My question is this (a theoretical one): If you have two identical sites, both of which have been equally SEO'd through the normal channels. One website has a domain which is effectively the company name (nothing to do with any particular related keyword to the product being sold) the other company domain name has a STRONG keyword in it which relates to the product both companies are selling. Which site will rank better... and in relatively terms, what kind of effect does this have on SEO compared to other factors? Thanks for you thoughts guys ps great forum you have here!! I think Ill camp here for a while... perhaps longer
Keywords in the domain are very effective. It makes it easy to get your keywords in the anchor text of the links pointing to your site.
Obviously keywords in the url help, but the effect is very little. All else being equal the keyword url should outrank the other, but like I said it's really neglegable. Indirectly it could help longterm though, as mad4 suggested.
While you can't always get the choice domain, you can control how your file structure is setup and deployed .... ABC company sells dog collars, but the "best domain" they could get was abesells.com - you could still set up your directories, pages and other structures to compliment with abesells.com/dogcollars/spiked.html for example. Further, as pointed out, it's not the end all if you don't have the "perfect" domain name - links, content, titles, etc. will propel further (in SERP) in the long run.
I view having the keyword in the domain for ranking purposes a "nice to have" vs. a "have to have". I have had just as much if not more success getting Page 1 rankings without keyword domains. The main benefit in having the keyword in the domain is that it is closely related/relevant to the searchers search phrase and therefore in the searchers mind may be more relevant to their individual search.
If you are building a blog promoting some particular product or offer then I would definitely have the keyword in the domain, especially if it's not a keyword phrase that is used massively. If you are building a site in a niche area it can also work well to have the keyword in the domain. I have a site that is no. 1 and 2 for various searches and I've done absolutely NO backlinking. Ok again they tend to be the longtail keywords of a niche, but it's enough to get consistent traffic(about 50/day) without ANY work. If you are building an authority site I'd not use the keyword in the domain. Andy
To answer the "theoretical" question - yes, theoretically two equal sites with one of them having the keyword in it, the site with the keyword in it should rank better. I don't think this is theoretical to say anymore, but if you have an exact match tld domain name for the main keyword you are going after, this is a no-brainer and will rank much easier than a company-branded domain name on the same topic that has put in much more work.
Keyword in the domain name is even better than the keyword in the title. The very best is to have the domain name to "be" the keyword, or at least that the domain name is a short-tail keyword of your main keyword. It is very good for SEO. But... do not think that "just" having the domain name will make you score well. You will still need to perform traditional SEO. But the keyword in the domain name helps a lot.