonline.com would probably both rank just as well from a domain standpoint.

Make sure the keyword you want has a string of consecutive words for the term. For example, the above domains will have better chances at higher search engine rankings for "best cars" than thebestEVERcars.com or bestFREAKINcarsonline.com.

 

Alright! Once again, I thank you all for taking the time to post your comments.

Based on the above, I understand that the following are true.

1) It helps to have your keyword on your domain.
2) There should be nothing standing in between of your keyword term - before or after it is fine.

However, the most important question - and the reason I started this thread has several different answers:

(a) thebestcars.com and bestcarsonline.com would probably both rank just as well from a domain standpoint.

(b) I recommend putting the extra word at the end. The reason for this is that the organic inbound links you get are usually of the websites name, thus you want the keyword combo you're going after to appear first, not last.

(c) It wont matter much if you have word+yourdomain.com

In my opinion, (b) seems to be the way to go.... What do you think?

 

I'd agree, a said it wouldn't matter to have it before or after, c basically said it wouldn't matter at all(positive), and b makes a good point, also that we read left-to-right probably better to have the term first.

Amazing that people still don't bother to read the posts though and assume they're giving you the right answer.

 

I know!! But I have a feeling we are getting there.. fingers crossed it won't be too long before we have the answer