Many people have been running for the hills when it comes to exact keword domains. Many people say that Google has penalized. What I have found is that yes, many exact keyword domain have dropped in the past couple of months but.... most of them were not regularly updated and just either spun or set up for Adsense. You still find many of these domains in the ranking. The difference is, the ones that are showing are regularly updated with good content. So what does this tell us? I believe Google might not be giving weight to domain names as much anymore. As most know, it is all about good content. I know this has been said more than once here but my point is if you have good content, your domain doesn't mean much as far as Google for the long haul.
Thanks for the insight. I suspected so for some time now too. I do believe, though, that domain names still have some kind of weight in regards to the respective content. I did read somewhere that a domain with good keyword in respect to it's content does get a boost from google. Correct me if I am wrong.
Maybe but my opinion is it doesn't play a role in domain names anymore. Google is starting to look for branding for sure.
I've had the same experience with EMD's as you. I own a lot of them, the static one-page sites dropped in search results while the ones that are regularly updated have kept their rankings. Some of these sites are still growing and getting more traffic from the search engines.. So I would definitely say it's all about the content. Good domains still help I think, but you have to have good content.
Content is absolutely essentail. I've seen horrible domain names with good content rank pretty high, lol.
google continuously revamping their algo and keeps changing...i've been researching about domain keyword rich url, and it seems like even if you have the exact keyphrase on it, google still look for the content relevancy and activity...
I guess if the domain name, title, description, h1 tag headings plus the general content of your website matches or contains your target keyword then it checks all the plus marks in my SEO box !
I don't think google will penalize you if you have a domain with a keyword in it, because every word is a keyword. So digitalpoint (dot com) is also a keyword domain for the keyword digital point. Every word is a keyword well some searched more than others. So you're not going to get a penalty, it can be totally legitimate e.g. makemoneyfast (dot com) or internetmarketing (dotcom)! Google makes sense and it will make no sense to penalize those sites. I have linkbuilderexpert (dotcom) and I rank page one for term link builder expert and haven't done any seo or link building for that site - I know it could be that there aren't real competitors but it does effect rankings keyword in domain and certainly not a penalty. The site itself if has very good content that's also why it ranks... Don't buy a keyword rich domain and spit crappy content to it like a ton of articles you stole from article directories... that's the tip
If you actually read what was said at the time of the update, Google stated that they were 'turning down'the importance of EMD's - they never said they were penalising them.All that it means is that now the playing field is level - quality content and a clean backlink profile/social signals work across any kind ofsite. Its a good thing IMHO because a lot of EMDs were taken
After EDM update , Google is killing those site that do not have fresh and quality content and rank on top of keywords with the exact match domain . That is why quality content mean the most now.