Hi guys, One look at the SERPs and you can see how much weight G is putting on KWs in domains. It's a lot! I understand that premium domains contain no dashes (?). My question is, will weight be given to keywords that are seperated by dashes as much as if they weren't. E.g. Which would be easier to rank: www.bmxspecialist.co.uk or www.bmx-specialist.co.uk ? Also, can anyone point me in the direction of some good reading regarding domains? Thanks, Zak
I've a few domains with dashes and they are ranking pretty good. You don't even need to have your targetted keywords in the domain name if you can SEO it. But of course it's better to choose a domain name with your desired keyphrase. I always register the .com first with no dashes, if it's not available then I go for the .com with dashes and if that isn't available either then I just register the .net
well, I'd prefer something without dashes and when it comes to domain quality, the smaller the better but of course, need to made of genuine keywords.
From my experience, domains without dashes rank better, however if all the non-dashed domains are take for your keyword then you don't have many alternatives. If you do end up with a domain with dashes do some extra backlinking and then you're set. No matter what you're domain is like, if you have enough backlinks you can rank on the fisrt page easily.
If you're building a brand name then I'd go for without dashes, less typo error when you're introducing clients to your business. But if you're just ranking for search engines and hoping for natural visits then I'd go for dashes if without is taken.