How important is it that your domain name matches your keyword? For example if my domain name is thedogleashes.com and I am trying to target the keyword dog leashes. Would dogleashes.com make significant improvements in ranking versus thedogleashes.com?
Ideally you should be aiming for dog-leashes. Having 'the' in the name really does nothing for you either way. Don't forget your dash.
1. If you can register a .com domain name with your primary keyword phrase (e.g. dogleashes.com), then just go for it... 2. If the .com domain is not available, then go for a .net or .org domain... 3. If .net and .org are already taken, then go for a dashed domain, ideally with one dash (e.g. dog-leashes.com)... 4. If a dashed domain ain't available, then go for a suffixed .com domain (e.g. dogleashessite.com)... 5. Lastly, if you can't find a good suffixed domain for your main keyword, then go for a prefixed .com domain (e.g. thedogleash.com). P.S. The title of this thread should have been "importance of keywords in a domain name".
Oh I see. How much of a difference does it make if my primary keyword phrase is in the domain name versus one with a suffixed?
I think I am reading too much. I just read another thread where there was a completely different take on hyphened URLs. However there is no one 'right' answer and obviously the people who made something worked were nailing everything else.
Well, I heard from several SEO experts that Google doesn't tend to rank sites with multiple hyphens (in the domain) higher in the SERPs. This is so because many spammers have been using hyphened urls to abuse the search engine rankings. However, there's no evidence from Google about such things. So, we cannot definitely say that using a hyphened domain can hurt your ranking. In fact, one dash in the domain name is usually acceptable in the SEO community.
Hmm...All I know is that there is a domain name for sale with my exact keyword phrase and it is ranked on page 2 with no content. The domain name is selling for $1100. Go figure?
I agree. I wouldn't think Google would disambiguate based on a hyphen. There was another objection raised to the effect that it makes a website look spammy but I disagree. If you arrive at a webpage and it is clean, professional and easy to navigate I don't think one hyphen in the URL is going to be a deal breaker.
Hi Jonny, What keywords does it rank for, how much search related traffic for each and keyword value? Thanks
I understand the importance of branding. However in marketing people who have obscene advertising budgets can afford arbitrary domain names and trademarks. In internet marketing I would imagine people tend towards generics, unless they are iconic like Google.
The keyword car battery prices gets almost 2 dollars per adsense click and it gets about 18,000 global searches. I'm not sure if i've answered your question.
domain name has lots of importance coz if ur domain has less competition and high visitors, then you can get ban fit otherwise not.
If you're serious about buying this domain, like a lot of other high ticket items you may purchase, don't go in at the full asking price, start at a midway point.
including your target keywords in domain name is a plus factor in SEO, but there are times that random domain names can rank higher in SERPs thru a better on-page and off-page strategy
Just make sure you keep your .com as this supercedes all the others .If you can afford it go for a premium domain name .My traffic soared when I did just that There are plenty of places selling them for below the market price .Good luck
I guess that's where the 'passion' comes in. What would I know about car batteries. But then there are content writers! @aira, all other things being equal, given the same off-page strategy, are you saying an arbitrary/random URL could be a dense one? One with density of 0 beating one with high density? I didn't know that. I guess I assumed that the off-page strategy and advertising would be important to draw viewers in and of course the trademark might be worth something if it acquires significant secondary meaning. I know a lot of people like to brand themselves on their personal name. Maybe you are saying the off-page strategy is more powerful perhaps. (the on-page factors being a few percent, the rest being the link network, traffic etc) @stuarts, I wouldn't be able to afford too much. I guess most people start out with one site to test their feet in the water. It would be nice to try out a few at the same time, even if they were lower quality. It's a difficult call. @Luvbird - I am a bit of an amateur but I would like to stick with .com domain names.