dash in domains?

does a single dash affects the value of a domain?

 

I think that this has been discussed a number of times. Mat Cutts (who works at Google) has this to say in the subject:

http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/dashes-vs-underscores/

 

thanks for the link..I guess, a single dash wouldn't be that much effect..

 

So does this mean that mod rewrites that present your page as my_page_with_mod_rewrite.com will have an adverse effect?

 

It depends on your market.

For the English market people (not SE) have started to look down on hyphens. In Japan & possibly China too I often see plenty of sites by major companies that contain a hyphen because since it's not Japanese they need it to break up the word. not everyone can own a 4 or 5 letter easy to remember dot com

 

Nope, it doesn't. It just means that hyphens are (probably) preferable.

 

It's better to use dashes. Google treats them as spaces. If you compare:
my_page_with_mod_rewrite.com
and
my-page-with-mod-rewrite.com

for a search for mod then my_page_with_mod_rewrite would be seen as a single word with the three letters mod in them but
my-page-with-mod-rewrite would be seen as 5 seperate words so a search for 'mod' would be more relevent.

 

I'd rather pick a domain name without a dash. It is the most common and easier to remember.

 

a good point. It's always difficult communicating a dash verbally, it just doesn't roll off the tongue as well.

But from an SEO point of view dashes are better than underscores - and certainly easier to say